Gabriel Crows | 04 March 2025
The Institute reports that once bee-like well-intentioned policies have backfired
The World Bank report, entitled “Promoting Inclusive Growth in South Africa,” is a welcome addition to expert advice in favour of reducing bee premiums in public procurement, says the Institute for Racial Relations (IRR).
Reports show that once bee-like well-intentioned policies backfired. “Today, these interventions are becoming so cumbersome that they suffocate the administration, especially local officials, the ability to implement open spaces for corruption.”
The report then links these harms to “state capture.”
This is not surprising, as the IRR repeatedly noted that a whole-body analysis of state capture reports discovered the issue of “legislative design” that promotes state capture. The problem is the confusion caused by tensions between bee premiums and “valuable” sourcing in non-transparent systems.
The Zondo Report provided the following advice:
“Ultimately, the view of the (state capture) committee is that if the government derives the greatest value in the procurement process and procurement officials should be advised in that way, the main national interest will be best provided.”
The World Bank effectively repeats its advice, with the first concrete proposal being “improving the efficiency of public spending.”
When an inefficient Be-Premium is spent, this profit is associated with elites (of all races), but it reduces the value of the money. For example, the city of Cape Town has discovered that it spends 7% on bee premiums on traffic controller parts. That means there's less money left to make the rest work.
To address this issue, both the State Capture Report and the World Bank emphasize the importance of introducing transparency in procurement. The World Bank says that corporate procurement needs to “share data with government bonds.”
That is an important call. This is because the Ministry of Finance has never reported on the costs of bee premiums, a violation of its constitutional obligations. Following the advice of the World Bank, the Treasury can remedy that mistake.
The IRR previously requested that the Treasury bee premiums bee by introducing new mechanisms in preparation for the March 12 budget presentation.
The World Bank advice to relax the bee is not only found in state capture reports, but also in Harvard and IMF reports.
Perhaps most importantly, the majority of South Africans want to end Bee's premium.
A poll commissioned by the IRR in 2024 asked survey respondents whether they should eliminate bee premiums. 64% of black respondents and 70% of all respondents preferred to reduce the bee premium to R0.
Put another way, South Africa has not actually grown since 2007, and is a singular failure among open democracies around the world, so most people want to move from racial preferences to gambling on economic growth.
The World Bank said “it was a development bargain, which has shifted from protecting their position to future gambling based on growth.”
“Disclaimer – the views and opinions expressed in this article are the views of the author and are not necessarily those of the Bee Room.”
