LETTER: Tell the whole truth, Cachalia

In an effort to take a centrist position, Ghaleb Cachalia misconstrues the pre-budget negotiations between the ANC and the DA, my interpretation of them and the nature of economic growth (“All parties guilty of horse-trading to control purse”, April 14). That's quite an achievement in a short column!

He says the “DA wanted oversight of spending by their ministers”, but if he had taken the time to read the document he would have noticed that the ANC and DA had actually agreed not on “oversight” by DA ministers, but the participation of DA ministers in a spending review, which is quite different. 

Cachalia, like many others, falls into the trap of claiming the DA overcooked the goose, when the document demonstrates the DA and ANC were actually agreed at that point in the negotiations on many of the points he mentions — only for the ANC to sneak out and cut a budget deal behind the backs of the GNU parties. 

I know political commentators generally like to appear unbiased, and that is not an instinct to denigrate. But when a party steps out of line, as the ANC did in this case, commentators should have the courage to look verity in the eye. It doesn’t mean the DA is always right — or always wrong — but it demeans analysis generally if commentators can’t bring themselves to tell the honest truth. If you sign an agreement with your opponents to form a government, then sneak off to cut a deal with outsiders when your plans are thwarted, that is obviously treacherous. 

Having said that, I loved Cachalia’s characterisation of the two sides (quoting Galbraith and Churchill): one desperately seeking a moral justification for selfishness, and the other clinging to a gospel of envy and a philosophy of failure. But the piece seriously degraded his claim that economic growth will only marginally improve the lives of black South Africans. I mean really, how ignorant of economics and economic history do politicians need to be these days?

Tim Cohen
Via email

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