Rosh Hashanah 2009 - South African Jewish Board of Deputies

JEWISH AFFAIRS ROSH HASHANAH 2009the time. There were important left-leaning Jewsrepresenting the ANC in Parliament, like Jeff Peiresand Andrew Feinstein, but all that’s tailed off. ANCwhite support was at its lowest-ever ebb in this lastelection.Feinstein was quite disillusioned with the ANC inthe end, writing a book to that effect after resigningfrom Parliament. 1Absolutely – disillusionment has very much takenroot. Minorities in general have turned away fromthe ANC, which has also lost significant colouredand Indian support and is becoming de facto auniracial party. They do, of course, appoint minoritiesto Cabinet posts, even if this can be seen as a form ofcooption, and they have a praiseworthy attitude todiversity, in which everyone gets a place in the sun.Turning to yourself and your own career, whatmotivated you to go into politics?Moral outrage against apartheid, actually – I feltit was the right thing to do. I went knocking on doorsfor Douglas Gibson of the Progressive Federal Partin the Bezuidenhout constituency in 1981. Then, Iwas not a member of the party, but a volunteer. (Onthat point, the PFP had a high calibre of peopleinvolved as volunteers in those days, giving time andexpertise for what they saw as a worthy cause). Iformally joined the PFP in 1987, and lost the councilseat to Howard Bloomberg of the National Party thefollowing year, by 28 votes. It was Bloomberg’sfather, Sam, who got me into politics in the firstplace, in fact – I was outraged that Jews werestanding for the National Party. But ultimately, Isuppose I am intrinsically a political animal.I was elected unopposed in the Highlands Northconstituency in August 1991, becoming the youngestmember of the DP in the Johannesburg caucus. After1994, I jumped over everyone’s heads to become oneof only five DP members in the Gauteng Legislatureand, because so few were elected in 1994, I am todaythe longest-serving DP-DA MPL in the country.The DP did very badly in the 1994 nationalelections, but already was performing somewhatmore strongly in the subsequent municipal elections.We did appallingly in 1994, winning only sevenparliamentary seats. We recovered to a degree in themunicipal elections, and still had a base inJohannesburg, but the real breakthrough came in1999. There we emerged as a much larger party, withmore opportunities. However, even in our smallishcaucus prior to that we had Jews like Peter Horwitzand Peter Leon. Today, even at branch level, there islittle Jewish participation, although I see Jews asbeing very active in civic activism – rate-payersassociations and so on – in Cape Town as well asJohannesburg. But it is very hard to get any whites,Jewish and non-Jewish, involved politicallynowadays.Could you tell us something about your rolewithin the Gauteng Legislature over the years – whatkind of issues you focused on and what you feel yourmain achievements have been?I’ve been Health spokesman since 1994. I wasnot particularly enamoured with doctors and hospitalsand suchlike, but was given the portfolio and ranwith it. Certainly, my name recognition today onhospitals is high. I pioneered hospital visits by politicalrepresentatives, and still visit hospitals very regularly,acting on complaints. The DA’s policy on health waslargely written by myself – I think it’s not enough forthe Opposition just to criticise; we have to havealternate policies as well.With regard to hospital visits, the then GautengHealth MEC Brian Hlongwa tried to bar me fromconducting them, but Advocate Jules Browde of theIntegrity Commission ruled in my favour, saying Icould visit whenever I felt it necessary without priornotice. So I have an official ruling, applicable to anyinstitution, which I regard as a victory for all publicrepresentatives.I also now have a new portfolio, called Corruption(which is all pervasive across the board and not justin the health sphere). Actually, I believe I havealready been very successful in exposing corruption,uncovering areas that people would prefer to remainhidden. I certainly was the one who brought downBrian Hlongwa, and can claim to have had some partin Paul Mashatile not being reappointed as GautengPremier.Over the past five years, I’ve asked 380 questionsin the Legislature, acquiring something of a reputationfor this. The ANC was very hostile to questionsinitially. We started off with the spirit of ‘nationalunity’, in which asking a question was regarded asbeing almost disloyal. I can probably claim to havebeen the highest profile member of the Legislaturesince 1994. The former Speaker even acknowledgedthis, calling me the ‘spokesperson for the Legislature’and saying that if it wasn’t for me people wouldn’tknow that the Legislature even existed.Presumably, one of the regular issues you’vebrought up has been the HIV/Aids question.Yes. I was the first politician in Gauteng to callfor anti-retrovirals for pregnant women and rapevictims. In fact, I was publicly credited in theLegislature by former Gauteng Premier MosiuoaShilowa with having influenced him in this regard. Iwas also the first to call on Mandela to make astatement on it. Looking back to the 1990s, we seehow late we were in mobilising on this. I got intosome controversy recently because I disapproved ofcondoms in schools, saying in general that condomswere not necessarily the answer (Gauteng hasdistributed over a billion condoms over the past tenyears and the HIV rate has hardly budged). I wasattacked for this by Zachie Achmat and NathanGeffen from the Treatment Action Campaign – was5