JUSTICE MALALA | Storms are brewing, and there’s no intelligence on when and how they’ll strike

Last month, on June 22, Australian prime minister Anthony Albanese announced the country’s top intelligence official would investigate national security threats that arose from climate change. Albanese said director-general of the Office of National Intelligence Andrew Shearer would assess “the implications for national security of climate change”.

It would be interesting to find out whether, in its orgy of looting between 2009 and 2018, our State Security Agency ever produced a report on the implications of climate change for SA’s national security.

I can bet you a few bob that it did not. Instead, it was busy funnelling money to Jacob Zuma (David Mahlobo paid him a staggering R4.5m a month), spending R54m on attempts to destroy the DA and the EFF, and making up lies about judges and journalists.

The collapse of our national intelligence agencies in that period, and the Cyril Ramaphosa administration’s failure to do anything about it, has had terrible consequences. It would be interesting to ask Siyabonga Cwele, the first state security minister of the Zuma administration, and his successors Mahlobo and Bongani Bongo, if they ever did any deep dive into climate change and its risks. It would be interesting to ask the same of Ramaphosa’s appointees to the portfolio, Ayanda Dlodlo and Mondli Gungubele.

It is worth asking them this question because in April this year more than 435 people died when floods destroyed houses, infrastructure, roads, bridges and buildings in Durban and large chunks of KwaZulu-Natal. Tens of people are still missing, thousands face hunger and starvation, thousands are still homeless. One source says it is one of the deadliest natural disasters in SA in the 21st century.

Now, imagine if the SSA had kept itself busy with real threats such as climate change, which is the direct cause of the KZN floods. If that had happened, we would not be sitting with more than R17bn-worth of damage caused by the floods.

If the SSA was awake and independent, strategies to move communities from dangerous areas would have been considered and implemented.

If the SSA was awake and independent, strategies to move communities from dangerous areas would have been considered and implemented. Ways and means to secure food distribution infrastructure would have been put in place.

Alas, none of this happened. Why? Our “intelligence agencies” were busy being used to loot and spy on opposition parties.

It is worth reflecting that the US’s National Intelligence Council warned in 2021 that there was a growing risk of conflicts over water and migration (we are already seeing this in Gqeberha and through the actions of the Dudula movement), and more food insecurity (think of unpaid flood relief grants), by 2040. All this, it said, would be triggered by climate change.

Ask yourself what advice the president of our country has received from his “intelligence” apparatus to deal with this mammoth challenge. The sad answer is that he has received zero advice on this. The real and present dangers of our time are not being addressed by our state security apparatus. Climate change is a threat to SA and should be one of our top priorities, but assessing its implications does not put money in the ANC’s pockets or help them in their internecine battles. So it is not a priority.

Let’s consider another real intelligence failure. According to Ramaphosa, two-million people were left unemployed and more than R50bn was “wiped off the economy” because of the July 2021 riots. At least 354 people died in the violence. SA’s reputation is in tatters internationally. The intelligence agencies were caught with their pants down.

Here is what’s worse: the same intelligence agencies have been absolutely useless in helping identify, arrest and convict the perpetrators. Show me any convincing narrative about what happened in SA in that week, emanating from our authorities, and I will happily applaud you. The truth of the matter is that Ramaphosa’s administration is as clueless about a real and continuing danger to our stability, safety and security today as they were last year. Indeed, it would seem Ramaphosa himself doesn’t care. The Zondo commission report says he told of a “major review” of the SSA. The truth, it found, is that the probe had “stalled”. The man is sitting on his hands.

All this underlines one crucial fact: After 30 years in power, the ANC has demonstrated that it is totally incapable of differentiating between national priorities and its own priorities. When the ANC says it is for the poor, it actually means it is for the R90 it takes in corruption off every R100 that is meant for the upliftment of the poor.

SA’s worst enemy is the ANC. Just study the past 12 years and you will see how ANC priorities have trumped national priorities.