Polity news this week

South Africa

PRETORIA – The Auditor-General’s office will start quarterly performance audits on national and provincial levels, in an effort to timeously detect red flags in the financial reporting and operational performance of State departments. “By conducting these audits on a quarterly basis, instead of annually, we will ensure that early warning signs relating to noncompliance and transgressions by departments are identified and that action can be taken by the relevant leadership,” Auditor-General Terence Nombembe says. In the 2009/10 Auditor-General report, only three out of the 35 departments were able to show improvements. The remaining departments seemed stagnant, with nine remaining unchanged with qualified audits, nine remaining unchanged with unqualified audits, seven regressing and seven improving. The report shows that disclaimers are largely confined to the departments of Public Works, Health and Education, which are also the departments with the highest spending. However, Nombembe says that these are large departments that often had to deal with a lot of complexities in their financial reporting. “It is often faulty or incomplete reporting on provincial levels that filter through to national levels. For instance, in the educational sector, specific programmes, such as school nutritional programmes are often not adequately documented on provincial level, which makes it difficult for the national department to keep track.” To increase accountability of the departments, leadership as high up as Ministers, have recommitted to monitoring processes.

JOHANNESBURG – Optimism among South African business owners is on the rise and remains well above the global average, the International Business Report (IBR) index by Grant Thornton reveals. The IBR shows an optimism balance of 64% for 2011, representing a 4% increase on last year’s index. The positive local index contrasted with the global optimism balance of 23% for 2011, which compares with 24% for 2010. The ‘optimism balance’ is the proportion of business owners reporting that they are optimistic less those reporting that they are pessimistic. Grant Thornton South Africa chairperson Leonard Brehm says that South African business owners continue to be optimistic about the nation’s economic landscape for the year ahead, despite expectations that the strong rand will continue to make business conditions tough for some, particularly those with an export focus. Western Cape business owners were the most optimistic with a 72% balance, while Eastern Cape recorded the lowest optimism balance of 52%. KwaZulu-Natal scored 69% and Gauteng 62%. Brehm reports that South African business owners are expecting continued growth in turnover in 2011, with a 65% optimism balance compared with the global mean of 56%. Another positive trend expected in South Africa during 2011, is a significant increase in selling prices, with local business owners recording a 56% optimism balance for the year ahead, compared with the 2010 figure of 46%. The global optimism balance for selling prices in 2011 is 28%, up from 11% in 2010. “Considering the current strength of the rand and low inflation, this optimism seems unusual,” Brehm says.

MANTASHE SAYS FIVE-MILLION NEW JOBS POSSIBLE – The African National Congress (ANC) is confident that five-million jobs can be created in the next decade, with rural development contributing an expected half-a-million jobs and manufacturing contributing some 350 000 jobs, ruling party secretary-general Gwede Mantashe says. A big increase in public-sector employment will help South Africa achieve the job creation target, set out in government’s new economic growth path blueprint. “…The ANC is confident that, in the next ten years, the economy will be able to create five-million jobs and thus reduce our unemployment rate from the present 25% to at least 15%,” Mantashe said. He was briefing the media on the outcome of a ruling party national executive committee lekgotla held earlier this month. “Jobs, jobs, jobs, jobs . . . Everyone must come up with practical programmes on how to create jobs,” he added. The bulk of the jobs – half a million – will be created in rural development and the ANC envisions an overall increase of 10% of jobs in the government sphere. The ruling party hopes to create
250 000 jobs in agriculture, 140 000 in mining output and beneficiation, 225 000 in tourism, 50 000 in business services and 300 000 in the green economy by 2020, increasing to 400 000 in this sector by 2030. The knowledge economy – information and communication technology, higher education, healthcare and new technologies – is expected to create 100 000 new jobs, the social economy 260 000 jobs and African regional development 150 000 jobs.

