Tide turns on SA’s age of hope

Up, up and away: Under President Cyril Ramaphosa South Africa has done very well since his 2018 State of the Nation Address and is on an upward trajectory, the writer argues.

- Cornelius Monama

Up, up and away: Under President Cyril Ramaphosa South Africa has done very well since his 2018 State of the Nation Address and is on an upward trajectory, the writer argues.

In every nation’s journey, there are defining moments when change gathers irreversible momentum, when the accumulated weight of decay and disillusionment finally yields to an irresistible surge of renewal.

Today, South Africa stands at such a threshold. After a prolonged period of institutional erosion, economic stagnation and social uncertainty, evidence is mounting that the tide has turned.

All indicators point to a country firmly on a positive trajectory. Even patriots inclined towards scepticism and cautious optimism about South Africa’s path are convinced that the country has entered a second age of hope.

Yet those whose eyes are trained to see only failure are unlikely to notice this palpable progress. Predictably, they continue to portray a picture of doom and gloom over a nation reclaiming its potential.

In his 2018 State of the Nation Address, President Cyril Ramaphosa spoke eloquently of a decisive break with our ugly past. He called on South Africans to “put behind us the era of diminishing trust in public institutions and weakened confidence in our country’s leaders,” urging the nation to shed the negativity that had defined the state-capture era.

He declared that a new dawn was upon us — one inspired by the memory of Nelson Mandela and grounded in the renewal of ethical leadership and capable institutions.

For almost a decade, state capture hollowed out institutions, normalised corruption and redirected the machinery of the state away from the public good. The economy stalled because governance foundations had been deliberately weakened.