Recently, the leading political party in South Africa, the African National Congress (ANC), hosted a Liberation Summit, with invitations extended to other like-minded liberation movements in Southern Africa. The initiative is commendable, given that such gatherings have been rare in this part of the continent.

The theme of the summit was: "Defending the Liberation Gains, Advancing Integrated Socio-Economic Development, Strengthening Solidarity for a Better Africa".

This evokes the African Peer Review Mechanism (APRM), once a promising initiative intended to foster erudition on governance challenges across the continent.

For Africa to advance development and achieve the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals by 2030, it must build effective and efficient infrastructure. Yet, the greatest impediments to this development lie in governance.

The APRM was thus crafted to focus explicitly on governance among African member states. It was intended as a tool for sharing experiences, reinforcing best practices, identifying deficiencies, and assessing capacity-building needs to support policies, standards and practices that foster political stability, high economic growth, sustainable development, and accelerated sub-regional and continental economic integration.

Its language was impressive—clearly, those behind the initiative were keenly aware of Africa’s governance challenges. Unfortunately, little discernible progress has been made since its inception. This raises a difficult question: was the intention genuine? And a similar question might be posed about the recent Liberation Movements Summit.

Nonetheless, reflective efforts must be encouraged.

One of the greatest failures of African liberation movements was their inability to define and develop a distinctly African philosophy.

Had such a philosophy been articulated, it could have provided the foundation for a compatible socio-economic system. Instead, these movements adopted either Western capitalist or Eastern socialist models—systems foreign to the African context.

Liberation leaders failed to revitalise the social harmony embodied in uBuntu as a guiding philosophy. Consequently, communalism—an economic system promoting self-sufficiency—was neglected.

These movements also underestimated the profound role of African culture and sacred spirituality in shaping society. Instead, they allowed African cultural capital to be eroded, leaving behind fragmented economic and social structures.

Genuine liberation of African societies must be rooted in a Cultural Revolution underpinned by sacred African spirituality. Only then can we see the emergence of a Charter for Self-Sufficiency—a blueprint for the full revival of African identity.

The failure to grasp these dynamics has contributed to what can only be described as modernised slavery. The damage inflicted by colonial regimes demanded a radical intervention in developing human capital. Yet, many of our societies remain dependent, lacking the initiative and means to establish enterprises that could support self-sufficiency.

Liberation movements failed to foster critical thinking and self-sustaining communities.

We must avoid uncritical adulation of liberation leaders. But where credit is due, it must be given.

There are echoes of Julius Nyerere’s thoughts in Chinua Achebe’s reflection: "Africa's postcolonial disposition is the result of a people who have lost the habit of ruling themselves. We have also had difficulty running the new system foisted upon us at the dawn of independence by our colonial masters."

Ignorance plays a major role in the continued exploitation of Africans through foreign narratives, leading to a psychological distortion of worldview. Poverty and ignorance have become the fuel sustaining African democracies, ensuring that colonial puppets remain in power.

DEBT AND INTERNATIONAL FINANCIAL CONTROL

On the international front, newly liberated states were seen as fertile ground for exploitation under the guise of market logic. The dogma of self-regulating markets has saddled these nations with catastrophic debt burdens.

These debts have become instruments of control, dictating what these countries should or should not produce. Former colonies have become consumers of goods produced in the manufacturing workshops of their former colonisers.

Today, we face crippling tariffs from the United States. Most former colonies are ill-prepared for these shocks. Liberation movements like the ANC never fully appreciated that financial independence is essential for national stability.

The desperately needed self-sufficiency of today could have been achieved through a Sovereign Wealth Fund, financed by proceeds from mineral resources.

Instead, the ANC opted for narrow participation in mining wealth, enriching a few through shareholding in the private sector. This move has ridiculed the broader goals of transformation once promised by initiatives like Black Economic Empowerment (BEE). Much could have been achieved through the Reconstruction and Development Programme (RDP), especially Mandela’s ideal of the "RDP of the Soul".

By now, we should be debating how to allocate national wealth for the benefit of future generations. Instead, political elites have profited from the desperation of the masses.

In South Africa today, it's easier to form a political party and peddle rhetoric than to start a business aimed at self-sufficiency. This conundrum has opened the door for oligarchs to exchange favours with political elites, shielding their profits under the pretence of market rationality.

DEMOCRACY, OR SOMETHING ELSE?

Given the theme of the ANC summit, a crucial question arises: can democracy, as it is currently practised, truly redress the legacies of colonial atrocities?

A candid evaluation of the 1994 Social Compact is overdue. That compact resulted in the majority of South Africans becoming cultural and economic minorities in their own country.

This system now demands interrogation by bold systems thinkers—people unafraid to speak truth to power.

South African democracy increasingly resembles a plutocracy, in which the political elite—allegedly including drug cartels—maintain dominance. This raises the alarming prospect that South Africa is not only corrupt but may also qualify as a narco-state.

The liberation summit ought to have addressed these systemic failures:

• The cultural and economic dominance maintained by the 1994 Social Compact.
• The modernisation of slavery via international financial systems.
• The inability to mobilise domestic capital to attain self-sufficiency.
• The failure of democracy to redress historical inequalities.

These challenges are sustained by an insatiable drive for individual greed.

At one point, the ANC championed trickle-down economic policies, assuming that benefits granted to the super-rich would eventually reach the poor. That assumption has been proven false.

It is time for a rigorous examination of the relationship between unregulated wealth and persistent poverty. This conversation might have begun earlier had liberation movements anchored their economic models in African philosophy.

EXPECTATIONS AND THE NATIONAL DIALOGUE

These are my expectations following the Liberation Movements Summit.

They can be explored further and more pragmatically through the upcoming National Dialogue. However, this Dialogue must not avoid the uncomfortable task of reviewing the 1994 Social Compact. It must ask: How can South Africa become a nation? At present, South Africa lacks shared core values.

We have a Constitution—a product of the 1994 Social Compact—but the institutions it established largely excluded the majority population, making them cultural and economic outsiders.

As argued, cultural revival must be central to building truly inclusive institutions. There are lessons to be drawn from the APRM, which attempted to advance sophisticated governance. Yet, institutional governance in South Africa is increasingly becoming a syndicated, joint-criminal enterprise, involving the elected few and their foreign allies, with possible links to organised crime.

The Liberation Summit could provide the intellectual foundation for the National Dialogue. But the Dialogue’s composition is critical. Without rethinking who gets to participate, it risks becoming yet another public relations exercise, designed to legitimise the rule of oligarchs, political elites, and criminal networks.

This situation is unsustainable—it can never be sustainable. We can only hope that sanity prevails. The indefatigable patience of South Africans has been tested enough.

Written by Bongani Mankewu, director, Infrastructure Finance Advisory Institute