Ramaphosa visits the Northern Cape and life goes on

President Cyril Ramaphosa’s Cabinet Oversight visit last month to the Northern Cape may have come across as a rehash of established setbacks from two years ago. Forgive us if this smacks of resentful criticism from one with an axe to grind against the 7th administration, and instead revisit the nostalgia of issues raised at his imbizo at this very province in 2022.

The President assured at Upington’s Mxolisi Dicky Jacobs stadium (and eParkeni reported on it) back then that his government would ‘not leave anyone behind.’ Barbara Creecy, then minister of Environmental Affairs Forestry and Fisheries and who also formed part of his delegation said that the province had ‘greater potential to generate electricity than anywhere else in the country.’

These were echoed in Ramaphosa’s 2024 State of the Nation Address: ‘almost R200bn has been invested in our renewable programme and 64% of that has come here in the Northern Cape. Already, we are seeing quite a lot of job creation.’ Similar phrases had come from the province’s Premier, Dr Zamani Saul in his state of the province address a year earlier.

Amongst the key issue on the recent stopover was to put the province at the forefront of the green energy revolution, particularly in solar as well as green hydrogen energy. Unemployment, service delivery and improving our municipalities crept up once more.

Needless to say, back in 2022, the phones and WhatsApps were wildly going off here at our lowly rag.

‘The President is on his way to the NC, all hands on deck!’

Could we find a correspondent out there, someone, anyone?

And, because a visit by the First Citizen to what is, in the bigger scheme of things, a province that doesn’t really command pride of place in national prioritizing is a special indaba, our reporters – often pressed for data and airtime – did their best; carefully followed-up on the press releases, news clips and government social media pages.

This year, however, even the SABC correspondent on the ground was made amply aware that the people were not quite sold on the whole thing. Reported Tebogo Msimanga; ‘most people on the ground, they’re saying the intervention by President Cyril Ramaphosa coming to Northern Cape, they don’t see anything that will be done because their argument is that this is not the first visit by officials from national [government]. They are not optimistic that after this visit things will change.’

One local publication simply took to publishing a piece that read more like a press release. Whether this indicates the death of journalism – both in the province and everywhere else – or the more worrisome death of civic political engagement is neither here nor there.

What is, however, abundantly clear is that, this vacuum of simmering apathy, has seen more individuals increasingly turning to the promise of community-driven projects. A vukuzenzele spirit centered around self-actualisation and a resignation that nobody is coming to save you. Over the years, co-ops have spawned through teams of women knitting from small living rooms. There are also agricultural co-ops, catering gigs operating from inside personal kitchens and the ever-resilient stokvels. More so in the areas of tourism, cultural and heritage initiatives, it is locals themselves who are pooling money together to print banners, bake cakes and send out raffles for fundraising, or to hand out clothes to the less fortunate.

All across the province, there’s an ever-growing outcrop of NGOs. Ready examples would be the Karoo Development Foundation – which we’ve written much about – in nearby Phillipolis as well as the South African Society for Cultural History.

There is the Foundation for Alcohol Related Research, Partners in Sexual Health and Second Chances, in their own way all doing invaluable work. Our intrepid journalist Destine Nde has also documented the work of Revive Willowmore, a group of tannies working towards the betterment of the Klein Karoo town. In many ways, it is the spirit of the ‘concerned resident’ that has seen the coming to life of such efforts, effecting change and fighting against the scourges.

To outsiders, the Northern Cape comes across as a vast dustbowl of economic disopportunity, with a smattering of mainly poor people and lots – as in, lots – of grazing land for its abundant tally of sheep. Though partly true, this assessment is mostly oblivious to the slow-blooming promise the province once held in the past, and the potential it has yet to make good on in future economic endeavour.

People of a certain generation will remember it as a bohemian getaway, a geographic heirloom to the simplicity of an easy-going life, unmesmerized by the trappings of glitz and modern refinements. They’ll speak fondly of the hearty, home-like meals in restaurants. The trinkets that one could pick up at a forlorn padstaal in the middle of nowhere or the musicians who sometimes played folk lidjies among the tumbleweeds on dusty roads.

Mostly, though, they’ll weep of the rustic railway towns with the uniform homes with the high, red stoeps wherefrom you might catch sight of the goods or passenger train chugging into town. Or the workers in heavy boots, greasy overalls and tin lunchboxes swinging at their side coming home from another day’s grind. The kids running to meet them as the wives or live-in partners got the ubiquitous Welcome Dover stove going and the wisps of smoke rising from the chimney that melted into the expansive grey skies.

Herman Lategan’s piece in the defunct Vrye Weekblad around the deterioration of Springfontein barely 100km from Colesberg is likely to get you commiserating deeply. That is not to suggest those times were bucollic. Not by any stretch. Not when there existed the usual ailments of bucket toilets, unelectrified homes, restricted economic progress and all those other sufferings this writer has touched on ad nauseum. Over the years, homes have been built in the province, schools erected, social grants and education bursaries dispursed. And yes, money – lots of it – has also disappeared into the palms and bank accounts of those who were close enough to power to figure out the loopholes.

In his latest oversight visit, Ramaphosa touched on this, the failing municipalities, year on year producing horrendous audits. Only three of the province’s municipalities showed clean audits in the 2022/2023 Auditor-General’s report. These may seem like just numbers, but on the street it’s real lives with real, immediate problems. ‘Inefficient service delivery’ means long queues at the clinic, effluence on the road and no water in the taps. ‘Irregular expenditure’ (the province racking up R3.67 billion in the 2023/2024 Auditor-General’s report) manifest in failing infrastructure, widening inequality and a defeatism that puts money in the tavern owner’s pocket and fosters a bulging prison population.

This is not to suggest that all is lost. In places like Kathu and Kuruman, once sleepy towns with backwater sensibilities, mining activity has rejuvenated them into growing capitalist outposts with flashy cars in the driveway and educated kids. There are new restaurants, jewelery stores, golf courses and long-limbed women walking the streets: the tell-tale signs of development and capitalist exploitation.

Nearby, the wind turbine project in Noupoort has been a godsend. Small miracles here and there, not enough to culminate in an economic boom, but enough to say not all is lost. And there a few more homeboys with a job.

It was hinted that I should do a write up on Ramaphosa’s trek down here. Few days at it and it felt like I was repeating what I’d written two years ago. I guess great statesmen and nondescript writers are sometimes met with similar problems.