What if Zuma ...

The leak of the Zuma Nkandla report came too sudden. It also raises question the legitimacy of the security cluster and the integrity of the Public Protector. If a report in the possession of the security cluster is leaked then it indicates their ineffectiveness which has broader security implications. One of South Africa's prides is their security cluster. They are ranked amongst the best in the world and for evidence we do not have to look far. The America's are paranoid when it comes to the security of their president and will not take any risks. Yet, all US Presidents since 1994 have visited South Africa.

The Public Protector over the past couple of years has worked very hard on her reputation and that of her office. In my opinion it is the only Chapter Nine institution that is functioning with integrity and not influenced by the NEC of the ANC. Her leaking the Nkandla Report will flush all that she worked for down the drain.

Hence, at first it seemed that some ministers and people within the NEC of the ANC are dissatisfied with Zuma - some disunity, but the more I made sense of the leakage I started to ask the following question: what if Zuma (representing the interest of the NEC) leaked the report?

It was then that I realised that it is of strategic importance for Zuma to leak the report now, because the information in the report will inevitable come out and it will be more damaging closer to the 2014 National and Provincial elections.

So, the best time for the information in the report to come out is now; when people are distracted and it is at least a month before the January 8 statement. I have a feeling that the ANC will launch their manifesto with the January 8 statement and kick off their election campaign. If this is the case then it would have been damaging and it will give the opposition parties more fire.

The best, therefore, was to leak the report now and let the public get the information and they deal with it. It also now make sense why the security cluster opted for an interdict, as it was the ANC's first tactic - stalling. If they succeeded in the court application they could have stalled the release of the report until after the election, but we all know that failed.

Apart from this, it also gives them an opportunity to tarnish the image of the Public Protector. Their argument would be why would they leak a report that is damaging to the ANC and the only other person that has a copy of the report is Tuli.

I must congratulate the one who came up with this strategy, it is brilliant, and it was able to fool the public, the media and the hundreds of so called analysts. Well done.

It is raining shit in the DA

I had to write this after the latest ‘shitty’ incident in Khayelitsha, Cape Town. Based on a discussion I had with my colleagues today I realised that what happened in Khayelitsha will probably set a trend throughout South Africa.

Firstly, I do not think it is a criminal offence to throw someone with shit, unless you seriously get injured or sick from it. Secondly, it put Zille’s government in a tight spot because she cannot criminalise this offence because whose rights were first infringed.

In this regard, it would be the citizens of Khayelitsha. If Zille makes the case that her dignity was infringed, the citizens in Khayelitsha’s right to human dignity was first infringed, especially after the City of Cape Town did not empty the toilets. What I was not able to comprehend is why Zille, after being warned by the ANCYL and the 2009 toilet saga, decided to visit Khayelitsha on such a sensitive matter. By just doing this it provoked citizens.

Thirdly, all politicians would now be very careful to be arrogant at community meetings, especially now that citizens have a weapon of mass destruction. This weapon is more peaceful then violent protest marches but more disgusting. Instead of burning down the councillors house citizens can just drench the house with shit. Police will also treat citizens with the necessary respect because they would be possible targets of this new found weapon. To be honest I will rather choose a stone over a face full of shit.

Citizens, I hereby urge you to use your new found weapon of mass destruction; every time you hear a politician talking nonsense flung them with shit, it seems to be the greatest insult in South Africa. 

 

Forgiveness and Emancipation

I finally understand why Mandela chose reconciliation over revenge. In his Long Walk to Freedom he gives an explanation for his approach of reconciliation. He said when he stepped out of jail, he knew he had two choices the one is to get white people back for what they have did to him or he can forgive them completely. He decided on the road to forgiveness because if he had chosen hate and revenge he would have imprisoned himself all over again.

It is funny what a strange hold hate have over oneself, and the saddest part is you expect the next person to care. The truth is that the people you hate in most cases are not aware of your feelings and does not even of care your state of mind. The issue in a post-apartheid SA is emancipation, and it can only be achieve through forgiveness.

It is bold of me to write this, but I came to realise that this is the truth.  Emancipation does not mean your problems of yesterday would magically disappear, it means that you will be willing to move on to a better life, and not expect any favours or anything from the next person (the hated one).

We black people need to forgive white people for apartheid and the injustice of the past, and white people must forgive themselves and the apartheid leadership for what they have done to them. White people were made believe that they are special and superior to black people, but this was taken away from them with the sudden abolishment of apartheid.