Africa & the world

JUBA – South Sudanese have voted overwhelmingly to declare independence from the north in a referendum held last week, according to early figures and a Reuters survey of officials in nine of the region's ten states. Referendum officials report that votes to secede approached 99% in some southern states and disapora communities in Egypt, Ethiopia and Kenya. Southern leaders have urged people from the oil-producing territory to wait until official figures due in early February before celebrating, for fear of antagonising the north. The figures are in line with expectations for the plebiscite, the climax of a 2005 peace deal that ended decades of north-south civil war. Referendum officials say of large votes in favour of independence in the southern states of Central Equatoria, Unity, Lakes, Jonglei, Warrap, Western Bahr al-Ghazal, Northern Bahr al-Ghazal, Eastern Equatoria and Upper Nile. Central Equatoria state, a territory that includes the southern capital Juba, reports 449 290 votes for separation and just 4 985 votes for unity. Campaign banners in Juba describ the vote as a "last march to freedom" after decades of war and perceived northern oppression. International observers say the vote is credible, removing another possible hurdle.

WASHINGTON – The United Nations Security Council has overcome Russian objections and unanimously agreed to send 2 000 additional peacekeepers to the Côte d’Ivoire, where UN troops have been coming under attack. Russia, which had expressed reservations about the draft resolution calling for the deployment of additional blue-helmeted peacekeepers to the world's top cocoa grower, joined the other 14 council members and supported the measure. The resolution expressed "deep concern over the continued violence and human rights violations" triggered by a disputed presidential election, including attacks against UN peacekeepers and civilians. The resolution says that those responsible for crimes against UN personnel and civilians must be held accountable. It also warns of the council's "readiness to impose measures, including targeted sanctions against those who obstruct the work of UNOCI." Alassane Ouattara is widely recognised by Western and African governments as president-elect of the Côte d’Ivoire after the electoral commission proclaimed him winner of the November 28 presidential poll. The results were certified by the UN mission but rejected by incumbent Laurent Gbagbo.

EU SHIPS BANNED FROM DEALS WITH CÔTE D’IVOIRE PORTS – European Union- (EU-) registered vessels have been barred from all new financial dealings with Côte d’Ivoire’s two main cocoa-exporting ports as part of fresh sanctions imposed after November’s contested election. The EU froze the European assets of the two main ports in Côte d’Ivoire – the world’s biggest cocoa exporter – saying they are “helping to fund the illegitimate government of Laurent Gbagbo”. But the sanctions also barred EU-registered vessels and companies from entering into any financial deals with the ports, unless covered by a contract agreed prior to the sanctions. The sanctions are designed to increase pressure on Gbagbo to step down following the November 28 election, which he is widely believed to have lost. “The assets of the ports in Europe will be frozen . . . but freezing assets also has an implication, which is a prohibition to make economic resources available to the designated entities,” a European Commission official said. “So that would essentially result in a prohibition to make business with those entities,” the official adds. French government spokesperson Gael Veyssiere says that his country’s interpretation of the sanctions was that EU companies or operators were barred from financial dealings with the Ivory Coast ports of Abidjan and San Pedro.

ARABS SHOULD CONSIDER LESSON OF TUNISIA – LEAGUE – The Arab League chief says that Arab States should consider the lesson of Tunisia after protests over prices and repression toppled its President. Arab States have made little or no comment about events in Tunisia that rattled a region of authoritarian leaders like ousted President Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali (pictured). Egypt has dismissed talk of contagion. Libya says that the protesters were too hasty in toppling their President. “We have to follow closely what is happening in Tunisia. And we hope that the people there will end up by building the system they want. And, of course, there is a lesson and there is a message from what happened in Tunisia,” Arab League chief Amr Moussa said. He was speaking to reporters at an Arab economic summit in the Egyptian Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh in response to a question about whether developments in Tunisia might have a ripple effect across the Middle East. He did not mention specific issues that prompted the Tunisian protests but said that “the Arab society has a lot of similar elements . . . so we can’t just consider Tunisia an isolated incident”. Moussa has a reputation for outspoken political comments in a region where caution or reticence is more common. Populations across the Arab world grumble about the same problems that sent Tunisians onto the streets: surging prices, poverty, a growing gap between rich and poor and systems of rule that offer them no political voice.