In many respects, 2010 represents a highlight year for South Africa with the global media spotlight focused on the headline-grabbing event of the FIFA 2010 Soccer World Cup. While there may be arguments for and against the actual economic benefit of such an event to ordinary people living in South Africa, one reality cannot be argued, that such an event does bring a certain level of prestige for the host nation and its people. But what else can we do in South Africa to ride the wave of the feel-good factor amongst the diverse population before, during and after the last whistle is blown?

For one, we can examine what actions we are taking to build a nation. Coming from over 300 years of domination of some sort or the other, South Africa is in a unique and exciting position to embark on a critical process to determine a collective path to build a nation. The most recent domination of Apartheid worked in a systematic fashion to shape a society with a particular brand of nationhood that left much to be desired for everyone who was not amongst the chosen. The peaceful transition from this abhorrent nationhood to universal suffrage was and still is a marker for the world and many people who live here.  It has attracted people from all over this continent to South Africa to reap the benefits of freedom and economic opportunity.

But the elephant in the room remains, that there has to date not been a process to think about and try out a state-led process to build a new nation that embodies the values of the Constitution and the Freedom Charter. Admittedly, we are only 15 years into the greatest social experiment of our time and the pressing challenges of addressing past imbalances and transitioning from a liberation movement to government have had to take precedence. However, if we do not take this bold and frankly scary step of examining whom we are and where we wish to go as a nation, then we would have possibly lost one of the most amazing opportunities to build a just, peaceful and prosperous nation. If we do not take this step very soon, then there is a good chance that we will continue to bumble from year to year well into our seventies as a nation, only to find that we have wasted much of the energy of the youth of our nationhood on worthless and petty bickering when we could have spent it building a great nation.

South Africa emerged from one of the most robust and deliberate social experiments and in the post Apartheid uhuru we may have missed the fact that an equally deliberate attempt must be made if we are to build a society where the ideals that people were prepared to die for can actually be brought to life. The recently released movie, Invictus, is held up as a marker for what we can achieve but we need to be brutally honest that the achievements detailed in the movie are not because of any deliberate attempts to locate such an achievement within a broader context of nation building. If anything, the achievements the book and the movie showcase were in spite of such a nation building agenda. The end of the Mandela presidency also signalled the end of any real attempts to work towards nationhood and given that we are unlikely to see another Mandela emerge in our political leadership, it may be a prudent choice to take the time to lay down foundations for nation building so that political leaders are at least compelled to take such matters into cognisance in their term of office.

The Presidency of Jacob Zuma has brought back some of the old Madiba sparkle and openness to dialogue, though in ways that are completely different and that is in itself not a bad thing. It at least opens the door to a dialogue that we should be having; Mr President, let’s not lose this opportunity.

Rajesh Latchman is Coordinator of the National Welfare Forum and GCAP-SA .