12 Aug 2014 | Tony Leon | Original Publication: The Times
During my brief training four
years ago on how to be an ambassador - which, contrary to expectation, did not
include instruction into how to hold a knife and fork or how to seat big wigs
at the dining table - I did pick up at least one piece of useful advice.
No man is so short as he who
stands on his dignity
One of the old-timers at Pretoria's diplomatic academy told me that most
of my ambassadorial colleagues were "very short". When I expressed
some surprise at this observation, he rejoined: "Yes, no man is so short
as he who stands on his dignity", a reminder of how many diplomats obsess
more about issues of their status than matters of substance.
And then he added a useful reminder: "Those who mind don't matter,
and those who matter don't mind." There is, for example, the rather
ridiculous, but harmless, local and overseas habit of keeping the title
"Ambassador" long after your diplomatic service ends, a practice that
certain of my former colleagues from the world of diplomacy apparently cling to
with cuticle-like intensity well into retirement.
I reminded my instructor that I had spent more than two decades in
parliament and politics. This is an ecosystem where bowing and scraping before
the titled classes of "Minister" and "Premier" and dozens
of others lower down the political food chain, but blessed with some or other
appellation, is now so hard-wired into the national dialogue, and even into
everyday conversation, that this new world held no terrors for me in the matter
of ritualised protocol.
Political titles are as suddenly conferred as they are removed and the
waters pass over quickly enough as once-titled office-holders learn another
lesson: there is nothing as ex as an ex. But those whose hard study and
intellectual excellence entitle them to use the prefix "Doctor" have
a longer shelf-life, indeed life-long entitlement, in the titled world of
status enhancement.
An academic or medical doctorate is the high-water mark of intellectual
attainment and its title-holders are regarded, sometimes incorrectly it is
true, as possessors of great wisdom or achievement.
But this is not really the context of either the controversy or the
reaction to the apparent lack of entitlement of the titled "Dr" Pallo
Jordan. Since the revelation in the Sunday Times about 10 days ago that the
honourable member of parliament and the former minister had apparently neither
a postgraduate nor any certified degrees at all, South Africa has been treated
to the familiar three-card trick. Traditionally, this is the sleight of hand
practised by card sharps, who induce a gullible "mark" to part with
his money by misdirecting him in the search for the queen.
So the essence of the disclosure about Jordan had nothing do with his
intelligence, his intellect or his contribution to the struggle. It had
everything to do with claims he made to a title he was, on the face of it, not
entitled to use, and which has been his calling card on all official
documentation and in every debate in which the voluble politician has featured.
Instead of dealing with the merits of this matter, essentially one of fraud
or wrongful misstatement, the public has been treated to the South African
equivalent of the three-card trick. The first card is to change the
conversation and there was no shortage of players here.
Appropriate to his first name, Baby Tyawa, acting secretary of
parliament, offered this childish rejoinder: "Parliament does not make
requirements for members to have a degree or PhD."
This spectacular illogicality is simply an evasion. Parliament does,
believe it or not, require its members to be "honourable" and
presumably the inquiry about Jordan was triggered by concerns of dishonourable
conduct.
Then the academic cavalcade rode into support. Former ANC politician and
now academic head of the Wits School of Education Mary Metcalfe dismissed the
brouhaha on the basis that "Pallo's intellectual contribution and standing
is leap years ahead of many PhD holders in this country". This novel card
has endless possibilities, not least for doctoral students under Aunty Mary's
care.
But, as The Times editorialised this week, the most notable comment of
all has been the non-comment of the man at the centre of it all. Jordan appears
not to feel the obligation to offer any explanation at all.
The third card then is the impunity card, very familiar to our local
audience: deeds have no consequences.
Last week, in the US, senator John Walsh of Montana was forced to quit
his senate race not because he did not have the PhD he claimed, but because it
was revealed that he plagiarised substantial portions of it.
Perhaps he should immigrate here, and resume his political career in the
land of no consequences.
• Leon is the author of Opposite Mandela (Jonathan Ball) Follow him on
Twitter: @TonyLeonSA OR on Facebook: facebook.com/TonyLeonSA
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