MR ZUMA - ARE YOU LISTENING

Very apt Fikile-Ntsikelelo, but I would venture to say that there are occassions when Zuma doesn't listen at all. Since you brought up his 'rape' case, let's start there. Clearly he didn't listen when she said that she 'didn't want to have sexual relations' with him.

So you see - clearly his 'listening' is selective! Perhaps he has a hearing aid that he turns on and off!

Mr Zuma, are you listening?
Fikile-Ntsikelelo Moya: COMMENT
20 March 2007 11:59

Jacob Zuma is indeed a remarkable man. Witness his apparent political strategy. He has turned the effortless behaviour of keeping quiet while others say what they think into a political attribute. His supporters have not stopped telling us that he listens.

This is part of the Zuma package -- wisdom, humility, man of the people. One Who Listens. And on the strength of this, he is a great choice for his party and the presidency of the republic. “He is a man who listens. He does not take the approach of an intellectual king,” says a Zuma supporter, quoted on the Friends of Jacob Zuma website.

Now, unless I have not been paying sufficient attention, little has been said about what life would be like should Zuma become president. He never shares what he thinks about his plans for the country. We don’t know whether there will be any shifts in macroeconomic or ­foreign policy.

But we can be sure of one thing: if Zuma becomes president, there will be a lot of listening at the Union Buildings. And, perhaps, a president who stays at home, but apparently this has not been mentioned as one of his better attributes. Zuma’s supporters point to the fact that he will be implementing ANC policy, and it is therefore not necessary for him to expound on policy matters.

I imagine psychologists and others within the ANC who make a living from listening to others rubbing their hands gleefully at the prospect of leading Africa’s oldest liberation movement. In fact, Zuma will say that we are jumping the gun. He has never said that he wants to be president but, being the good cadre that he is, he will listen and comply should his movement’s supporters insist at the Polokwane showdown in December that he is the best man for the job.

It is a pity that his supporters don’t seem to think or make much of the fact that he was the first ANC leader sent by the exiled leadership to engage with the apartheid government after the unbanning of the ANC. The party strategists must have known that he would listen to the De Klerk government, perhaps even charm it into making concessions it otherwise wouldn’t have, had they sent one Thabo Mbeki, whose greatest flaw, we are to surmise, is that he does not listen.

But Zuma’s greatest strength may also be his greatest weakness. It was his tendency to listen that got him into trouble before. His rape accuser told the Johannesburg High Court that she went to Zuma’s house because he was an “uncle” who listened. Look where that got him. The National Prosecuting Authority is pleading with Mauritian authorities to provide a diary that it hopes will prove that, at the very least, Zuma listened to offers of a bribe. But he has not stopped listening. He recently went on a charm offensive in the Afrikaner community. He listened to their fears of crime and then offered: “I think the problem is that there is less talk between the Afrikaner community and those in authority to say what are the problems.” In other words, the government is not listening to Afrikaners, and Afrikaners are not listening to the government.

I would not therefore be surprised if Parliament’s battle cry for this year, masijule ngengxoxo [let us deepen conversations] was his brainchild. I will be watching the Friends website for confirmation. When he does share his vision for the future, it is clearly on the basis of having listened intently. After visiting the family of a slain Johannesburg florist, he opined: “It is important that the entire nation be mobilised against crime.” Deep stuff.

The people of Khutsong, the township that refuses to accept that it is now part of North West province, have appealed to him to listen. And, according to some media reports, he has responded, not uncharacteristically, by saying that he is willing to listen to their concerns. I accept that listening is a great attribute. I recommend it wholeheartedly. But, for a nation that has so many structural and policy challenges, it would be dandy if we had a leader who planned to do a little bit more than that.