[DEBATE] : (Fwd) Mohau and Lebohang Pheko crit Mbeki

[Patrick Bond]

www.pambazuka.org

LETTER TO THABO MBEKI FROM AFRICAN WOMEN
Mohau Pheko and Lebohang Pheko

South African leader Thabo Mbeki, in his state of the nation address  
at the opening of parliament in Cape Town last Friday, focused on  
plans to support government's accelerated and shared growth  
initiative (Asgi), aimed at boosting economic growth and job  
creation. But Mohau Pheko and Lebohang Pheko, from the Gender & Trade  
Network in Africa, take Mbeki to task for failing to adequately  
consider the country's women in his latest plans to fast-track growth.


Dear Mr. President Thabo Mbeki,

You have missed a great opportunity in the State of the Nation  
Address to articulate the problems confronting the women of South  
Africa. Why is it after 50 years of contributing to resistance,  
opinions, wisdoms and economic growth in this country when you  
mention us in your speeches we are merely lumped together with the  
disabled who should also take exception to this patronising  
marginalisation.

Since this is the 50th year that women celebrate their tremendous  
contribution to this country, it is worth using it to sum up what the  
last 12 years have been like in terms of economic policy. In adopting  
a market led macroeconomic strategy, we should tell you that the  
relationship between women, markets and the state has been  
increasingly complex. The market in the past 12 years has not acted  
in the interest of women nor has the state always acted in the  
interests of women. This has resulted in a rather disconnected policy  
framework which has failed to accurately evaluate the realities of  
women's lives which are controlled through the interaction of  
economic, political, social and cultural forces based on class,  
gender and race. The policy framework has also failed to evaluate  
women's role in social reproduction and how they maintain life within  
the family and communities they live in.


It is deplorable that women in the South Africa's policy framework  
are still treated as dependents and instruments for family survival  
or state objectives. South Africa has long neglected gender as a  
category in the economic analysis of poverty, growth, inequality and  
the concentration of wealth. The frameworks suggested for poverty  
eradication by 2014 do not empower the majority of women in their own  
right. They tend to view women from a skewed perspective of  
'neediness' rather than recognizing women's wisdom, intellect, and  
achievements.

More importantly the assumptions in your Accelerated and Shared  
Growth Initiative for South Africa (ASGISA) do not spell out how the  
women of this country stand to benefit from this plan. The latest  
labour survey still reports that women are the most unemployed in the  
country. The most recent United Nations Human Development Report for  
South Africa confirms that women are still the poorest in our country  
and this trend is downward. In ASGISA, who are you accelerating  
growth for? How will you ensure that women qualitatively and  
quantitatively share in this growth? What type of growth are you  
talking about? The pattern of growth is as important as the rate of  
growth. Some growth patterns even if they increase per capita income  
and consumption may in the long run be detrimental to women as we  
have experienced in the current neo liberal framework. Economic  
growth without a distribution mechanism is inimical to women.  
Economic growth that depends on cuts in public expenditure,  
productivity, on labour deregulation are a danger to women in this  
country. Growth patterns or resource allocation that do not  
meaningfully integrate women, or result in growth equity are all  
costly to the women of this nation.

Many of your policy makers and public servants do not understand that  
women experience poverty differently from men due to gender  
inequalities resulting in different access to entitlements, economic  
leverage and social advancement. Women are subjected to the  
intergenerational transfer of poverty. Women have fewer economic  
resources, less access to labour markets. They shoulder greater  
responsibilities at the household level and many have restrictions on  
their mobility. These interlocking disadvantages result in women  
having less time to access your expanded works programme and less  
power to negotiate opportunities. How will ASGISA respond?

Gender equity is the power relationship that enables men and women to  
have equal access to the scarce and valued resources of their  
society. Within asymmetrical, unequal power relations at the  
household level women are the least powerful. These asymmetries  
include employment, education, wages, personal autonomy, healthcare,  
leisure and decision-making. The over weaning posture and support  
given to the male private sector has not been extended to women in  
the same way. Business and Economic Commissions set up to advise the  
President are still dominated by males. Trading enterprises have put  
severe limitations on market opportunities for many impoverished  
women and has allocated to them the nooks and crevices. The issue is  
not just the quantity of market opportunities it is also the quality.  
Many women work in the informal market under conditions of  
insecurity, are subjected to police harassment and exploitation and  
have little bargaining power and freedom to organize. At the same  
time, the commercialization of common property and cutbacks and  
privatization of healthcare and education have deprived women in  
poverty of access to affordable resources to improve their  
conditions. To what extent does ASGISA address these issues and how  
will it act as a catalyst in changing these critical dimensions?

The growth process suggested in ASGISA will in fact create new  
patterns of poverty deprivation for women because the issues that  
create inequality have been embedded and reproduced in ASGISA. In our  
country, women are responsible for social reproduction and daily  
household management. Since ASGISA is dependent on labour  
flexibility, inadvertently, women are the ones who will pay the cost  
by having to devise coping and survival strategies when household  
incomes fall and prices rise.

When food prices increase, when user charges for water, healthcare,  
electricity, and education are introduced and increased, the access  
of women to these services is affected, especially in a situation of  
poverty. There has been the casualisation of women's work to lower  
unit labour cost, not just in the informal sector but also in the  
formal sector in terms of outsourcing or subcontracting arrangements.  
What is happening is that economic growth will depend on increased  
efficiency becoming a transfer cost subsidized by women from the paid  
economy to the unpaid work of women at the household level. That  
second economy you keep talking about consists of millions of women  
who subsidise the first economy without any fruits of growth accruing  
to them. Women especially in the rural and peri-urban areas are  
concentrated in the agricultural sector and the informal sector where  
the rate of growth and the potential for growth is relatively low to  
non-existent. In the industrial sectors women are concentrated in the  
unskilled or semi-skilled categories and have limited access to  
opportunities and benefits of economic development and growth. Is  
ASGISA a sufficient tool for standing up to these challenges?

The role of the State in distributing resources along gender, class  
and race lines to ensure access is critical if there is to be any  
meaningful developmental benefit for women. These social constructs  
and lived realties are essential mediating factors. The State is not  
a private company but a nation requiring government intervention to  
enable social cohesion, people participation and conscious  
distribution of the fruits of growth.

* Mohau Pheko and Lebohang Pheko are with the Gender & Trade Network  
in Africa, which works on international trade providing  
macroeconomic, trade, and policy literacy on the Africa continent. It  
works in 18 countries and is linked to the International Gender &  
Trade Network based in Brazil. Contact 082 6702505/084 881 9327