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The ThinkerF O R T H O U G H T L E A D E R SThe ThinkerThe Thinker

VOLUME 12 / 2010

SOUTH AFRICA R29.95

USA $2.95 UK 2.95

F O R T H O U G H T L E A D E R S

EQUAL TOTHE TASK

DR ESSOP PAHAD INTERVIEWS

PRESIDENT JACOB ZUMA

EQUAL TOTHE TASK

Viacheslav Tetekin on Lucky Putin: Unlucky RussiaKhadija Sharife on The DRCs Magic Dust: Who Benets

Special Focus on Copenhagen Climate Talks: Success or Failure

Viacheslav Tetekin on Lucky Putin: Unlucky RussiaKhadija Sharife on The DRCs Magic Dust: Who Benets



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CONTENTS

In This Issue2 Letter from the Editor

4 Contributors to this Edition

6 Interview: President Jacob ZumaEssop Pahad

16 After CopenhagenMichael Prior

20 Climate Chaos: Promises and LiesPercy F Makombe

24 Kyoto 2Oliver Tickell

28 The Trials and Tribulations of a Post-Imperial NegroFrancis A Kornegay

32 The Changing World and the USAVusi Gumede

34 Lucky Putin: Unlucky RussiaViacheslav Tetekin

40The Post-Polokwane Leftists vs Nationalists Faultline:An Unedifying DiscourseFholisani Sydney Mufamadi

42Democratic Republic of Congos Magic Dust:Who BenetsKhadija Sharife

46 Rule of Law or Cults of Personality?Ronald Suresh Roberts

50Setting Apartheid in Concrete:Lessons from the Moloto RoadMike Muller

54Critical Assessment of the ANCsJanuary 8th Statement 2010

Zamikhaya Maseti

56The Condition of, and Strategies for,South African AgricultureRil Malan

60Transformation of Football in South Africa:Prelude to the 2010 FIFA World CupSiso Mxolisi Ndlovu

62 Through a Creative LensIdentity: Poems by Ronnie Govender and Melissa King

64 Readers ForumPluralism and Religion by Rabiah T Badroen

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On the Cover:In an exclusive interviewwith The Thinker, PresidentJacob Zuma reects on hisrst six months in ofce and

the way forward.

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The ThinkerF O R T H O U G H T L E A D E R SThe ThinkerThe Thinker

VOLUME 12 / 2010

SOUTH AFRICA R29.95

U S A $ 2 .9 5 U K 2 . 95

F O R T H O U G H T L E A D E R S

EQUAL TOTHE TASK


PRESIDENT JACOB ZUMA

EQUAL TOTHE TASK

Viacheslav Tetekin on Lucky Putin: Unlucky Russia

Khadija Sharife on The DRCs Magic Dust: Who Benefits


Viacheslav Tetekin on Lucky Putin: Unlucky Russia

Khadija Sharife on The DRCs Magic Dust: Who Benefits


1 cover thinker FE CO ERdps.indd 1 010/01/ 3:36 PM

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Hannelie Coetzee MediaClubSouthAfrica.com; iStockphoto.com;Greame Williams MediaClubSouthAfrica.com


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T H E T H I N K E R2

LETTER FROM THE EDITOR

DR ESSOP PAHAD

Violent attacks leading to thedeath or injury of innocentcivilians are simply unacceptable

acts of terrorism. Such actions cannotbe justied by claims that they providepublicity for a just cause. Where armedstruggle is used by genuine liberationghters, every effort is made to restrictcivilian casualties and limit the focus toappropriate targets.

The vile terrorist attack on the Togofootball team in Cabinda, Angola,was both horric in execution andmurderous in intent. The splinter groupof the so-called Frente de Libertacodo Enclave de Cabinda (Front for theLiberation of the Enclave of Cabinda),which claimed credit, is not a nationalliberation movement. Nor does it inany way represent the interests and

aspirations of the citizens of Cabinda.Our rst thoughts must be forthose who died, those who wereinjured and for the players, coachesand management of the Togonational team.

We must consider possible reasonsfor such an act. Given that a signicantamount of Angolas oil is producedin Cabinda, the motives behind theterrorist attack may well be moresinister than is at rst apparent.

The attack occurred in Cabinda,

which is separated from the rest of

GalloImages/GettyImages


Pallbearers carry the cofn with the remains Togolese assistant soccer coach

Amalete Abalo during the funeral service in front of Congress Palace in the capitalLome, 15 January 2010. Togos national soccer team was attacked by separatist

guerrillas on 8 January 2010 as it travelled by bus through Angolas Cabinda enclave to

participate in the African Cup of Nations tournament. The assistant coach and a press

ofcer were killed, as was the bus driver.

People march during a rally against violence on 16 January 2010 in Cabinda following

the attack against Togos national football team. The banner reads People from

Cabinda unite with people from Togo. Down with terrorism. Long live peace.

Angola by the Democratic Republicof Congo. It would be wrong to makegeneralisations from this one attackand suppose that the security situationis problematic throughout Cabinda asa region, and even more unwise toextend such an assessment to Angolaas a whole.

The spectacular opening ceremonyof the African Cup of Nations (Afcon)and the entertaining and skilful soccerdisplayed in the opening rounds augurswell for the entire tournament. AsSouth Africans we are condent that

Afcon will be successful and a worthywinner will emerge.


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Predictably, some media outlets in Europe,especially England, speculating on the attack have castserious doubts on South Africas ability and capacity toensure the safety and security of the 2010 FIFA WorldCup. Some of the disingenuous comments border onthe hysterical. As usual we are tempted to exclaim:When, oh when, will they recognise that Africa is acontinent and not one country?

This convenient naivety is even more surprisingsince it was Great Britain, France, Germany andPortugal that were instrumental in carving up Africa tosuit their colonial and imperial ambitions.

One cannot but endorse the sentiments expressedin the editorial ofThe Star of 12 January 2010. Theeditorial said: We had thought the Afro-sceptics hadbeen silenced once and for all when we hosted the FIFAConfederations Cup, and held a successful 2010 drawin Cape Town last month. Sadly we underestimatedthe boundless energy of those who would desire todeny this continent the honour of hosting this premier

sporting event for the rst time ve months from now.South Africa has built the stadiums, jacked upthe infrastructure and modernised its airports, hotelsand telecommunications. Our security serviceshave joined forces with foreign agencies to keeptabs on international threats that may jeopardisethis event. While there is no guarantee thatthere will be no stumbling blocks, everything that canbe done has or is being done.

Any unbiased, rational assessment of South Africasrecord in this context over the last decade wouldclearly demonstrate that no terrorist act or incidenthas occurred on our soil. In contrast, a number of

European countries, including the UK, France, Spain,Greece and Russia have been subject to abominableattacks and remain under threat. But no sane personis likely to suggest that while these countries andothers remain vulnerable to terrorist attacks, the2012 London Olympics should be transferred outof Europe. So why the double standards? Moreover,since many European countries for at least thenext decade cannot be considered immune fromterrorist acts, does this mean that no Europeancountry should be considered for the 2018 FIFAWorld Cup?

If needs be, let us emphasise over and over again

that we are ready to host the 2010 FIFA World Cup.Safety and security plans and arrangements are welladvanced.

Indeed it is a safe bet that saturation policingand crime combating will lead to a decline incrime over the duration of the 2010 World Cup.Nevertheless, all the parties concerned cannot andshould not be complacent. Ongoing vigilance andcontinued attention to detail should be the marchingorders for all concerned including the general public.

South Africa is ready! Africa is ready! South Africawill host an unforgettable, awesome, extraordinary2010 FIFA World Cup. Ke Nako Celebrate Africas

Humanity!

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Contributing AnalystsIraj Abedian, Haroon Bhorat, WillieEsterhuyse, Brandon Foot, Steven

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Gutto, Adam Habib, Suhaib Ilyasi,Francis Kornegay, JP Landman,Chris Landsberg, Eddie Maloka,

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CONTRIBUTORS TO THIS EDITION

Dr Vusi Gumede has a Post-Graduate diploma in Policy Studiesfrom the University of Londonand a PhD in Economics from theUniversity of Natal, among his otherqualications. He worked for theSouth African government for about10 years as an advisor, economist,and analyst. Prior to that, he was in

the research/academic environment.He has been a visiting scholar/fellowfor various international universitiesand institutions, including havingbeen hosted by Cornell University as aDistinguished Africanist Scholar and by

Yale University as a World Fellow. Healso lectured at the Graduate School ofPublic and Development Managementat the University of Witwatersrand. Hepublishes in international and South

African journals, contributes chaptersin books, authors working papers,

background papers and policy briefs,writes for his blog (www.thoughtleader.co.za/vusigumede), writes Op-Eds inSouth African newspapers, and is anEditor for theJournal of African Studies

and Development. He also serves in anumber of governance and advisorystructures, including as a Trustee forSouthern Africa Trust. He presentlyholds various part-time positions.

