Lobbying

LET’S TALK ABOUT IT

By Sisanda Zulu with Maria Paschini

Ya Wakili Student Magazine – 2023-08

What is lobbying in simple terms?

Lobbying is when you have a cause you would like to put forward that no one, especially those in power or those in government are not attending to. Hopefully, you will get more people to support you and then lobby or ask the government to take note of your concerns and what you require to be done.

Is money always involved in those groups?

I don’t think necessarily you have to have money; I think the issue in the world is that people who have money, with lots of money lobby the government to have their agendas put forward which creates the problems. Indirectly money is involved because you still need petrol to get around and if you were to take the money side out of it, I think it would be more genuine.

So more righteous causes could come into being if money was not a factor?

Yes, I mean money seems to rule the world so much these days. Let's say we are looking at the environmental aspect where oil companies have huge amounts of money and they can influence the decisions that are being made. On the other hand, your environmental groups have so little money so it's a David and Goliath kind of thing and hopefully, David would win in this case and if money were taken out of it the playing field would be leveled.

In my understanding when we talk about environmental planning, we are speaking about planning that is cognizant of the environment, we are for development, but it must be in line with conservation. In a space like that, how have you maybe seen lobbying play out?

I don't have a lot of experience in terms of the practicalities of environmental planning, but certainly, if there is more lobbying for the environment to be taken into account, we would see much better urban and rural settlements as far as I can see. I'm sorry I can't really comment more than that on that question, but you're right it is about bringing the environment into the whole planning aspect. We are always looking for balance. We see a scenario where developers, because they have the money have more say, so again if we were to re-balance that so that the environment and social aspects are taken into account.

To try and bring it home a bit, when we did research and saw that countries like the USA have budgets that are dedicated to different groups lobbying for different things. Do you know or are you aware of how lobbying in our country plays out or even politics?

No, that's the short answer. I do not know how it works in South Africa at all and I'm not even aware that it actually happens, but I suppose it does to some extent where you have NGO's trying to lobby the government.

Are there any ethics of lobbying the right way that you are aware of?

Certainly, ethics always plays a major role in terms of what you are lobbying for and how you lobby, but unfortunately in South Africa, just generally, going back to the political arena is that there doesn't seem to be much ethics about how things get done. Certainly, in professions, we try to do things ethically and in the correct way, and there are aspects of doing things ethically when you deal with the government, for instance, where you are in situations that you might not be so comfortable with that always proves to be a challenge and not an easy aspect to deal with.

In a situation where businesses lobby for investments, is there a way to ensure balance, where the government might be for investment but at the same time instructs these corporations to give some investment to SMMEs?

I think so, I think from the government's point of view, as you point out, they can lobby for what you are lobbying for, but you need to look at environmental factors, look at rural areas, look at small businesses or any aspect they have pinpointed. Having NGO's as well on the floor, would also counter balance what business is doing. There always has to be that, we can't just have one (business) overriding everything and we just started by saying that businesses have more money does not mean they have more say.

In a non-profit situation (lobbying for informal settlement upgrading) how do we ensure that the initiative is prioritized, if its business and people are off the profits that are more likely to be prioritized?

Well, again I think the problem in general with the world is that we are chasing profits when perhaps we should be chasing a few other things, social well-being should be at the top of the list. Upgrading an informal settlement is going to require funding and one has to take that into account and speak to the government so that they can budget and bring to their awareness because it's a priority. At the end of the day, informal settlements are not going anywhere anytime soon so they do need to be upgraded into proper settlements.

The last question would then be, do you think that if a concept like lobbying was applied in South Africa for different streams whether it's environmental, politics, or housing would result in change and good initiatives?

Yes definitely, I think we need it, and we need to develop it. If we can get strong lobby groups, it could have a major impact in counterbalancing what's happening in government and it would aid the government in the right direction. It would highlight the aspects that need attention from the grassroots point of view. I think we wait a lot for the top-down approach to happen and the whole thing about lobbying is that it's bottom-up and we need a lot of that in South Africa.