ANC is cutting off its nose . . .

Leader of the Freedom Front, Pieter Mulder, suggests Jacob Zuma’s State of the Nation speech shows the ANC’s “gas is out of the bottle”. Certainly the man himself looks deflated. And ill.

    And what activity has there been since that dull, repetitive speech? Not much.

    Former Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan who, towards the end of his tenure did at least accept the need for an economy drive, has been energetic in his new job of cleaning up local governments. This last week, his department fired four Limpopo mayors and charged East London councillors who pocketed six million rands intended for Mandela memorial services.

    But there is no indication yet how the Government plans to garner all the funds it would need for its development plan, including a whole new ministry with all those attendant officials. It’s interesting to note that the Nats could manage with 16 ministries. The ANC requires 35.

    The Minister of Rural Development has come up with a ridiculous scheme by which farmers would give half their land to their workers. Even Julius “I want it all” Malema must know that is impossible.

    One of Zuma’s stated aims during his second term is to see the creation of a million new jobs in the agricultural field. Financial experts shake their heads, citing the growing mechanisation in farming generally; a process that is likely to speed up if there are more strikes in the industry.

    However, there is a way to at least make a start if only the ANC government would recognise it.

    In the past 20 years, the State has appropriated white farms in all the provinces by the “willing seller” scheme. Other farms are on offer but somehow still awaiting payment by the Land Bank.

    In its relatively short life, Israel has been able to transform the barren land it was allocated after World War II. To a large extent, it has achieved this through its kibbutz system. These communally run settlements, in which children are collectively reared, played a crucial role in the development of the country. In the process, many thousands of young Israelis and foreign volunteers have been trained in diverse skills – agricultural, industrial, even ecological.

    Although there has been a recent movement to the greater comfort of Israel’s cities, the 270 kibbutzim still account for 40 per cent of the country’s agricultural output.

    Would that not be a viable way of employing and training some of the millions of South African youngsters currently out of jobs? By creating collective farms on all that vacant land, with the assistance of Israeli experts?

    It would indeed. If only the ANC could forget the past. Forget that Israel helped the Nat government develop the atomic (though not the nuclear) bomb in the late eighties.

    That must be the sticking point, for it is inconceivable that somebody in government would not have considered the kibbutz route before now.