White people are also victims of apartheid (we can argue the extent of it). White people lost their families and friends in a silly war that benefitted them nothing, and in many cases this hate and anger is protected towards black people. Some white people blame black people for this because their family and friends were killed for fighting black communists in Namibia, Zimbabwe, Mozambique and Angola.

Black people as victims of apartheid had to endure the constant humiliation and discrimination of white people. Black people were not allowed to use the same public spaces as black people or love someone of another race. Black had to call white people ‘baas’ (boss) and sit at the back of a bakkie while the dog is sitting in front. The homes of black people were destroyed and were forcefully removed to places that were not fit for human inhabitancy. Their friends and family were killed and imprisoned if they protested for a South Africa that is free from racial injustice.

This shows that both white and black must forgive. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) was established in this regard. The aim was to let South Africans forgive and reconcile. The TRC have contributed towards this but did not succeed to get the desired results everyone has hoped for. My critic on the TRC is that the scope was too small and that it was too short-lived.

The question one need to ask is: How do you forgive? If you forgive please use the standard that was set by the Bible. Jesus said that when you forgive you must forgive 70 x 7. Once you forgive like that your mind is freed from all hatred and ‘buts’ and you are willing to move on. With forgiveness also comes acceptance. You accept that the other person might not change. You also accept the fact that you are doing this for yourself and do not expect something in return from the other party. Forgiveness is without expectations; do not expect the next person to change or care.

Mandela chose forgiveness for himself and by doing this he freed himself from the last thing that might have kept him captive, and since he made that decision, he grew stronger, wiser and became iconic. It takes more to forgive than to hate, but the results of forgiveness is far better than that of hatred.

It is how you finish

If there is something that I would like a lot of people to understand about achieving their is the following: In life it is not how you start the race but how you finish it. There is nothing wrong with a good start because a good start set the pace for the race but it does not mean that the pace-setter will win the race.

I can remember when I was in high school (many moons ago) I made it to the regional athletics championship and that day I had to ran two races. The first one was the 5000m and the second was the 1500m. The first race went well and I win the race but the second almost gave me a heart attack.

If you are familiar with the 1500m you know that you start 300m and once you have finish that you still need to finish 3 more laps. So, when we started the race I was nervous and did not know what to expect and decided not put everything in the first 1000m. For those that know athletics a bell usually rang to announce the last round and it is also where you increase your speed and push yourself pass your physical and mental limits.

So, when there was two laps left one of the athletes accelerated insanely and left us all behind. When I saw this I became worried because with his pace he will break the SA schools record and I am not close to that record. I was tempted to follow him but I decided to keep to my original plan.

When we reached the 100m before the last lap this guy already created a gap of 80m. So when we got to the 80m mark before the last lap this guy just crossed the finish line and suddenly decrease his pace. I became clear to us that this guy thought he finished the race and as expected the bell rang as he was first passed the bell. We could see how shocked and demotivated he was.

We catch up with him at the 200m mark and when we finished the race he was not part of us. The important thing is we finished the race and he did not. So what can we learn from this?

Firstly, plan effectively. I had a plan before the race started and a strategy during the race. Secondly, stick to your guns. If someone is speeding away and it was not part of your plan to accelerate at that point do not do it. Resist the temptation of running someone else's race, run your own race. Finally, completing the race is the most important thing. A mentor of mine believe that the person that is second is not the loser but the last person or the person that do not finish the race is the loser. So if you came second great stuff.

But remember the basis for finishing any race is preparation. They say when you are tasked to cut done a three in an hour use the first 30 minutes to sharpen the axe because a sharp axe makes your work easier. Do not just start cutting blindly. So, how is this applicable to you?

If you writing an exam, a test, running a race, starting a business or starting a community garden please remember this: it is not how you start your goal but it is how you finish it that counts. But for you to finish the race, remember to plan/prepare, stick to your guns and do everything in your power to finish it.

Pre-Conceptions

After work today I heard this lady on Radio 2000 and I could hear that she is a very intelligent woman. She explain how she grew with her mother and grandmother and how she never had any father figure in her life.

They way she spoke and expresses herself intrigued me, and I was wondering who this could be. She spoke about the values her mother and grandmother thought her, and how her family transitioned into the new SA. I must be honest I was thinking it must be some doctor from a university or a really educated person.

But to my surprise it was Khanyi Mbau. I was surprised how the 'faceless' (the true) Khanyi Mbau are so different to the one we all know (the one in the media). It also made me wonder how much the media have influenced our perceptions about life. Our perceptions about politics, the weather, what to eat, what is good and what is bad.