Francis A Kornegay is Research Associate at the Institute for Global

Dialogue (IGD). A political analyst ona wide range of foreign affairs andinternational relations themes, he isespecially widely published in thefollowing areas: South Africas foreignpolicy and its African agenda; Africancontinental and regional integration;US foreign policy and US-African/South

African relations; and South-South

cooperation and global geopoliticaldynamics. Kornegay, a graduateof the University of Michigan, holdsMasters degrees in African Studies fromHoward University and in InternationalPublic Policy from the School of

Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University, both inWashington, DC.

Percy F Makombe works with theEconomic Justice Network (EJN) inCape Town. EJN is the economic arm

of the Fellowship of Christian Councilsin Southern Africa. Makombe haslobbying and advocacy experienceworking on issues that are of concernto the South, such as trade, aid,development, debt, governance,human rights, and the environment. Hehas also worked as deputy director forthe regional NGO, SEATINI (Southernand Eastern African Trade InformationNegotiations Institute). Makombe hasa wealth of journalism experiencehaving worked as a journalist and

Editor on magazines and newspapersincluding Zimbabwe Independent,Moto, Mundo Negro andAfrica NewsBulletin. He has also previously sat inthe steering committee of EQUINET,the Regional Network on Equity inHealth in Southern Africa. He holdsa BA General and a Post-Graduatediploma in media and communication

studies from the University ofZimbabwe as well as a Masters degreein Globalisation and Communicationsfrom the University of Leicester(England). He is devoted to the ght forsocial and economic justice for a betterlife for all.

Ril Malan is Managing Directorand founding member of the UnlimitedGroup a diversied fresh producegroup of companies based in Paarl,South Africa. The Groups interests

span production, nance, packaging,logistics, distribution, and marketing ofa wide range of fresh produce and foodproducts to local and internationalretailers. Malan is an economicsgraduate from the University ofStellenbosch and completed an IEPin 2006 at INSEAD in France. He hasextensive experience in internationalagriculture and food production andhas consulted on agri-projects in Chinaand greater Africa. He is passionateabout Africa and helping the regions

All contributing analysts write in their personal capacity

iStockphoto.com


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CONTRIBUTORS TO THIS EDITION

agricultural potential come to fruition.

Zamikhaya Maseti is a politicaleconomy analyst. He graduatedfrom the University of the WesternCape with a BA degree in Sociology,Political Science and History and an

Honours degree in DevelopmentStudies. He now holds an MPhil inSouth African Politics and PoliticalEconomy from the University of PortElizabeth (now known as the NelsonMandela Metropolitan University).His research interests cover the areasof international political economy,

African politics, regional integration,governance, peace and security. He isa Managing Director of NgubengcukaResearch, Policy, Strategy and AdvisoryConsulting.

Dr Fholisani Sydney Mufamadihas a Masters and a PhD (Universityof London). As a scholar and socialscientist, he works at the intersectionof the following disciplines: politicaleconomy, political sociology, politicalscience, economic history andinternational relations. He was amember of the political undergroundof the ANC and SACP. For many years,Mufamadi served on the ANC NEC andthe Central Committee of the SACP. Heserved as Minister in the governmentsof Presidents Nelson Mandela andThabo Mbeki. He continues to workin the diplomatic realm, facilitatingconict resolution processes in anumber of African countries.

Mike Muller is a registeredProfessional Engineer and VisitingProfessor at Wits Graduate Schoolof Public and DevelopmentManagement. After training in London

local government, he managed watersupplies in Mozambique and policyand infrastructure programmes atthe Development Bank of Southern

Africa. He participated in ANC policydevelopment, preparation of theReconstruction and DevelopmentProgramme and, as Director-Generalof Water Affairs (1997 to 2005) ledthe development and implementationof new policies and programmes. Heis engaged in local research and policywork and advises internationally on

water, climate and development,

recently editing Integrated WaterResource Management in Practice:Better Water Management forDevelopment (Earthscan 2009).

Dr Siso Mxolisi Ndlovu obtainedan MA in History at the University of

Natal (Pietermaritzburg) and a PhDin History at the University of theWitwatersrand. He is currently theExecutive Director at the South AfricanDemocracy Education Trust (SADET).He is one of the authors ofThe Roadto Democracy in South Africa series.Dr Ndlovus other main research eldis on youth, labour and precolonialhistory.

Michael Prior is a British economistwho has worked for over 30 years as an

international consultant specialising inenergy and environment projects andpolicy development. He has workedin several African countries including

Angola, Ethiopia, Uganda and Sudan.He originally trained as a physicistbefore obtaining an Economics degreeand was previously Director of theStockholm Environment Institute at

York University where he initiatedcontinuing work in South Africa onenvironmental issues.

Khadija Sharife is a journalist,researcher, visiting scholar at theCentre for Civil Society (CCS) at theUniversity of KwaZulu-Natal andcontributing author to the Tax JusticeNetwork, an independent organisationlaunched in the British Houses ofParliament in March 2003, and whichis dedicated to high-level research,analysis and advocacy in the eld of taxand regulation. She is the lead authorof the forthcomingTax Us If You Can

report (Africa edition) and contributingauthor to Aid to Africa: Redeemer orColoniser? (Fahamu Books). Her workfrequently appears in a number ofpublications.

Dr Viacheslav Tetekin is Secretaryof the Central Committee of theCommunist Party of the RussianFederation (CPRF). He holds a PhDfrom Moscow University and studiedlanguages at Minsk Linguistic University(Byelorussia), which allowed him to serve

as an interpreter at Busitema Agriculture

Mechanisation College (Uganda). In hisearly years, he did a one-year service inthe Soviet Army and later worked for theUSSR State Committee in vocational-technical training and then at the Africadesk. He also assisted the InternationalDepartment of the 1980 Moscow

Olympics Organising Committee. Atthe height of Apartheid, between 1981to 1996, Tetekin was a member of theSoviet Afro-Asian Solidarity Committeein charge of support to the ANC andSWAPO. During this time, he wrotea PhD paper titled UDF Against

Apartheid. Since 1996 Tetekin hasbeen a staff member of the CommunistParty faction at the Russian Parliamentand a party activist. In 2004, he waselected member of the CPRF CentralCommittee (CC). In 2008, he was

elected Secretary and member of thePresidium of the CPRF CC. Tetekin isalso a member of the Editorial BoardofSovetskaya Rossia, a leading nationalnewspaper.

Oliver Tickell is the author ofKyoto2(Zed Books 2008) in which he sets outa novel international framework forthe control of greenhouse gases, whichpromises to be effective, efcient andequitable in contrast to the existingKyoto Protocol and its failing lexibilitymechanisms. In his book, Tickelldraws on his extensive environmentalknowledge and understanding acquiredas journalist writing on environmentalissues over a career spanning some20 years. During this time he haswritten for all the UKs broadsheetnewspaper titles and numerousmagazines includingNew Scientist, TheEcologist, Resurgence, Geographical,BBC Wildlife and Country Life.He also spent a period as dedicated

environment correspondent forThe Independent. Kyoto2 hasattracted considerable interest andwidespread support within the UKand internationally, and is gainingrecognition as one of the mainalternative frameworks for climategovernance that could follow theKyoto Protocol. Tickell holds aMasters degree from OxfordUniversity, is a founding partner ofOxford Climate Associates and amember of the Oxford GeoEngineering

Institute.


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INTERVIEW

Dr Essop Pahad (EP): First ofall, Mr President, thank youvery much for granting The

Thinker an opportunity to have thisinteraction. You have been in ofcefor just over six months. Could youplease comment on your experiencesthus far?

President Jacob Zuma (JZ): It hasbeen challenging, but also exciting tobe part of a team that was tasked toimplement what the ruling party hadput before the people, and which thepeople voted for. I think it has been verychallenging, particularly, as we had tolook at how the ruling party has faredin the past 15 years. Has everythingworked? Was everything perfect? Andthose questions inuenced us to dosome adjustments in one form or theother. So it has been quite a full sixmonths, with almost nonstop work.

EP: Since taking up ofce, you have

reorganised the Cabinet by creatingnew Ministries and Departments. Arethese now fully functional and whathave been the difculties faced?

JZ: Well, it has not been easy. Anychange with human beings is not veryeasy. [Laughter] But I think it has beenvery successful. I am one of thosewho believe in engaging people toappreciate exactly what it is that weare trying to do. So I have encourageda process of open discussion.

I think we have resolved matters.There were issues, for example, in thearea of education with regards to theshifting of the Skills Education Training

Authorities (SETAs) from where theywere before into Higher Education.This was done to emphasise the

priorities of educating and skilling oursociety.

