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Empowering ourselves: The past is past but the future is not here yet!
By Professor Bonang Mohale, Chancellor of the University of the Free State After World War II, in a new age of empire, great powers aimed to carve up the planet and nations pledged to create a more equal and law-abiding world. Now, Russia, China and the USA are returning to an older model in which powerful countries impose their will. Nearly five years since the COVID-19 pandemic upended the global economy, growth is slow but stable, inflation has gradually declined in advanced economies and trade trends have turned positive. Despite this, there remain challenges such as high public debt burdens, ongoing geoeconomic tensions and the potential impact of industrial policies on smaller countries. Poverty reduction is possible China has lifted over 800 million people out of poverty since the late 1970s. This is the largest reduction in inequality in modern history by focusing on no more than six economic reforms, namely economic growth (which grew rapidly after 1978 with an average annual growth rate of over 9%); infrastructure investment (invested in roads, railways, water supply and electricity); education and health (improved access to education, health care and social security); targeted policies (targeted the most poverty stricken areas with public policies); data collection (used data to identify the poorest areas and their needs and public support and mobilised the public to assess the status of each household). China’s poverty reduction efforts have helped the world achieve the UN 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development goals. South Africa’s tax base According to the latest tax statistics from the National Treasury and the South African Revenue Service (SARS), 490 676 South Africans earned over R1-million in the 2024/25 financial year. This figure represents 6.7% of the country’s 7.4 million registered taxpayers and marks a significant increase of 82 000 individuals compared to the previous financial year when 408 288 South Africans earned above this threshold. These millionaires, who cover around 50% of all assessed income tax paid in the 2024 tax year, demonstrate the country’s progressive tax regime is in full effect, with the majority of income tax being paid by the country’s richest individuals at R2.2-trillion in gross tax revenue – R87-billion or 4.2% more than in the prior year. Personal Income Tax (PIT) revenue remained the biggest contributor to the tax haul, accounting for 35.7% – R641-billion of the total tax collected. Just 1 660 182 individuals, a mere 2.6% of the country’s 64 million people contribute 76.2% of all personal income tax. The situation is equally concerning in the corporate sector where only 1 051 companies, representing 0.1% of the total, pay 72.3% of all company income tax. Over 30% of the population, approximately 19.2 million people, currently rely on social grants, a figure projected to grow to 19.7 million by 2026/27. This means that about 12% of South Africans who pay income tax are supporting a social safety net for nearly half the population! Youth unemployment Youth unemployment has been at catastrophic levels since ‘two weeks in July 2021’ at 74.9 percent! Four years later, it is still hovering at 60.2% compared to Spain’s 26.6; France 20.5; Italy 17.7; China 17.1; Turkey 15.8; Canada 14.4; UK 14.4; USA 9; Australia 8.8; Netherlands 8.7; Germany 6.5; South Korea 5.5; Japan 3.2 and Switzerland 2.7. It is Mosibudi Mangena who opines that, ‘poverty and inequality are a menacing reality in South Africa. Unless the state and the citizens do something to share the fruits of the economy, things might unravel very soon. It is simply unsustainable to have wealth concentrated in the hands of a minority race whilst the vast majority wallow in abject poverty’. Human rights Human rights are those basic and fundamental rights to which every person – for the simple reason of being human – is entitled. These rights are inalienable – a person has them forever and they cannot be taken away. The natural rights of South Africans received no protection before the country became a constitutional democracy in 1994. Chapter 3 of the Interim Constitution introduced legally protected fundamental rights to South Africa for the first time. Now fundamental human rights are entrenched in Chapter 2 – Sections 7 to 39 – of the 1996 Constitution. The Bill of Rights is arguably the part of the Constitution that has had the greatest impact on life in this country. As the first words of this chapter say: ‘This Bill of Rights is a cornerstone of democracy in South Africa. It enshrines the rights of all people in our country and affirms the democratic values of human dignity, equality and freedom.’ It has also been the source of the majority of the groundbreaking rulings the Constitutional Court has handed down. In an address to the South African Constitutional Assembly on 8 May 1996, the day of the adoption of the final Constitution, President Rolihlahla N. Mandela declared that ‘now it is universally acknowledged that unity and reconciliation are written into the hearts of millions of South Africans. They are an indelible principle of our founding pledge – ‘the glowing fire of our New Patriotism’. At the same occasion, Deputy President Thabo M. Mbeki asserted that the Constitution ‘constitutes an unequivocal statement that we refuse to accept that our Africanness shall be defined by our race, colour, gender or historical origins’. Constitutional patriotism The University of the Witwatersrand’s Elsa Huyssteen reminds us that this is a patriotism of new South Africans who do not belong on the basis of race or ethnicity but on the basis of a shared loyalty to a constitutional state and a commitment to national unity, reconciliation and human rights. The creation of such a ‘constitutional patriotism’ is intended to establish the legitimacy of the outcome of the transition as well as to promote national unity and reconciliation, both seen as crucial to the consolidation of democracy in South Africa. Constitutional patriotism is seen as capable of meeting these challenges to the consolidation of democracy in South Africa as it ensures that the principles and values