The Khanyi Mbau on radio tonight was not the out of control freak and 'queen of bling' (as she is commonly known) but an honest and hardworking women. She could have been my sister or my cousin; women I love. So I am asking myself how many skewed perceptions do I have of other 'famous' people, like for example our politicians.

What would I think of a 'faceless' Julius Malema, Hellen Zille, Gwede Mantashe, or Mosiuoa Lekota. By 'faceless' I mean the real person and not the one that the media portray. How would our perceptions change about these individuals? Will we truly have the same feelings that we currently do? I must be honest mine is definitely changed.

A Nation at War With Itself

The recent gang violence on the Cape Flats, the violent protest marches in the City of Cape Town and the ‘mine war’ at Marikana cannot be seen as separate or as isolated incidents. It must be seen as symptoms of a much greater underlying issue. I see it as a nation at war with itself. In a war there are always two or more parties involved, one group always want to take control and in most cases it is a struggle over scarce resources.

The common denominator of all these events is the quality of life of ‘black’ people in South Africa and it relates to a struggle over scarce resources. The violence that is currently manifesting on the Cape Flats would have never happen if not for apartheid. It was the apartheid legislation that relocated black people on the Cape

Flats, it was apartheid that denied the majority equal education and work opportunities. So people living in Hanover Park do not have the same standard of living as their white counterparts.

The same with Khayelitsha, it was created as a dormitory township for black to sleep in and not for real development to take place. A large part of black people in Khayelitsha do not have basic services. For example, Monwabisi Park does not even have electricity. Furthermore, mine workers at Lonin Platinum mine earn a salary of about R4000.00 a month (apparently it is more but was nt confirmed). These mine workers are from the rural areas across SA and the money they earning is not enough to sustain them and their families.

The second denominator is that there are always two parties involved in these conflicts. For example, on the Cape Flats rival gangs are trying to exterminate each other. In Khayelitsha the DA claim to have evidence that the protest marches are organise by the ANCYL and in Marikana it is the mine workers against Lonin management and NUM.

The third denominator is a lost to human live. In all of these three cases you will find that human have lost their lives. In Khayelitsha and on the Cape Flats it was mostly innocent bystanders. What worries me is that violence has become the acceptable way of dealing disputes. Most political commentators and ‘so called analysts’ have been so blinded by the ANC leadership race that they are not able to connect these dots.

So here is my appeal: let us find ways to stop this trend (violence) before it is too late.

“It is not yet Uhuru”

Introduction
The author of the above quote is Oginga Odinga. He was influential in the struggle for Kenya’s independence and became the first vice president of an independent Kenya. Uhuru is a Swahili word which means freedom and he therefore implies that Africans are not yet emancipated since Africa’s independence. A postcolonial period is what the name suggests; an era after colonialism which must be free from any form of colonial oppression. However, if we analyze the period after colonialism, we will find that the quality of existence for most ‘black’ Africans did not change much since the independence of Africa. The only obvious change is the emergence of a small affluent ‘black’ elite in Africa, whilst the majority of ‘black’ Africans are poor. This begs the question: Are we really free? This essay will attempt to answer this question by arguing that freedom in Africa is not yet achieved. And will, therefore firstly, discuss freedom in a postcolonial Africa and lastly, it will look at the ‘back to route’ movement which is essentially going to explain where it all went wrong for Africa after independence.

Freedom in postcolonial Africa
What does freedom in a postcolonial Africa entail? How can freedom be obtain and maintained in a postcolonial Africa? These are some the questions we need to ask ourselves as political studies students when we want to found out if we are really free. Freedom in postcolonial Africa is a very contentious issue with many arguments but with no clear answer. And it seems as none of these arguments can help poor ‘black’ Africans to achieve the freedom that they have been waited for since the independence of Africa. Before we can start a discussion on freedom in a postcolonial Africa, we will firstly have to look at the various levels which Africa was colonized and secondly at the meaning of freedom that one of the leading political scholars in Africa provides us with in his book Uhuru Na Maendeleo (Freedom and Development).

According to Ture & Hamilton (1992: 6-23) colonialism had operated in three areas which were politics, economics and culture. During colonialism political decisions which affected Africans were made by colonial powers through a process of British indirect rule and the French assimilation. Further, the colonial project from the beginning was an economic project; colonial powers came to Africa not to ‘civilize’ but to exploit them economically. On, the cultural front colonial powers created an ideology that “relegated the black man to a subordinated, inferior status in society” (Ture & Hamilton: 1992: 23). This therefore meant that for Africans to be completely decolonized they had to be decolonized at all three levels. More simply put, is that they had to operate completely independent from the West at all three levels. The next section will discuss freedom in a post colonial era.