We have also had discussions onhow to shift, for example, Fisheriesfrom Environmental Affairs to theDepartment of Agriculture, Forestryand Fisheries given the fact thatFisheries is an economic activity.

I think there has been a very livelydebate relating to the economic sectors,particularly because we established theEconomic Development Department.This is very important and I think ithas taken a little bit longer becausewe had to engage the people involvedand discuss the changes againstthe background of our economicperformance in the last 15 years. Therecould not be a lot of fault to be foundin terms of our economic performance,which has been very good and highlypraised across the world for the steadyand resilient growth since 1994 and

the manner in which we have dealtwith our economy, which has, in fact,helped us to withstand the globaleconomic crisis.

But, equally, while the economyhas been growing, poverty has beendeepening, and the gap between richand poor as well as the rst and secondeconomy has been widening. I thinkthat this is a very concrete challengethat we have to address urgently.

The Economic Development

Ministry has been created to enableall elements of economic policies andactivities to talk to one another, so thatwe do not have one moving in onedirection or others remaining behind.I am convinced that the way in whichwe have congured it so far has been

correct. So, we are happy with that.We are still working on those

matters, however, because these arenot easy. We started even before theelections to see how best we couldreconstruct Cabinet. And not all of therestructuring has been concluded. Asyou know, very important departmentsstill have to come into being, forexample, Performance Monitoring andEvaluation, which I regard as crucialin terms of making government workdifferently. In my view, it is goingto be a very massive department,because it has to monitor all spheresof government, and, if possible, reachdown to the level of individuals.Because, in government, at times,people just sit and are not working,or not working at the place that wewant them to be. It is very difcultto know, because they can producethe reports. So, what we have to do

is establish a way of ensuring thatwe know how government generallyfunctions. We, for example, aremoving the Presidential Hotline fromCommunication to this department,because it is an instrument that thedepartment should utilise.

The other department that still hasto come into being is the PlanningCommission. It, too, is not a smallone and it needs a lot of thinking. Ithas also, as you know, provoked a lot

of debate and led to a louder debate,with some people being very criticalthat we over-consult. But, if wewere not consulting, then I am surethe critique would have been that wewere instituting a dictatorship, anautocratic way of doing things. So, it


President Jacob Zuma18 January 2010, Ekurhuleni, South Africa

While the economy has been growing, poverty has been deepening, and the gap between rich andpoor as well as the rst and second economy has been widening. I think that this is a very concrete

challenge that we have to address urgently.


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INTERVIEW

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INTERVIEW

does not bother me. I think consultingis important. And I think people alsoshould appreciate that that is partof a democratic culture things aredone not by one person; you have toget more heads to think. So, that hashappened. I think we are now moving

forward.EP: It looks likely that we are in aposition to achieve a 2.5% or 3% rateof economic growth. However, toachieve this or even to surpass it, whatin your view needs to be done by all ofthe major players government, tradeunions, business, and communities?

JZ: First, we should emphasiseworking together. As expressed inThe National Economic Developmentand Labour Council (NEDLAC), weshould try to understand, all of us, the

common objectives and the commonthings that we need to do. We havetried and I think we have gone farin terms of utilising the resources ofgovernment appropriately to ensurethat we invest. But government has todo things differently.

For example, Public Enterprisesneeds to be examined and turnedaround. My intention is to do a verymajor review, so that we can releasethe resources. We need to do thingsproperly and reengineer them in

a particular way. And, therefore,government must play a very specicrole in terms of ensuring that there areinvestments that are being put in.

We have emphasised, once again,and it is now the position, that weare going to focus on infrastructurenationally. I think that is going to bean important area especially in termsof a very tired infrastructure whichneeds to be revamped. In addition,all the development in anticipation ofthe 2010 FIFA World Soccer Cup hashelped us as a bridge to move forward.We need not lessen the momentum.We need to ensure that as we completethe 2010 Soccer Cup preparations,

we anticipate what is next. There is aneed, for example, for hospitals to berevamped and built. We also need tolook at the infrastructure in the ruralareas, which has become a focus ofwhat we need to do.

So, I think from the governments

perspective, there is a lot that we needto accomplish. But I also think that theprivate sector must be ready to investin whatever way they can. In otherwords, we must participate jointly oneconomic development, particularlyon the infrastructure.

My take is that if we succeed, wewill open up the space for economicactivities and further investment in thecountry which, because of the old andlimited capacity of the infrastructure,was beginning to frustrate the growth

of the economy. With that in mind,it means some extraordinary planningneeds to be put in place.

EP: What role can the trade unionsplay in growing the economy?

JZ: We need, of course, to talkto the trade unions more, as I saidin NEDLAC. There ought to be anunderstanding that the more wegrow the economy, the better for theworkers. There are a number of issuesthat I think we should look at in time,and which I think we should introduce

into the process. I would imagine eventhe resources of the unions should beutilised in this process. They do havesome resources as well.

My feeling is that if we utilise ourresources prudently, we could evenreduce the culture of dependence.Because, if you look at resources thatwe put into social grants, for example,we need to think very carefully. Howdo we work out a plan that we growthe economy and therefore begin toutilise such resources for economicgrowth? How do we put in the skillsprogramme, so that we are able toskill the citizens, so that we decreasethe numbers of people who are

dependent on the grants? You have tocreate opportunities for South Africansthat can generate economic activities.So, everybody must participate. I dontthink some people must be onlookers.Government must be doing somethingand the private sector must be doing

something, the trade unions andcommunities must be doing something.The opportunities for the private

sector will be enormous. They must,therefore, utilise the opportunities thatare going to open up. I think in thatway we could grow the economy andsurpass the projections that have beengiven so far.

EP: Mr President, once the 2010stadiums and the roads have beencompleted, a lot of people who arenow working on this infrastructure will

become unemployed as a consequenceof successfully completing thosetasks. What are the possibilities ofutilising these workers, who have nowaccumulated the skills and experience,to contribute to the other infrastructureprogrammes that you are talking about,such as hospital revitalisation, schoolbuilding and so on?

JZ: That is precisely the point that Iam talking about. Whatever plans wemake, we should take into account thatthe wave of building the infrastructure

leading up to 2010 has helped toproduce skilled people. I think one ofthe things that all of us have to discussis what kind of future infrastructure we

will commit to, and how do we do itdeliberately so that we utilise the skillsgoing forward. That is going to needinteraction between all stakeholders.We are aware that if we do not dothat, it will mean a huge percentage ofthose who were working will becomeunemployed. That is what we needto avoid. So infrastructure is stillgoing to continue to be an importantelement for economic growth and foremployment. I am sure the Minister ofEconomic Development will have to

The Planning Commission has also provoked a lot of debate and led to a louder debate, withsome people being very critical that we over-consult. But, if we were not consulting, then I amsure the critique would have been that we were instituting a dictatorship, an autocratic way of

doing things.


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INTERVIEW

plan very carefully together with otherMinistries to ensure that these skills areutilised properly. And we must limit thepossibility of a huge unemploymentarmy that results from the completionof the infrastructure opportunity.

EP: To what extent will the

developments in the global economyimpact upon our capacity to buildingan economy in a manner consistentwith ANC policies to create decentwork, curb unemployment, andproduce sustainable livelihoods?

JZ: Well, there is no-one who isgoing to escape the global economicimpact. All of us are going to go throughsome challenges; our economy as well.But I think what I have just describedas our efforts to address these matterswill go a long way in assisting us to

respond to the global downturn of the

economy. What is positive is that theeconomy is now picking up globally,including in the developing countries.

I think the manner in which

NEDLAC tackled this issue, as a joint effort to respond to the globaleconomic crisis, was an important actthat we undertook, which has been, bythe way, praised by the economists ofthe world because there was nowhereelse that this kind of effort took place.Given the fact that we are still inthat process, I am condent that allstakeholders are going to resolutelydiscuss how we should utilise ourefforts and our collective thinking toensure that our economy grows. But

we cant say that the impact is notgoing to affect us.

EP: Mr President, one of the criticalissues that you have spoken about agreat deal even before you becamePresident is rural underdevelopment.What is your strategy for meeting this

challenge?JZ: The reason we establishedthe Rural Development Departmentwas specically to address the issuevery concretely. Now, we have alead department in terms of lookingat what happens. In a sense, we aresaying, Let us roll out the economyto areas that are on the margins. Andwhat has happened already is thatthis department is able to lead otherdepartments to go out there. There areprojects already where departments

are able to work together as a result of

this initiative.I think that, with time, we will see

a situation where we begin to createeconomic activities in the rural areas.

Infrastructure, again, is important. Forexample, there is a lack of roads andbridges. You have a situation in therural areas where people, in order toget something, with the little moneythat they have, must leave their villagesand use money to transport themselvesto small towns and then come back,which means using more. The moneydoes not stay and circulate in one area.

