National Dialogue: A R700 Million Smokescreen for Political Survival?

IOL News

6 days ago

In a country increasingly characterised by the symptoms of a failing state, democratic erosion, economic dysfunction, and deepening public disillusionment, President Cyril Ramaphosa's renewed call for a National Dialogue demands urgent and critical scrutiny, says the writer.
Image: IOL / Ron AI
Clyde N.S. Ramalaine
The notion of a National Dialogue is not new in South Africa's post-apartheid political discourse. It has featured under successive administrations, particularly during the Mbeki and Zuma eras.
What distinguishes this moment is that Ramaphosa has formally articulated the dialogue as a key initiative of the 7th Administration. His announcement on 10 June 2025 framed the dialogue as a renewed commitment to inclusive engagement that would contribute to Vision 2030 and the National Development Plan.
The dialogue is pitched as a phased and participatory process, beginning with local consultations and culminating in two national conventions. Its coordination includes an Inter-Ministerial Committee chaired by the Deputy President, a Steering Committee of sectoral leaders, and a Secretariat based at NEDLAC. Yet the structure, while appearing inclusive, masks top-down control and leaves open questions of oversight, transparency, and independence.
In a country increasingly characterised by the symptoms of a failing state, democratic erosion, economic dysfunction, and deepening public disillusionment, President Cyril Ramaphosa's renewed call for a National Dialogue demands urgent and critical scrutiny.
Marketed as a nation-building initiative rooted in inclusivity and moral renewal, this dialogue, backed by an anticipated and staggering R700 million budget, emerges not as a bold new chapter in South Africa's democratic project, but rather as a strategic, and arguably self-serving, manoeuvre by a presidency mired in crisis.
While dialogue is undeniably a vital tool in healing fractured societies and fostering inclusive democratic participation, its potency is dangerously undermined when it is co-opted as a smokescreen for political self-preservation. When those leading the call for national dialogue are themselves implicated in the very crises they purport to resolve, the process risks devolving into a performance of consultation rather than a pursuit of justice.
Dialogue, in such cases, becomes not a space for truth-telling and collective agency, but a carefully choreographed theatre of deflection, where accountability is diluted and systemic rot is masked behind the language of renewal.
The true tragedy lies in the erosion of public trust, as citizens grow weary of being summoned to a conversation that merely serves to sanitise the image of leadership while the root causes of disillusionment, corruption, inequality, unaccountability, and unkept promises remain unaddressed. Thus, the problem is not with dialogue itself, but with its manipulation into a tool of political survival rather than societal transformation.
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Far from embodying the spirit of genuine public engagement, the dialogue appears to function as a symbolic performance, carefully choreographed to legitimise the controversial 'Government of National Unity' (GNU), a grand political coalition of convenience, while shielding the President from meaningful accountability.
At a time when South Africa is reeling from extraordinarily high unemployment rates, billions in unaccounted-for COVID-19 relief funds, unmet anti-corruption promises despite over R1 billion spent on the State Capture Commission, and the persistent stain of record-breaking inequality, this repackaging of elite consensus under the guise of public consultation serves less as a moment of national renewal and more as a mask for political inertia and stagnation.
President Ramaphosa has repeatedly evaded accountability, from the courts' sealing of the funders of his CR17 campaign to his choreographed evasion of prosecution over the Phala Phala scandal, and his murky ties to Glencore, a multinational corporation convicted of corruption. Unfortunately, Ramaphosa remains suspended in a legitimacy crisis, presiding over a nation that no longer trusts its institutions or the moral authority of its leadership.
We warrant interrogating the motives, structure and implications of Ramaphosa's National Dialogue, exposing it as a costly exercise in obfuscation, elite preservation, and democratic deferral.
The invocation of historical continuity with earlier dialogues like CODESA and the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, both often uncritically celebrated, attempts to root the initiative in national tradition.
However, such parallels are romanticised and deeply misleading. Past dialogues often resulted in elite pacts that deferred economic transformation and marginalised grassroots voices. Without addressing the exclusions of these earlier processes, the call for continuity becomes performative nostalgia.
