After the Party: Corruption, the ANC and South Africa's Uncertain Future [Paperback]

Reading this book about ANC corruption and incompetence one is struck by how deeply torn the writer is about his subject. To say Mr. Feinstein -an ex-ANC MP- is in two minds about what he wants to convey here is to dreamily understate the struggle he must have gone though to pen this book. It is obvious that Feinstein really wants to lift the lid on the corruption he inadvertently helped uncover but it is as if he can barley bring himself to face the reality of what his beloved ANC was/is complicit in. On the one hand he valiantly attempts a post mortem on the corruption surrounding the ANC's arms deal while oddly on page after page he effusively complements the same party on it's wonderful competency and great achievements. It is this `double-think' that makes this book such a terrible chore to wade through. One feels that Feinstein and the publishers might have done better to hand the writing duties over to another person who could focus more objectively on the facts without adding the layers of complex emotion and ambivalent personal issues to the mix. Alternatively, good editing pass on his book might have distilled his thoughts and revelations into a more cohesive and altogether more powerful account. The excision of superfluous filler like the digression of the `On being Jewish' chapter would have helped focus the book on the subject at hand.

One of the most revealing moments of the writers mental twostep occurs in chapter 16 where Feinstein addresses the slack way Mbeki handled the xenophobic attacks of 2008. He opines in referring to Mbeki that `the Emperor's clothes, already looking threadbare after Polokwane, were turning to rags'. It is redundant to point out that the Emperor in the fable Feinstein refers to, had no clothes whatsoever. So it is a telling slip on his part to suggest that even the most threadbare attire covered the royal personage. It is as if Feinstein has heard the little boy proclaim the truth of the bare-assedness of the Emperor but can only bring himself to furtively view the truth. The nakedness of Mbeki was of course proved by an alarmingly long list of policy failures: the HIV/AIDS denials, cover-ups, systemic corruption, incompetence in service delivery, running blackouts, centralization of power, undermining of the judicial system, flouting constitution, etc, etc... but Feinstein wants to almost excuse these shortcomings. So he fools himself into seeing torn garments on his king, sadly by that stage the sheer mass of these issues has clearly shown that Mbeki's was practically a failed presidency.

Then there are many other instances where Feinstein's lapse of moral courage contributes to the almost pneumatic undermining of his and the ANC governments claim of a morally superior stance. Feinstein admits -on occasion- to these personal failings and cowardice. Sadly, he is less candid about the ANC governments failings... One of the most shocking occasions is when he admits his huge relief when Winnie Mandella once more manages to slip out of the process of justice -using a `statute of limitations' type loophole- and live to not tell the tale or be held accountable! Feinstein reasons that Winnie will be spared `further embarrassment' around her involvement with shady dealings and un-approved spending of government money. The rather massive cost to the ANC's credibility, national accountability and ANC responsibility is evidently of less importance to him than the `embarrassment' to one of the party's high profile renegades is. One trembles at the sight of this indentured thinking.

Andrew Feinstein says -quite proudly- that he has to ability to talk to the press with `great sincerity but little substance'. A quite revealing comment coming from an ex-politician and one of the few times in his book where he dares to be as unflinchingly honest as he would have us believe he is in the rest of this book. Of course it can be said that this insight into Feinstein's relations to the press is hardly anything new since we are very well versed in the tedious obfuscations and clammy manoeuvrings of our public servants. But this type of double book-keeping on Feinstein's part is what undermines his `tell-all' expose. It's as if he is unable to fully rid himself of the double-speak that politicians deem such a necessary skill. The ability to dodge questions might be a boon to a public figure but it is a massive liability in a writer. Especially a one who wants to cast a light of truth on his party's sad machinations.

On top of that, Mr. Feinstein diminishes the import of the rather drearily obvious conclusions his tale leads us to, that is that the ANC has been -since it took power, or very shortly thereafter- systemically riddled with corruption, incompetence and internal factional fighting. (Proof of this can be seen in the way Mbeki waylaid his rivals for leadership toward the end of Mandela's reign.) However, Feinstein would have us believe that this infighting and jockeying for position is all a very recent occurrence and that the west's influence is mostly to blame for this sorry state of affairs. At one point he says that to imagine S.A. is just another failed African state is racist and a caricature of a continent that `comprises 54 states, 18 `new' democracies and over 300 languages'. However the terrible and deeply embarrassing fact remains that most African states are being plundered by their ruling elites and that most of these countries have been sovereign states for over 50 years. He insists that the blame for the bulk of the post colonial era's misdeeds are not -at least- to be shared between the ex-colonial powers and Africa's kleptomaniac leaders, but that the West carries the vast bulk of the blame while letting the oligarchs off the hook as virtual poorly-done-by victims. In short, Feinstein skirts very close to the noble-savage fallacy and the deeply intrinsic racism of that rather lame liberal view seems to completely escape him.

Feinstein used to be a ANC MP and toed the party line obsequiously from the Mandela era through to Mbeki's AIDS denialism and centralization of power only to quit in hot indignation at the barefaced interference of the Mbeki/ANC government in the investigation into the Arms deal. This obeisance lies at the very heart of his book. While at times it seems he genuinely wants to set the record straight it is a pity that he lacks the guts to fulfil his self-defined brief. It is quite laughably mendacious of him to -whenever he gets a chance- insult the abilities and competency of all the opposition politicians while almost ululating the praises of most of the ANC cadres when the falsehood of this idea so abundantly on display. He quite frankly insults his readers by doing this. He takes it for granted that his readers will -like him- blindly accept the argument that the ANC was after it was unbanned a paragon of competency, unity and moral dignity. While the latter is more easily provable, the former is contradicted by public record.

Aside from these tedious aspects Feinstein does relay an impression of the depth of the moral morass the ANC/State has manoeuvred themselves into. And for that part of the book this is a worthwhile read, pity then that it is only from about halfway through that we get to the grist of his intent. Compared with the slew of recent books on S.A. and Africa, among them R. W. Johnsons `The Rainbow Nation' and Richard Dowden's `Africa', `After the Party' is a rather muddlingly dualistic affair.