So it is going to be necessary thatsome of the facilities like big shops,etc, are established in the rural areas.

People within the rural areas have notgot an easy burden. If they need to buysomething, even just small groceries forR20, they have to use probably close tohalf of it for transport. But the creationof economic activities would mean thatthey could use that R20 fully where

they live. Also, we are looking at howgovernment, particularly localgovernment, is going to dovetail withthe initiatives that are going to beundertaken. These initiatives mustthen begin to turn the trend of peopleleaving the rural areas, coming tosearch for jobs in the cities. Again, itcomes back to this interaction betweenthe public sector, private sector andthe unions. So, I think that this is one ofthe most important steps that we have

undertaken.

EP:You are on record, Mr President,and it was emphasised in the January8th Statement, that both the ANCand the government are profoundly

committed and determined to dealwith crime and corruption. Could youelaborate on that position?

JZ:Yes, absolutely. This, of course,as you know, is an old commitmentand not a new commitment. Thequestion has been how do we effectand implement our commitment? Iam more condent than ever that wewill do so. In terms of ghting crime,we have a department that has beenregenerated in terms of energy andimagination. One of the things that the

ChapelLaneMedia

Mr Ajay Gupta, Non-Executive Chairman of Vusizwe Media; Dr Essop Pahad, Editor ofThe Thinker; Jacob Zuma, President of

South Africa.


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INTERVIEW

leadership of the Police Force is doing isto look at the Police Force itself wherethere is a percentage of corruption andcrime committing.

I am satised with the reportsthat I am getting that we are indeed

making headway on this one. And,for example, there are measures toretrain some sections of the policeforce and the retraining is alreadyproducing results that are interesting.The leadership is paying attention tothe quality of policing and thereforenot making it easy for those who arecorrupt. So I am happy with the plans

that are in place and the determination

and the commitment that is prevalent.The issue of corruption, in general,

is an issue where I think we need tobe innovative, because it still causesa lot of problems in many ways. My

problem, for example, is that as weght crime, the laws and regulationsdo not help that much, because theprocess to address corruption takestoo long. What is demanded by thelaw to deal with an issue takes a lotof time. We have created a situationwhich is in keeping with democracy,but to establish a case is quite a task.So you have a situation where manypeople keep on earning salaries whileon suspension.

My view is that we have got to

change that as well, so that if we havea case of corruption, the time to dealwith it is shortened and we have waysof dealing with that. We have alsogot to dovetail very clearly the justicesystem, all of it, on how to deal with

corruption via policing, the magistrates,the courts, and the prosecutors. Howdo we create a dynamic kind of systemthat is able to pick up and deal withmatters quickly?

There is an example that I alwaysgive of a police ofcer in the WesternCape who came to me and said:What must I do, because as a law

enforcement ofcer I arrest people, but

the courts release them and they comeback to create crimes? He said hehad been chasing one criminal threetimes and he was now looking for thatcriminal for the fourth time, because

this criminal is known, but the law sayshe has the right to have bail, and so hecomes out and even interferes with thewitnesses. And the police ofcer asked,What must I do? I realise that it isnot an easy matter to handle. And weare, therefore, working hard to tightenprotection of those witnesses, amongother things. There are a numberof factors and this is one sector ofgovernment where we are really tryingto change things. So, I am very hopeful.

EP: Since the advent of democratic

government in 1994, we haveexperienced a lack of implementationof government policies. To what extentis this a structural problem in terms ofhaving three spheres of government,and what can and should be done to

improve the capacity and the efciencyof local government?

JZ: Well, it is partly structural.We have looked at this, as you willremember. The three spheres ofgovernment were established as animportant element of a democraticgovernment, of trying to roll out powerto the people.

The real implementation is at the

local government. But, the reality isthat the best cadres are at the nationaland provincial spheres. At the localsphere, where there is massive demandfor cadres, that is where you have the

cadres who we do not really knowwell, and they are the ones who mustactually do the real implementation.

So you have the situation where youhave people who are less experienced,less skilled at the level of wards.

At the national and provincialspheres, there is a clear demarcationbetween the politicians and the civilservants. In the municipalities, it is oneand the same thing. Here, politiciansdo administration and everything else.So there is a mixture of duties. As one

We must limit the possibility of a huge unemployment army that results from the completion of the(2010 Soccer World Cup) infrastructure opportunity.

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attempts to address this, we are nowsaying, Let us nd a way to separatethese tasks. It does affect the mannerin which they work. So, in a sense, itwould not be only structural change.We also have to look at what kind ofpeople we employ, or deploy, there.

And we need to adjust that.But also, we have examined themunicipalities, for example, and themanner in which they are demarcated.

After 15 years we are able to say thatthere are municipalities that do nothave resources. Not a thing, at all.But they are there. And therefore,whatever little they get does not go todevelopment. It goes to salaries andother things. And that is part of theproblem. So, we need to look at thatas well.

And fortunately, we have a Minister

who has been given the task to lookinto that issue and he has produceda report. We are now talking abouta turnaround strategy to deal withlocal government, which among other

things, includes a clear identication ofthe municipalities that are not viable.We need to take a decision aboutwhether we should consider puttingsome municipalities together or puttingsome under an existing authority,rather than just sitting and knowingthat there is no revenue base yet.

There are many factors thathave contributed to the lack ofimplementation of policy. Part of it,of course, has been that we never hada National Plan to say, this is what

we are doing as a country. We havehad policies and different plans indifferent departments, provinces andmunicipalities; each one doing its ownthing this way and the other that way.That is why we have come up with aNational Plan, a Planning Commission,

so that all of us in all spheres ofgovernment can work towardsimplementing a common nationalplan. That, in a sense also helps tochange the manner of implementationand where the emphasis is placed.

Lastly, performance monitoringand evaluation also comes in veryhandy, so that if, for example, there isa problem, we are able to discover itquickly and do something about it. Weshould know where the weaknessesare and where we need to add more

effort and time. I think we are quite

happy that in the manner in which weare handling matters, we are tacklingthose fundamental issues.

One of my views has been that 15years is quite a time. We are now in

the ve years which is going to makeit 20 years. I am sure that after this itis going to be difcult to say, Look,

Apartheid is the cause of all ourproblems. [Laughter] And I knowthat some countries failed to do theirassessment at the right time. So, we areusing these ve years to really launchinto a situation where we complete ourgoals. We must look at what have beenthe shortcomings, so that when welook back on the 20-year period, weare able to say, This is what we have

been able to do.EP: Mr President, our education

system still experiences great problems.What can actually be done to ensurethat principals work in a disciplinedand diligent manner and that teachersteach and learners learn?

JZ: We have been discussing thisvigorously at the Lekgotla as the ANCand government, and those are someof the issues that we are tackling. Wehave taken very rm decisions. Wehave diagnosed the problem and Ithink everybody knows that a goodpercentage of the failure is, in fact, inthe system of teaching and learning.We have, for example, researched andlearned that at previously black-onlyschools, teachers spend only 3.5 hoursa day teaching, while in the previously

white-only schools, teachers spend 6.5

hours a day teaching. That is the reality,which means that there is less teachingin the schools that were disadvantageda long time ago. We have got to dealwith that.

We need to introduce measuresthat can evaluate the performance ofprincipals and, therefore, teachers. Wehave also talked about the parentsinvolvement, and I have talked aboutthis a great deal. We have schoolgoverning bodies, which are a reallygood idea, but we make them operatethe same way in the urban areas as inthe rural areas. In an urban area parentsknow what to do in a governing schoolbody. It is a meeting. But if you arecalling in the parents who are in the

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INTERVIEW

rural areas who have never gone toschool, how can they help to run theschool properly? We did not say thatthe school governing bodies shouldbe created in a different fashion in therural areas. So, there are many factors

that affect the education system. A critical and dominating factor

is to ensure that all concerned spendenough time as well as quality timeteaching and learning. For example,how do you explain the fact that thereare schools within the system thatproduce 0% pass rates, while others

in the same area are producing 100%success?

You could change the system andeverything many times, as we havedone, but as long as you do not deal

with the teachers and the principals orbring back the inspectors, very little willchange. We need inspectors becauseteachers today know that whatever

they do, they can do it for a wholeyear. No one expects someone to walkin and ask to inspect their work.

Let us bring back discipline. Wewant to put more effort into it, becauseif you solve the education problem,you have almost half-solved the otherproblems. So, to us that is the criticalissue. We are therefore going to look atthis very, very strongly.

SADTU has to be part of theprocess, they have to agree, becausethere is no way that we can succeed

without them participating in theprocess. We are engaging them and Ithink we are agreed on a number ofissues. For example, we are in totalagreement on the non-negotiables. It isa question of how you implement that.