Ramaphosa's emphasis on national unity comes amid systemic crises: poverty, inequality, crime, corruption, and alarming unemployment. Yet appeals to unity can obscure the state's role in perpetuating these crises.
Genuine unity must emerge from structural change, not rhetorical overtures. If the dialogue becomes a mechanism to pacify dissent or dilute public anger, it risks deepening disillusionment rather than healing it.
The R700 million allocated to this process is both ethically and economically indefensible. In a country grappling with failing public services, mass unemployment, and chronic inequality, such a sum represents misplaced priorities. It also raises the spectre of procurement abuse and elite enrichment through politically connected consultancies. The dialogue risks being perceived as a procurement bonanza masquerading as a civic renewal.
Volunteerism, not financial excess, should underpin participatory democracy. If civil society, faith-based organisations, and community leaders are expected to engage, their participation should stem from moral commitment, not monetary incentives. The budget undermines the ethos of civic mobilisation and reinforces the perception of a state addicted to performative governance.
The proposed group of eminent persons, intended to steer the process, raises concerns about legitimacy and representativeness. Too often, such groups are curated to exclude dissenting voices and elevate those aligned with the President. This risks turning the eminent person group into a curated echo chamber rather than a forum for critical engagement. Without accountability mechanisms, it becomes a technocratic buffer shielding the state from scrutiny.
The promise of delivering a shared national vision and a social compact is fraught with contradictions. South Africa's political and economic fractures cannot be papered over with aspirational language. Without addressing systemic inequalities and redistributing power, the compact risks becoming an exercise in the lowest-common-denominator consensus that prioritises stability over justice.
Claims that the dialogue will inform Vision 2030 and the National Development Plan must be treated with caution. South Africa suffers not from a lack of policy frameworks but from weak enforcement, lack of political will, and institutional incoherence. Without binding mechanisms for implementation and monitoring, the dialogue's outcomes may simply gather dust.
Stakeholder buy-in is frequently cited, yet seldom interrogated. Who are these stakeholders, and how are they selected? If civil society is co-opted into legitimising predetermined agendas, or if critical voices are excluded, then buy-in becomes a euphemism for top-down control. The dialogue's legitimacy depends on its ability to disrupt, not entrench, existing power structures.
Unity, as presented, appears more as political camouflage than a genuine commitment. The dialogue provides a convenient narrative cover for the 7th Administration's 'Government of National Unity', a grand coalition that serves political elites rather than the public. In doing so, it risks silencing dissent, stabilising elite bargains, and consolidating Ramaphosa's tenuous grip on power to ensure the fate of recalling his predecessors [ Mbeki and Zuma] suffered is avoided.
Why now? The timing coincides not with a sudden eruption of national crisis, these crises are long-standing, but with Ramaphosa's need to paper over his direct failure of leadership. The dialogue deflects from the state's failures and attempts to reposition the President as a unifier rather than a figure presiding over institutional decay.
Calls to shape a common ethos or build national direction ring hollow in a context of widespread mistrust. Unity without justice is pacification; participation without accountability is tokenism. The risk is that the process becomes another technocratic ritual, managed from above, and disconnected from the needs and aspirations of the people.
The proposed National Dialogue, far from being a platform for transformation, emerges as a shield for political stagnation. It reflects a government increasingly reliant on symbolic politics, bureaucratic rituals, and costly consultations to mask the absence of structural reform.
Until South Africa's leadership demonstrates genuine accountability, moral courage, and ethical governance, no amount of dialogue—however lavishly funded—can rescue the nation from its democratic malaise.
What South Africa needs is not another elite-managed conversation, but a democratic reckoning, a redistribution of power, and a reimagining of governance rooted in justice, equity, and the dignity of all its people.
* Clyde N.S. Ramalaine is a theologian, political analyst, lifelong social and economic justice activist, published author, poet, and freelance writer.
** The views expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of IOL, Independent Media or The African.