The intergovernmental relations challenge of the Zuma administration is snowballing into a cooperation quagmire that requires political maturity similar to the pre-1994 democratic breakthrough elections. The political grandstanding of party leaders and spokespersons can only polarise the environment with grass and elephant consequences for the electorate. The need to understand the nature of these relations outside 2009 electoral mandates and 2011 local government electioneering contexts becomes critical for those charged with the responsibility to govern.

The wish by a DA-led Western Cape administration to operate as though provinces have a defined role in the National Executive should either be toned down, or a reality check on the extent to which a provincial administration can dent the direction of the National Executive be made. The strategic references to the Republic’s central government as the federal government can only recreate the federal-unitary state debate that characterised the CODESA negotiations.

It is now a historical fact that the debate was not completed, albeit repudiated by subsequent national legislations of the post-1994 state forming era.

The South African Constitution establishes South Africa as one sovereign state with a government constituted as national, provincial and local spheres of government that are distinctive, interdependent and interrelated. As convention would dictate that a country’s constitution reflects the socio-political emotional state of a nation at the time of its drafting, South Africa’s constitution reflects the bargaining characteristic of the Nelson Mandela nation creation era. Fundamental to this characteristic was the need to create a common vision for South Africa at all costs, and this included discounting future realities.

Zimbabwean socio-political emotion created a liberation war truimphalist constitution that locked power in a President-dominated parliament with cataclysmic political consequences.

The most classical of these realities in South Africa is the manner in which the executive authority of the republic was abrogated to the different spheres of government. According to the constitution the executive authority of the republic is vested in the President who exercises it together with members of the cabinet. Whist the constitution creates an intergovernmental relations environment underpinned by governance virtues ranging from mutually cooperating with to avoiding litigation against each other; it also empowers the National Executive to supervise provincial administration under certain circumstances. The position of national legislation over sub-national laws is saliently entrenched.

The exactness of the circumstances remains a matter that can only be mediated politically between mandate carriers and constitution defenders.

It is in this context that the call for Madame Zille to review the composition of the Western Cape Cabinet should be understood. If we assume that gender equity, visible non-racialism and equitable service delivery are some of the minimum essential national standards envisaged by the common vision characteristic in the constitution; it will be a violation of the oath of office for the National Executive not to ask questions about administrative activities in the Western Cape. The ‘toe the line’ pronouncement by the cooperative government minister is indicative of a special strand of mandate understanding in the corridors of political power.

Critical to a province’s ability to exercise its defined powers as well as implementing provincial policies envisaged in the constitution, is the provinces’ ability to collect revenue. The racial and gender transformation agenda of the pre-1994 liberation movement that has now become a generic footnote for any policy making and shifts in all spheres of government will, and according to the ANC Manifesto, inform public spending. The ‘stop Zuma’ implementation mechanisms will also have to be footnoted by the same agenda. The space for spending nationally collected revenue outside the national transformation mandate is not as wide as that of spending local government raised revenue on the same basis.

The need therefore for the cooperative governance space to be anchored by the principles of consultation, respect and citizen-centeredness cannot be overstated. Intergovernmental relations practise accepts that the decisions of the ultimate political authority in the form of budgets, judicially justifiable legislation, proclamations and regulations should guide public officials (elected and appointed) when interacting and transacting. The truth about the RSA IGR environment is that it has the potential to disrupt the flow of government and thus requiring a political attitude that sees all South Africans as one people in different geographical locations.
 The South African IGR environment procures therefore for the review of how established national forums operate in the electorally redefined political landscape; the reconfiguration and reformation of IGR structures such that the resources for collective and national consciousness building and commitment to nation-building are developed; the foregrounding of non-negotiable minimum national standards such as non-racialism, gender equity and the indivisibility of the South African State; and a monitoring process that decodes the filtered silences from provincial constituencies dwarfed by electoral fate