So, they will be part of the process. Ithink everybody accepts that we havea problem and that we need to solve it.

EP: Mr President, in the January8th Statement, the ANC once morereiterated that it is the ANC that is theleader and the guide of the Alliance.But how does one interpret this in

the context of the Alliance partnersasserting that it is the Alliance that isat the centre of policy and decision-making?

JZ: Well, I think it is agreed now,

because we have made clarication onthe matter that the ANC is the leaderand is the centre. There is no ambiguityabout it now. I think there was a bit of

an ambiguity because people beganto argue differently and certainlybecause of some difculties that wewent through where people acted inparticular ways. And that created thatfeeling that, look, the centre could besomething else.

I do not think it is difcult. I thinkwe have resolved that issue now. It isno longer a problem.

EP: What, in your view, can bedone to ensure that some of the morehostile statements are made, and dealt

with, in Alliance structures?JZ: Well, we are dealing with that,

and as you would know, it is an oldsickness. It just reects the times. Andit reects the type of membership youhave at this given time. In the past,there were such anti-Party statements,

but the media at that time was not asactive and developed as the media istoday. But I think that it can be resolvedwith time, with helping people todeepen their political understanding. Ithink it reects a lack of maturity andunderstanding.

But also, it tells you that the Allianceis operating in new conditions, unlikethe conditions that we operated in,particularly from 1950 onwards, whenthe Party was banned. I think we stillhave to get very sharp political people

to understand and create a cadre whounderstand the environment of todayand how to operate in it. I think we aredealing with it. We are dealing with itas the movement has always dealt with

it. It is not an easy issue, particularlygiven the environment of today.

But as a matter of fact, I am notthat worried about it. For example,

people still have to learn the cultureof differentiating things that you cansay in public from what you say to oneanother in the Alliance. I do not thinkpeople appreciate what those kinds ofstatements do in terms of impacting thecitizens of this country. That is, again,a necessary political understandingthat we need to acquire. And if thereare differences, dont we have forumswhere we can deal with these matters?Why should we deal with them throughthe media?

In terms of ghting crime, we have a department that hasbeen regenerated in terms of energy and imagination.

GCIS


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ENVIRONMENT

One key issue is the refusal ofmany in the developed worldto accept the reality of climate

change and its link to human activity.This is particularly stark in the USwhere, according to results released in

October last year by the Pew ResearchCentre, considerably fewer Americansnow believe the earth is warming (thedecline has been from 71% to 57%over the space of a year and a half).

As for agreement with scientists aboutthe cause of global warming humanactivities, human emissions that, too,has sloped downwards, to just 36%today. In Britain, almost a third of thepopulation is reported to doubt thetruth of global warming. One reasonfor this situation is a well-funded and

well-connected campaign of climate-denial. In Britain, The Times, the DailyTelegraph, the Daily Express and TheSpectator magazine are examples of

journals which have given prominenceto climate-change denial without

bothering to consider either the validityof the claims made or the expert statusof those making the claims. Even theBBC commonly balances the viewsof 99% of world scientists with one ofthe few scientic dissenters. The factis that it remains difcult to convincepeople of the need to acknowledgethat their comparative prosperity islinked to unsustainable energy useand that some change is needed totheir lifestyle. Politicians are aware ofthis resistance and most take the easy

The debacle of the Copenhagen conferenceis only the beginning of a protracted period

of international negotiations which, at least at

the moment, look likely to come to grief on

the rocks of at least three separate problems.

Another conference is promised for 2010 in

Mexico, but if no solutions are found soon then

there will be little progress there as well.

By Mike Prior

iStockphoto.com

CopenhagenAfter

option of either sidelining the issue or,when it is thrust upon them, to try andnd an easy way out.

People living in poorer countrieshave less choice for they areincreasingly confronted with the realityof climate change. The human misery

in Darfur is, in part, a consequenceof increasing aridity throughoutcentral Africa, which is believed toderive from climate change, as arethe increasing number of unusualand often devastating weather-relateddisturbances. The scale of the latter wasillustrated in the Human DevelopmentReport 2007/08 from the UN. Thisestimated that, annually, in developingcountries between 1980-84, about 80million people were impacted bysome kind of meteorological disaster, a

gure which had risen to 262 millionby 2000-04, about 1 in 19 people.1This has almost certainly increasedstill more in the last ve years as, forexample, drought was followed byexceptional oods in southern Africa.That climate change will hurt the poormost of all is demonstrated by the sameReports estimate that only 1 person in1,500 is similarly affected in wealthycountries. Impacted is a euphemismfor the death and homelessnessinicted on those who suffer these

extreme conditions.The chief negotiator for the G77

group of 130 developing countriesrepresented at Copenhagen andSudanese ambassador to the UN,Lumumba Stanislaus Di-Aping, wasreported in The Observer (20 December2009) to have rufed a few sensitivefeathers among Ministers of the G8group in Copenhagen when he said:[This] is asking Africa to sign a suicidepact, an incineration pact in order tomaintain the economic dependence

of a few countries. Its a solution basedon the values that funneled six millionin Europe into furnaces. Insensitive?Well, that is a matter for individualmoral perception, but the fact is that thethousands currently dying annually rightnow from climate change will rise intohundreds of thousands within 20 yearsif nothing is done. It is possible that theimpact of extreme weather in Europeand America, for example the fact thatunusual ooding has now occurred forthree years in a row in different parts


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of Britain, will change their peoplesattitudes. But the money nancing theclimate-denial campaigns is unlikely todiminish.

The second big issue is easy tosummarise: US President Obamaarrived in Copenhagen with just

one offer on the table: to reduce USemissions by 17% by 2020. This was agood headline move, but it containeda major defect that the cuts shouldbe from a baseline of 2005. This shouldbe compared with the cuts proposedby all other Annex 1 countries, whichare all based upon 1990 emissions.2When adjusted to this baseline, theproposed US cuts amounted to just5%. EU countries have been boundunder Kyoto to this scale of cuts bynowand were offering targets of up to

30% over 1990 by 2020. This was not just a failure by America to proposeany signicant cut, it was also a signalto a wider issue, that the US was not

prepared to adhere to the Kyoto Treatybut wanted a new agreement.

This was a crucial sticking point formany countries, in particular the G77group. Kyoto had divided the worldinto Annex 1 countries, for whichformal and legally binding emissioncuts from a 1990 baseline were agreed,and the remainder, which agreed totry and limit carbon emissions but forwhich no legal limits were set. The UShad signed the Kyoto Treaty but, undera sceptical Bush administration, hadby a unanimous Senate vote refusedto ratify it. Other Annex 1 countries

had delayed ratication, sometimes byyears, but by 2009, the US was alonein its stubborn refusal with Australia, itslast companion, ratifying in December2007. By setting a proposed baselineof 2005, Obama was, in effect,announcing the USs continuing refusalto abide by its Kyoto obligation. Instead,it wanted to push the developing worldinto making similar binding agreementsover future emissions cuts. It wantedto dump Kyoto, a treaty which onlybecame legally binding in terms of

emissions cuts in 2009, and is set torun until 2012.

The much-heralded statementby Hillary Clinton that the US wouldbe prepared to contribute to aninternational fund must be seen in thiscontext. Her actual words were: In

the context of a strong accord in whichall major economies stand behindmeaningful mitigation actions andprovide full transparency as to theirimplementation, the US is preparedto work with other countries towardsa goal of jointly mobilising $100billion a year by 2020 to address theclimate change needs of developingcountries. In other words, dumpKyoto and the US would pay somemoney, some time, from unknownsources, though she also made clear

that it would be a mixture of bothpublic and private sources, the lattercoming in part from money found bycarbon trading schemes. I will come

back to these but it is worth lookingat the conditionality of the nance

a context of full transparency aboutmeaningful mitigation actions. Therefusal to accept this context wasused to lay blame primarily on Chinaand a small group of countries forthe Copenhagen debacle. It seemsthat India, Brazil and South Africaare included in this small group ofcountries. (I use the term seems tobecause in the manner of backstairsbriengs, nothing is ever quite spelledout or attributable).

The statement is also interesting, in

part, because transparent and openinternational inspection is the onething that the US has always refusedto accept, specically about carbonemissions but more generally aboutalmost anything. It has also, of course,failed to undertake any meaningfulmitigation actions, with the result thatsince 1990, its carbon emissions havesteadily increased.