Julius Nyerere argues that there are three forms of freedom: (i) national freedom - which is the freedom of citizens to determine their own future; (ii) freedom from hunger, disease, and poverty; and (iii) individual freedom - which includes the right to live in dignity and equality and the right to freedom of speech, etc. For Africans to be free in a postcolonial Africa they have to experiences all three forms of freedom. But, as people that stay in Africa, we are all aware of the inequalities that are present in our societies. This, therefore, seems as that we as Africans in a postcolonial Africa are partly free. We are free to choose our government and our individual freedoms are protected by our constitutions, but we are not free from poverty, hunger and disease.

Firstly, the reason for this is that during the struggle for Africa’s independence we “decided for practical reasons to accept a fragment of independence” (Fanon; 1987: 120). The “fragment of independence” that Fanon here refer to is that we have exchanged economic power for political power and because we do not have the economic power we are burdened by social inequalities such as poverty, hunger and disease. This also means that we were never economically decolonized. A classic example would be how the ANC, during negotiations for a democratic South Africa, had to choose between economic power and political power. Today 15 years since the first democratic elections in South Africa this is still visible, the ANC has the political power and the ‘whites’ has the economic power. Inequalities, in Africa, are entrenched by Western capitalism through neo-colonialism. Neo-colonialism “addresses itself essentially to the middle class and to the intellectuals of the colonial country” (Fanon; 1987: 122) and therefore it creates unequal relationship between ‘black’ people in Africa. This unequal relationship causes the emergence of a small ‘black’ elite and the poor ‘black’ masses in a postcolonial Africa. And as long as we will have Western capitalism present in a postcolonial Africa we will not be free from Western oppression.

The second challenge that we face Africa is intellectual colonization. Intellectual colonization is a result of cultural colonization. Intellectual colonization makes us accept the unequal relationship that Western capitalism portrays as ‘right’. For example, every time we watch something on television the ideas of Western capitalism are being fed to us ‘as the right way of life.’ This simply means that you as the audience want to live your life like those ones on television. You want to drive their cars, you want to go to their schools and you want to do their jobs. But not knowing you are agreeing to the veiled inequalities that this life presents. To drive that car, to live in that house and to do that job, you are in support of the idea that some people must be rich whilst some must be poor; and some must be the servant whilst others are the boss. This entrench inequalities in Africa and deny Africans from the freedom which many had died for.

Where it all did went wrong for Africa
The ‘back to route’ movement explains where it all went wrong for Africa. There are number of arguments that we can discuss but this section will discuss the work of Issa Shivji. He wrote a document which is titled ‘The silences in the NGO Discourse’ in which he discusses how freedom in Africa was taken. Firstly, he notices that the generation of African nationalist, after Africa’s independence, crafted a form of nationalism which was modelled on that of the colonial powers but the ideological genesis of African nationalism lay in Pan-Africanism (Shivji; 2006: 6). Julius Nyerere and Kwame Nkrumah has realised that in order for African nationalism to work it must happen in Pan-Africanism, if not independent African stated will become pawns on a chess board for European imperialists’ (Shivji; 2006: 6). This was the biggest mistake most African leaders made. They went for self-interest over the interest of the majority. This gave Western imperialist the opportunity to regain their grip on Africa through various ways such as supporting corrupt African governments if they benefit from it and by only supporting “crisis-ridden economies” (Shivji; 2006: 9), if African governments adopted the structural adjustment programmes by the Bretton Woods institutions.

Towards Uhuru in Africa in the 21st century

A number of scholars has came with solutions to fix the Uhuru problem. This section, however, will only discuss the work of Julius Nyerere and Thabo Mbeki. Julius Nyerere suggests the following solution:

Our first step, therefore must be to re-educate ourselves; to regain our former attitude of mind. In our traditional African society we were individuals within a community. We took care of the community, and the community took care of us. We neither needed nor wished to exploit our fellow man (1973: 166).

His solution according to Bogue (2003: 103) brings two aspects to the fore which needs to be considered to enable us to achieve human equality: they are (1) intellectual decolonization and (2) the relationship between the individual and the community. Julius Nyerere wrote Ujamaa as a political framework to stimulate the intellectual decolonization of Africans, after the independence of Tanzania. His thought was based on human equality. If we study his concept of human equality it is apparent that human equality may achieve freedom. The second aspect means that you have individual rights within the community but your rights must not be greater than that of the common good of the community. This, therefore, entails you to generated wealth as an individual for the greater good of the community and not for your selfish needs.

Posted by Jacob Cloete ©

 Posted June 02, 2011