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The transition (1989−1999): the activists, the exiles and the technocrats
The early 1990s was a period of considerable change in South Africa. Democracy was knocking and the task of institution building beckoned. Freedom had finally arrived for those South Africans who had fought apartheid from within, those who had taken up the cause in exile, and those who had sought opportunity elsewhere. This was a time of renewal, remaking and reimagining in the polity which would be known as the ‘new’ South Africa.
As the apartheid state ceased fire and prepared to negotiate a pathway to democracy, liberation movements had to redirect their energies from the struggle and prepare for the probable responsibility of governing. In the retelling of this multidimensional story, the vivid memories of those entrusted with this immense and complex task of institutional renewal, remaking and reimagining are relied upon.
A series of interviews was conducted between April 2020 and January 2021 to piece together an account of this period which redefined South Africa’s governance paradigm from one of repression to one anchored in the principles of constitutional democracy. The National Treasury − which then comprised the Department of Finance and the Department of State Expenditure − and the SARB were sites of contestation as the two levers of macroeconomic policy.
The interviews centred on the transition, the SARB’s self-directed identity makeover, the varying versions of how the SARB’s independence clause was arrived at in the final Constitution, the SARB’s working relationship with the National Treasury in the early days of democracy and beyond, and the changes to the central bank’s institutional culture.
Economic crises, South Africa’s reintegration into the global financial community and the idiosyncrasies of the rand also feature in later segments. Furthermore, a comparative analysis is provided on the 2008 global financial crisis and COVID-19 in terms of the fiscal and monetary responses.
These themes and shifts dominated during the governorships of Dr Chris Stals (1989−1999), Tito Mboweni (1999−2009), Gill Marcus (2009−2014) and Lesetja Kganyago (2014−present).
Dr Stals, Dr XP Guma, Prof. Jannie Rossouw, James Cross, Dr Renosi Mokate, Ian Plenderleith, Dr Ernie van der Merwe, Lambertus ‘Bertus’ van Zyl, Francois Groepe, Trevor Manuel, Maria Ramos, Brian Kahn and Lungisa Fuzile helped in this exercise.
So, too, did Barbara Hogan, Ismail Momoniat, Deputy Governor Kuben Naidoo, former Deputy Governor Daniel Mminele, Joel Netshitenzhe, Governor Kganyago, former Governor Mboweni, Deputy Governor Fundi Tshazibana, Deputy Governor Dr Rashad Cassim, Unathi Kamlana, Dr Mandla Gantsho and Adv. John Myburgh.
The SARB’s quest for a new identity: Stals’s first term (1989−1994)
In 1987, before President F W de Klerk’s era-defining speech in 1990, the SARB moved to a new home in Pretoria. Church Square had served its purpose, so it was time, once again, for a change of scenery for the growing central bank.
When Stals assumed duties as Governor in 1989, he started the process of drafting the SARB’s mission statement. This was in line with the first King Report on Corporate Governance, “an important document at the time,” according to Stals.
Governor Stals attending a briefing session in Parliament. /Reuters via Getty Images