Of course, neither China norany other member of the small group ofcountries was particularly forthcoming

in the negotiations when faced by USintransigence. The Chinese offer toreduce its emissions by 40% over abusiness as usual path did constitutea signicant concession, but it couldhave been made a good deal morequantitative. As, William Gumedes

recent comment in the British Guardiannewspaper (23 December 2009)argues, The nal deal, signed by 28countries, kicked aside a UN-brokereddeal that was more inclusive, nanciallymore generous and more sensitive tothe needs of African and developingcountries and which was backed by

Africans. In Copenhagen, industrialnations have again successfullymanaged to divide African anddeveloping countries, by co-opting thebigger developing countries, such as

China, India, Brazil and South Africa,in private deals. Such co-opting oftenstarts with the demonising of thesecountries: those who insist on a fair

deal are being mercilessly portrayedas stubborn obstacles in the march

for a greener future, or as much toblame for global problems as industrialnations, and therefore should makethe same compromises and pay forit also. Gumede added, Of course,the big developing countries China,India, Brazil and South Africa are notblameless when it comes to pollutingthe earth. While co-option istoo strong a word for what actuallyoccurred, demonising is not.

The nal issue raised by theCopenhagen failure is much wider

than the specic problems of the nalaccord or lack of it; the obsession withmarket mechanisms shown by themajor developed countries.

The rst is the reliance by almostall the developed world countries onvarious kinds of carbon trading as amajor mechanism in achieving nationalcarbon emission cuts. There is little roomhere to explain why the generalised useof trading mechanisms is a poor routeto global cuts in carbon emissions. (Areport from UK Friends of the Earth

The fact is that it remains difcult to convince people of the need to acknowledge that theircomparative prosperity is linked to unsustainable energy use and that some change is needed to

their lifestyle.


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(FOE) goes into detail).3 Historically,it started with the use inside a majoroil company of a process of allocatingtarget emission levels (originally ofsulphur dioxide SO2) to all operatingunits within the rm. If any unitexceeded its target cuts then it was able

to sell the surplus to other units thatfound it harder to comply at whateverprice they could negotiate. This internalquasi-nancial exchange would becontained in the accounts of eachinternal prot centre in the company.This was an efcient and effectiveprocedure inside a large multi-nationalcorporation, but was taken up byproponents of the free market as a routeto introducing market mechanisms intonational environmental control, an areadominated up to the 1980s by simple

regulatory control by a governmentagency. It was adopted after some yearsby the US as a procedure for limitingthe sulphur emissions responsible foracid rain. It can be contrasted withthe simple regulatory caps on sulphuremissions adopted by the EU. Althoughmuch-lauded by proponents of marketmechanisms, there is no evidencethat the US mechanism was moreefcient or cost-effective than the EUroute. What is certain is that reductionsin acid rain and the consequent

damage were delayed by some yearsin the US because of the complexbureaucratic process of setting up themarket. As the FOE report notes: TheUS scheme was much less successful atreducing SO2 pollution than equivalentregulations elsewhere. SO2 emissionsin the US had been reduced by 43.1%by the end of 2007, but over the sameperiod 25 members of the EU saw adecrease in emissions of 71%. Thesereductions were achieved throughregulation, rather than a cap-and-

trade scheme.The basis for a similar mechanism

in the reduction of carbon emissionswas laid by the Kyoto Protocol, whichallowed countries to meet theiremission targets not just by tradingbetween controlled installationsinside a country but also by tradingbetween countries those covered by

Annex 1 but also between these andall other nations, the so-called CleanDevelopment Mechanism (CDM).Under the CDM, projects which would

not otherwise have been undertaken

commercially in these countriescould be nanced externally and thecarbon emission reductions claimedto be obtained could be tradedinternationally. Thousands of projectshave now passed through the CDMprocedure and have resulted in an

international trading market, mainlyunder the European Emission TradingScheme (ETS) worth billions of Euros.

The ETS is regarded as having failedalmost totally in its objectives, withcompanies being given lax targets foremissions and actually making largeprots out of the sale of carbon credits.It is quite astonishing that, accordingto the FOE Report, A study of veEU countries commissioned by WWFfrom Point Carbon in 2008 estimatedthat investors and other holders of

permits under the EU ETS were likelyto make between 23 billion and 63billion over the course of Phase II ofthe scheme (covering 2008-2012)on the basis that the price of carbonwould be between 21 and 32.73.

Among the businesses likely to reapsignicant prots is the worlds largeststeel company, ArcelorMittal, alreadyestimated to have made approximately2 billion in prots from the EU ETSbetween 2005 and 2008.

The CDM process has come under

particular criticism, with many well-documented cases of outright fraud aswell as the almost universal complaintas to just what is required to showthat a project would not otherwisehave been undertaken. Hundreds ofhydro-electric schemes in China, forexample, have been awarded creditsunder the CDM, despite the fact thatencouragement of such schemes is afundamental component of Chineseenergy policy.4

However, despite such criticism,

carbon trading and, in particular,the offsetting of increases in nationalemissions by the purchase of carboncredits remains a cornerstone of policyfor all EU countries as well as anyputative scheme put in the US. TheEU expects that to achieve its targetreductions by 2020, up to 50% oftarget will be met by offsetting actualincreases through the purchase ofcredits from outside the EU. The resultof these ambitions is that just as theyare attempting to lock the poorest

countries of the world into binding

carbon emission targets, the developedworld will, in effect, be removingsources of achieving these targets(which will include reforestation) byclaiming them for themselves.

In a sense, this obsession with use ofmarket mechanisms, particularly odd

at a time when condence in the freemarket has plummeted elsewhere, canbe traced back to the rst problem notedhere; that acceptance of the reality ofclimate change is, at best, precariousin many developed countries. Nationalpoliticians in these countries are loatheto undertake the necessary measuresto limit carbon emissions in their ownbackyard and, instead, seek an easyway out by borrowing them fromother countries, usually the poorest.

A blanket sense of pessimism,

though appropriate to the failureof Copenhagen, is not entirelywarranted, however. There are somesigns that action will be forced uponthe developed world. Some citiesare taking a lead in de-carbonisingthemselves by introducing toughcontrols on car-use and radical energy-efciency measures in dwellings. Evenin the recalcitrant US, to take oneexample, Chicago has adopted theambitious target of making 50% of itsdwellings carbon-neutral by 2015. It

is possible that the city level is bettersuited to getting democratic backingfor such measures than the national.It is also clear that there is a strongenvironmental movement which isprepared for a long and tough struggleto achieve an appropriate response byWestern governments, a movementwhich contains many of the youth ofthese countries. It seems to be theyoung who see most clearly that theissue of climate change really is amatter of life-and-death. Perhaps they

realise that it will be their old age thatwill be blighted unless some radicalmeasures are taken now. Perhaps they

just have better eyesight.

Notes:1 UNDP Human Development Report 2007/2008:

Fighting Climate Change: Human Solidarity in a

Divided World.2 Annex 1 countries are those specied in this Annex

to the Kyoto Protocols; essentially they include the

developed world.3 UK Friends of the Earth,A Dangerous Obsession,

2009. Available at www.foe.co.uk/resource/reports/

dangerous_obsession.pdf.

4 Ibid, p28.


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ENVIRONMENT

The Kyoto Protocol does notexpire in 2012. It is not milk thatcarries a BEST BEFORE label.

Some 10 years ago, 37 more or lessindustrialised countries and economies

in transition called Annex 1 Parties agreed to cut their greenhouse gasemissions by an average of 5% below1990 levels over a period of four yearsstarting in 2008. It is this commitment

of Annex I Parties under the KyotoProtocol that is expiring in 2012. Therest of the provisions of the Protocolremain intact.

Parties to the Protocol have been

Promisesand Lies

iStockphoto.com

In December 2009, the worlds attention was riveted on Copenhagen

as delegates from 192 countries met to discuss a climate deal. In the

run-up to the meeting, a misconception that was running riot fuelled

claims that the Kyoto Protocol would expire in 2012, hence the need

to negotiate a new agreement. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Whatever spin is put on the Kyoto Protocol, the fact of the matter is that

rather than end the Protocol, the climate talks were supposed to discussthe implementing of this protocol.

By Percy F Makombe

CLIMATE CHAOS


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ENVIRONMENT

in heated discussions on subsequentcommitments, and this is wheredeveloped countries have shied awayfrom making adequate reductioncommitments. The climate talksreached fever pitch in Barcelonain 2009 when the African Group

threatened to walk out because ofthe failure by developed countries tomake a commitment on gures foremission cuts.

The Kyoto Protocol is a legallybinding document and a majorproblem is that the US abandoned it in2001. It appears that the US is simplynot interested in an internationallylegally binding document, hencethe chances that it will sign tothe second commitment periodof the Kyoto Protocol are slim to

zero. At the Bali climate meetingin 2007, it was thought that if theUS did not return to the Protocol,then it would be treated separatelyand dealt with under the UnitedNations Framework Convention onClimate Change (UNFCCC), where it isa member.

