Going South

Does South Africa confuse you? Here's a beginner's guide.

The ANC is the ruling party. However, it's not clear who is really in charge in South Africa. This is because of a delightfully laissez - faire  approach to the rule of law, governance, responsibility and much else. Those little things that silly politicians fret about in less jolly parts of the globe.  'In-charge' contenders are Afriforum, Julius Malema, Gift of the Givers, Operation Dudula, the RET faction and an assortment of crime corporations.

In like fashion, borders (like much else) are elastic and optional. People pass through as freely as the wild geese migrate. Some welcome, and even encourage this, as a sign of the uhuru-like, brotherhood of all African peoples. Others maintain that we have sufficient numbers of our own unemployed, as well as our own accomplished criminals. No doubt, this conflict will rumble on, unaffected by lawsuits, demonstrations, tiresome orations, commissions and task teams.

South Africa has world-class cricket and rugby teams. I've heard that we also play soccer. The sport in which we really excel is large-scale looting. Age is no barrier to participation  and some of our ablest athletes are senior citizens.

We are also excellent talkers. Conferences, task teams, committees, commissions are our bread and butter.Nothing ever comes of these. Nothing happens. But that's not the point is it? We should just enjoy the fact that we're a world leader. A cynical friend said that's why we have eleven  official languages. There's lots of k..k to talk. We should have a twelfth, he said. As I abhor crude language, I stopped him before he could say 'bullshit'.

We have developed a unique language similar to Orwell's newspeak. 'Revolutionary' for example is an adjective used freely to make the most commonplace things sound..well, revolutionary. We have revolutionary buildings which don't do anything different from what your average, dingy office block does. We have revolutionary oratory that sounds remarkably like pre-masticated stuff from every underwhelming socialist  / workers' paradise on the planet. Nothing truly revolutionary actually happens. Excellent service or innovation , for example. 

Just as nature abhors a vacuum, so the South African authorities seem to abhor anything that works efficiently. We have dismantled the rail network, education, training, all state owned enterprises. It is now difficult to find other things to dismantle but I have no doubt that we will. You can't keep a good wrecking ball down.

One cannot fault South African politicians when it comes to humour. One suggested that there are no alternatives to the ANC for South Africa. A bit like saying that there are no alternatives to Russia for Ukraine (of course, some do believe that). Another made the side-splitting recommendation that politicians fingered for possible corruption should be allowed to self-correct. Jack The Ripper, Al Capone and other jolly persons of interest would have loved that. A recent corker was that we should cease to be a constitutional democracy and let parliament have the final say. Suffice it to say that that's not too far different from handing the school over to the worst playground bully. Or the prison to the most hardened inmates? And I don't mean the wardens. Or the henhouse to a fox grinning with blood-smeared jaws?

South Africans have come through some very difficult times. I have no doubt that they will also survive the antics of the clowns and asses  which we've been blessed with an abundance of.

It's just that it's a long, brutal comrades' marathon.

Tips for the blogger gratefully accepted 

Capitec Bank, South Africa  

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O Tichmann 

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