EDITORIAL: Why nationalising the Reserve Bank means everything and nothing
Deep significance of a futile gesture
Business leaders understand that the ANC policy conference’s resolution to “nationalise” the Reserve Bank — buying out its private shareholders — is the equivalent of handing your car keys to a toddler having a tantrum. You know there’s no way it’ll make a difference, since he can’t drive. But at least the yelling will cease for a bit while he struggles to remember why he so desperately wanted the keys in the first place. Nationalising the Bank is the mother of all meaningless gestures: the economic dunces in the ruling party might be slow to grasp it, but the Bank’s shareholders have exactly zero bearing on its behaviour or monetary policy decisions. They don’t “own” the bank and its independence is enshrined in the constitution. But, you might argue, if the move to nationalise the Bank is so meaningless, why did the rand fall by 2% after the news broke? The short answer, of course, is fear — fear that the country’s economic policy is at risk of becoming a toy in the hands of a fis...
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