At the climate talks in Copenhagen,other industrialised countries weresending signals that they wanted to

join the US bandwagon and were,therefore, not interested in doing a

second period of Kyoto. This angeredthe G77 members and China, a blocof developing countries with over 130members. The G77+China called forall States to respect the Kyoto Protocoland went so far as to suggest thatCopenhagen would be a disastrousfailure if there is no outcome for thecommitments of developed countriesfor the second commitment period ofthe Kyoto Protocol.

Mithika Mwenda, the Coordinatorof the Pan African Climate Justice

Alliance (PACJA), argued that thecauses and consequences of climatechange lie principally with thedeveloped countries: We call ondeveloped countries to acknowledgethat they have used more than afair and sustainable share of Earthsatmospheric space. They must repaytheir debt through deep domesticemission reductions and by transferringthe technology and nance requiredto enable us to follow a less-pollutingpathway without compromising our

development.It is not surprising that there has

been a lot of agitation in Africa aboutclimate change issues. The UnitedNations has identied 49 countries asbeing least developed countries (LDCs)based on three criteria: low income,

high economic vulnerability andweak human assets. Some 33 of thesecountries are in Africa. In his welcomeaddress at the opening ceremony ofthe Copenhagen Climate Change talks,the Chairman of the IntergovernmentalPanel on Climate Change (IPCC),Rajendra Pachauri pointed out that:In Africa, by 2020, between 75 and250 million people are projectedto be exposed to water stress dueto climate change, and in somecountries on that continent yields from

rain-fed agriculture could be reducedby up to 50%.Given that such serious issues

are at stake, it is surprising that themuch respected UNFCCC has beencirculating fact sheets to the media andthe public that border on falsehoods.One of the fact sheets states: Theinternational community, in drawingup the broad parameters for a climatechange deal in Bali two years ago,acknowledged that industrialisedcountries must accept binding

emission reduction targets. Accordingto PACJA this is not correct becausethe industrialised countries werealready committed to accept bindingemission reduction targets through asecond commitment under the KyotoProtocol.

Another fact sheet states: Despitethe fact that key developed countryforums such as the G8 have recogniseda 2C limit, pledges for mid-termtargets by industrialised countries fallwoefully short of the IPCC range (25%

to 40% below 1990 levels by 2020).This, too, boggles the mind, not leastbecause the IPCC does not makeany recommendations. In fact, manydeveloping countries are calling foremission reductions of more than 85%by 2050.

PACJA quite rightly contends that:The 25% to 40% is not an IPCC range.The IPCC lead author has conrmedthat the range is not a recommendationby IPCC. It is simply a summary of asmall number of studies on burden

sharing between developed anddeveloping countries (most of whichwere conducted by authors employedor funded by EU institutions), whichreect the assumptions of those authorsand their models...

Climate change is a long struggle and

no-one expected it to be completelyresolved at Copenhagen. What isdisappointing is that the shenanigansof the World Trade Organisation(WTO) spilled into the climate talks.Divide and rule tactics were used.Experienced Philippine negotiatorBernarditas de Castro Muller, who wasthe spokesperson of G77+China, forexample, was mysteriously droppedby the Philippines government fromits list of delegates to the Copenhagentalks. No clear reasons were given

for this action, although speculationabounds that this was at the behestof the EU and US. Muller had beenthe Philippines representative in theUNFCCC since 1994.

His exclusion raised alarm with civilsociety organisations. Chito Tionko ofthe Civil Society Organizations (CSO)Working Group on Climate Change andDevelopment was quoted as saying:The negotiators of industrialisedcountries are really afraid of DitasMuller because she keeps reminding

them of their responsibilities. Theywant her out of the picture so thatthey can push their own agenda.There are many developing countriesthat depend on Muller to defend theirinterests. It is these steamroller tacticsthat are so characteristic of the WTOtalks that seem to have now beenperfected in the climate talks.

A deal that works is very important,especially for Africa, and internationalcooperation is needed. This is wherethe key issues of mitigation and

adaptation come into play. Mitigationis about reducing emissions ofgreenhouse gases to avoid the worstimpact of climate change. Adaptationis about how people adjust and copewith climate change. As a result ofclimate change, millions of people willface water and food shortages as wellas health risks.

Mary Robinson, former UN HumanRights Commissioner, argues that whilemitigation policies encouraging bio-fuelproduction may decrease emissions


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and bring benets to certain farmers,they also reduce the land available forfood cultivation and increase conictsover land. Land scarcity translates todecreased food production, whichleads to higher prices for staple foods,putting communities at risk. Robinson

goes on to say: Adaptation policiesmay also have unintended humanrights consequences, particularly fortraditionally marginalised groups. Ascommunities face increasing foodsecurity brought on by climate change,women will bear the brunt of theburden as they struggle to feed their

families, often compromising their ownhealth and nutrition to do so.

Questions have been raised on therole that the World Bank will play inreceiving and distributing climatechange funding. Without nance,

Africa will nd it next to impossibleto deal with climate change. It istherefore important that funds arechannelled inside the UNFCCCrather than the World Bank, given the

latters chequered history in dealingwith the socio-economic developmentof Africa. If the World Bank controlsthe money, there is a real fear that mostof it will go to mitigation and therewill not be enough for adaptation,which is really what is urgent fordeveloping countries as they arealready struggling to cope with climatechange.

There is also the issue of technologytransfer, which is important becausereducing greenhouse gas emissions

poses technical challenges fordeveloping countries. This is whythere is talk of developing climate-friendly technology for mitigationand adaptation. However, suchtechnology will not mean much ifintellectual property rights (IPR) areleft intact. Technology transfer isnothing if IPRs are maintained. Thereis, therefore, a need to push for therelaxation of IPR rules for developingcountries to ght the climate battle.Currently there is no structure in the

UNFCCC dealing with technologytransfer. They merely have an advisorygroup. It is therefore necessary toset up a body with policy-makingpowers to handle technology transferissues. This body should, among otherthings, recommend what policy isneeded on IPR. The overriding goalshould be to treat IPRs in a mannerthat allows access to technology ataffordable prices.

As the haggling in Copenhagengathered steam, EU Heads of Statemet in Brussels from 10-11 Decemberand proudly announced that new

nancial resources would be set asideto deal with the clear and presentdanger posed by climate change. TheEU agreed to offer near-term fast-track nance to immediately helpdeveloping countries deal with theproblems caused by climate change. Atleast 27 Member States of the EU aresaid to have pledged a total amount of2.4billion annually for the next threeyears, beginning next year.

The EU refers to its contribution astheir fair share to deal with climatechange. This amount of money issupposed to signify the EUs seriousintent in the climate talks. Yet thisnew contribution reects a lack ofcommitment and seriousness to a justand effective nancing arrangementto deal with climate change, not leastbecause the EUs new offer is largelythe re-packaging and re-labelling ofalready existing Overseas Development

Assistance (ODA).

It is only the Netherlands, whichmade an unequivocal commitment thatthe money they will give is in additionto the existing ODA. For Denmark andSweden, for example, the money is notnew and will be taken from existingposts in the national budgets. Thesame is true of the pledge made by theUK and several other major Europeancountries.

The problem is not just that thenew money is in fact old money,but there is something essentially

wrong about the EU just emphasisingnear-term fast-track nance. Lest weforget, the EU Heads of State agreedto a climate nance package on30 October 2009. This nancepackage was to be guided by theposition that both near-term andlong-term nance are critical elementsof a global agreement. It is, therefore,a source of surprise and consternationthat the focus now seems to be solelyon near-term nance.

To be sure, nance for the next threeyears is critical as it will fast-start actionin the poorest countries, but it cannot

replace long-term nance. Manyindustrial countries want to avoid costsand they believe that to grant quick,small amounts now is better thanmaking long-term commitments. It isnot implausible that many countriesfrom the South will be overly excitedwith the EU offer and argue that taking50 million now is better that waitingfor 2013, but that is not the point.The debate is not that there should

not be near-term nance, the point isthat near-term fast-track nance mustbe part and parcel of an agreementthat includes clear commitments andconcrete arrangements for predictableand scaled-up funding beyond 2012.In this regard, it would be a mistakefor developing countries to accept adeal that is hitched only on near-termnance.

At any rate, developed countrieshave already committed to providinglong-term nance both in the Climate

Convention and in the Bali ActionPlan. The attempt to recycle oldcommitments and pass them off asnew money smacks of deceptionand must be exposed. If there is noclear commitment that the climatenance is new and additional toODA (0.7% of GDP), it means thatthe new offers are just repackagedoffers meant to hoodwink the restof the world into believing thatthere is positive movement in theclimate talks.

The debate is not that there should not be near-term nance, the point is that near-term fast-track nance must be part and parcel of an agreement that includes clear commitments and concretearrangements for predictable and scaled-up funding beyond 2012.


