Unite for change: a chance to hit reset button

ABOUT thirty years ago the good ship, Democracy ZA, set sail on a Constitutional mission to heal the divisions of the past through building a united nation, improving the quality of life and freeing the potential of all citizens.

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It was a noble quest embodied by an extraordinary generation of leaders and endorsed by the overwhelming majority of South Africans and global nations.

The major political parties were a triumphant liberation movement and the party of apartheid that had previously led the State. The apartheid party has since dissolved but its role in opposing the objectives of the liberation movement continued when its ideologues joined forces with an old liberal party.

Though the protagonists both claim to represent non-racialism, the perpetuation of their old dynamic has been a major contributor to holding South Africa back.

Instead of focusing on building unity, improving quality of life and freeing potential, what was the anti-apartheid struggle evolved into contestation over ownership of apartheid's spoils. Instead of South Africans growing closer together, we've seen the rise of identity politics and politicians who want to shoot down the Constitutional provisions for nonracial justice.

In the meantime, billions of rand have been stolen, tens of millions of South Africans don't have jobs, economic growth has been stunted for years, municipalities are too dysfunctional to deliver basic services, and criminals roam the streets without fear of a broken criminal justice system.

Thus a gaping chasm has opened up at the centre of SA politics. A void that poetry-loving former President foresaw in his repeated recitation of the words of WB Yeats, in The Second Coming:

· "Turning and turning in the widening gyre

· "The falcon cannot hear the falconer;