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But rst, a quick recap of theCopenhagen Circus. Initially,the strong turned against the

weak; that is, mainly European high-emitting countries, led by Denmarkas Conference Chair, put together theso-called Danish text which quiteaside from its merits and demerits appeared to pre-empt the proceedingsof the Conference itself in attemptingto impose a pre-determined outcome.Consequently, howls of protest came

from the weak, low-emitting nations,many of whose delegates were alreadyhopping mad after being kept waitingfor hours in the freezing cold just tryingto get in.

Then the Conference organisers,police and Danish government turnedagainst civil society. Peaceful protestors,and anyone else who happened to bein the way, were attacked by police,arrested and brutalised. Accreditednon-governmental delegates, having

travelled from across the world, werekept waiting outside for days on endfor their badges, and nally excludedfrom the Conference altogether. Even

journalists were kept out, includingthe Guardians George Monbiot, whospent an entire day trying to satisfyever-shifting bureaucratic requirements only to be nally excluded becausehe was freelance, despite beingfully accredited to the Guardiansdelegation.

Putins

Russia

Im sure you have heard the story of the man who got lost on his way

to the station. Stopping a passer-by to ask for directions, the reply came:

Now if I was going to the station, I wouldnt be starting from here! Post-

Copenhagen, we are in a similar position in trying to achieve an effective

climate agreement. That is, a long way away, with many difculties ahead,

and with no obvious route to getting there.

By Oliver Tickell


Kyoto2


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No satisfactory explanation wasever offered for the appalling conductof Denmark, or the shameful treatmentof ofcial delegates, or the monstrousbehaviour of the police. Denmarkspositive international image as aharmonious, well-organised society

with an enlightened government andrespect for civil society has suffered asevere blow. And about time too, somemight say: the country is now ruledby a right-wing government, electedmainly for its hostility to Muslimimmigrants, whose instinct when facedwith a vibrant global movement callingfor effective climate action is to bangits collective head against the backdoor of a police van, then arrest it forcriminal damage.

But then something else happened.

The stronger-still turned against thestrong. China, India and the US

put their own deal together theCopenhagen Accord with Brazil andSouth Africa in attendance, playing aminor role. The EU reluctantly agreed

to it reluctantly, since the Accordwas far weaker and vaguer than it hadwanted, with no emissions targets andinsufcient nance for adaptation andmitigation in developing countries. AtChinas insistence, emissions targetsfor 2050 that the world should cutits emissions by 50%, and Annex 1industrialised countries by 80% wereremoved. As was the aim to limittemperature rise to 1.5C, proposed byMaldives and other highly vulnerablestates, in favour of 2C. Chinas desire

for coal-red economic growth described in the Peoples Daily asits right to develop overcame itsanxiety over climate change.

Thus the strongest turned, not onlyagainst the strong, but also against theweak and climate vulnerable, whohad put forward the 1.5C target,only to have China strike it down.The G88, which encompasses bothlow-emitting, vulnerable countries likeMaldives and Tanzania, and wealthy,rapidly industrialising countries like

China and India, was split. Some tookChinas side, like Sudan, while othersbroke from the old you lot have hadyour turn to burn fossil fuels, get richand destroy the planet, now its ourturn to do the same! G88 consensus,replacing it with a call for rich

countries to nance poor countrieslow-carbon development based onrenewables and efcient energy use, asrepresented by the Vulnerable NationsForum. Thus the nal resolution of theConference was only to take note ofthe Copenhagen Accord.

So the outcome of the Conferencehas been, not to bring the worldtogether in a constructive, cooperativeagreement to safeguard the globalclimate, but the opposite: to widenexisting fault lines between Annex 1

and other countries; to reveal China inits new belligerent colours; to split the

G88 down the middle; to marginalisethe EU as a world climate leader (albeita far from perfect one); and to leavebehind an ill-smelling reek of acrimony

that will persist through further UnitedNations Framework Convention onClimate Change (UNFCCC) meetingsthis year in Bonn and Mexico. Also theprospect of progress on secondarybut important climate issues, fromforests to HFCs (powerful warminggases used in refrigeration), methaneand black carbon (soot, to you andme, from biomass burning and smokyengines) which may be the main agentof ice and snow melt, was kicked intothe long grass.

The consequence is that emissionsgrowth is set to continue until 2040,25 years beyond the 2015 target calledfor by the Intergovernmental Panelon Climate Change. By 2020 globalemissions are set to increase from 46billion tons of CO2 today, to 55 billiontons. In short, a recipe for globalclimate suicide.

So are there any grounds for hope?Yes, some. First, we should not confuselegislation or international agreementswith actual delivery. For example, it is

not obvious that the Kyoto Protocol hasdelivered any emissions reductions the rate of increase of world emissionspromptly accelerated following thetreatys adoption, instead of goingdown as intended, as high-emittingindustries moved from Annex 1 to

developing countries. Canada, despiteratifying the Kyoto Protocol, didnothing to try to meet them and facesno sanction as a consequence.

China, India, the US and Brazil,despite having no obligation to reducetheir emissions, are nonetheless takingserious action to do so. Brazil hascommitted to an 80% reduction in

Amazonian deforestation. China ismaking itself the worlds renewableenergy superpower, dominatingworld production of solar PV and

wind turbines, while mandatinggreatly increased energy efciency.

India is committed to a massivesolar energy programme. And underObama, the USs emissions are ona rm downwards trend thanks to

rm executive action with strongstandards on energy efciency in carsand appliances, huge investments intorenewables that are displacing plannedcoal-red power station construction,and an Executive Order to forcesustained emissions reductions acrossthe federal government.

With investments into renewablesand efciency on the multi-billiondollar scale now taking place,renewable energy will becomeprogressively more cost-competitive

with fossil fuels. Developing countrieswill increasingly opt for renewable-based development because it will bethe cheapest, cleanest, most secureand most sustainable choice. Sheikh

Yamani famously commented that theStone Age did not end for lack of stone.The Fossil Fuel Age may indeed notend for lack of oil, coal and gas.

Will this powerful, and perhapsnow irreversible trend, be enough totackle climate challenge? Probably not.Demand for oil is strong, and will likely

It is not obvious that the Kyoto Protocol has delivered any emissions reductions the rate ofincrease of world emissions promptly accelerated following the treatys adoption, instead of going down

as intended, as high-emitting industries moved from Annex 1 to developing countries.


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get stronger due to rising transportdemands, stimulating the developmentof highly polluting unconventional oilsources like the Canadian tar sandsand Orinoco bitumen. But oncegovernments can see for themselvesthat fossil fuels are not essential to

development and prosperity, andthat viable alternatives exist, they willbe increasingly willing to sign up to

a global climate agreement that willeffectively phase fossil fuels out over aperiod of decades.

The interval until such an agreementis signed may well last several years

creating an opening for a moreeffective, fair and efcient frameworkfor global climate governance thanthat of the Kyoto Protocol. My ownKyoto2 proposals set out one suchapproach.

South Africa now plays a pivotalrole: Does it consider itself primarilyan African country, representing acontinent highly vulnerable to climatechange? Or as a fast industrialisingnation whose main interest is rapid fossil-fuel-based development? Fortunately

there is a middle way which theKyoto2 system would facilitate. This isfor South Africa to assert its right to

develop but to do so in a clean waythat will avoid exacerbating the climatecrisis, supported by external nance. Thiswould place South Africa rmly whereit belongs, as an economic powerhouse

at the heart of Africas response toclimate change: rebuilding energyinfrastructure using clean, efcient, lowcarbon technologies; and transformingland use to conserve carbon in soils,forests and other ecosystems in the

process making them more resilient toclimate change.

And let no one forget: for all itsrelative wealth, South Africa is a climatevulnerable nation, especially as regardsfresh water supply. It should join theother nations of the Climate Vulnerable

Forum, founded last year in the Maldives which already includes Bangladesh,Nepal, Ethiopia, Kenya, Vietnam,

Kiribati, Rwanda, Ghana, Barbados,Bhutan and Tanzania. Its participationwould doubtless attract many other

African nations and promote a positiveway forward for the Continent.

Note:Oliver Tickell is the author of

Kyoto2 (Zed Books 2008). For furtherinformation, visit www.kyoto2.org/

The strongest turned, not only against the strong, but also against the weak and climate vulnerable,who had put forward the 1.5C target, only to have China strike it down.

1. Set a cap, or a series of annual caps, on global emissionsof CO2 from fossil fuels, and other industrial sources intended to deliver an agreed CO2 target by, say, 2030and 2050.

2. Enforce the cap upstream where fossil fuels areproduced, rather than where they are burnt. Thisway you can control emissions at just a few thousandlocations worldwide, such as oil reneries, gas terminalsand coal washing stations, reducing compliance costsand opportunities for fraud.

3. Sell permits up to the cap in a global auction, subject to areserve (to gu

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