#ProudlyBroughtByANC - THE BANANA REPUBLIC SPECIALISTS

Dear Blog Readers,

         Somebody has just sent me South Africa’s memorable achievements under the rule of the African National Congress; otherwise known as the Banana Republic Specialists.

         It’s fascinating reading, but not if you happen to live in this once thriving tip of Africa. Here’s the list with a few of my additions. It reads like a HAIRY TALE.  

1.    In 19 years of rule unemployment has shot up by 60%, one of the highest rates in the world.

2.    The country is now the rape capital of the world.

3.    Since the ANC came to power the country has achieved the dubious distinction of being 140^th for education brilliance on a World list of 144 countries.

4.    Officially the world leader for hijackings.

South Africa's new national Coat of Arms

5.    The Police Force has hundreds of convicted criminals in its ranks, some in high positions and others who had a record before they joined. Now the top brass doesn’t know how to get rid of them because of stringent labour laws that make it virtually impossible to fire anybody.

6.    In the Top Ten for most murders.

7.    In 19 years the rand/dollar exchange rate has dropped from R3.41 to R10.00 and sliding.

8.    The Defence Force has gone from being the iron fist of Africa to a laughing stock that couldn’t defend Disneyland from an invasion of fluffy toys.

It's hard work for President Zuma, running a country into the ground

9.    There are now 10 times more people in squatter camps and 1000% more illegal immigrants.

10. Government hospitals are so bad that the only one Nelson Mandela could possibly have been admitted to was the top military hospital, but its VIP units had been closed for two years for renovations so he was treated privately.

11. All kinds of other facilities such as roads and municipal services are deteriorating rapidly.

12. Electricity and water supplies are teetering on the edge of a national disaster.

President Zuma as Zapiro sees him

13. Education at Government schools has all but collapsed.

14. Unions are striking mines into oblivion and their inflated wage demands are driving other businesses to the wall.

15. 90% of once prosperous farms bought by the Government from Whites to satisfy the demand from Blacks for land have failed.

16. Bloomberg recently scored 74 nations for their “stress factor” and it’s hardly surprising that South Africa is second from the top.

Head of the Wild Life Conservation Society

17. No other country has more convicted criminals in Parliament.

18. On the sporting front corruption and in-fighting has caused chaos in the administration of soccer, cricket and athletics and probably others I don’t know about.

19. Bafana Bafana the national football team is ranked 60^th in the world and 10^th in Africa even though it has the best facilities on the continent and is the flagship of the country’s most popular sport.

20. There are so many depressing defects in the country that it’s impossible to mention all of them. 

The President with another leopard skin in his cap

Fortunately nobody needs to worry if they follow the lead of the ANC Government. All is well according to these blinkered leaders.

     President Jacob Zuma gigglers childishly on television when talking about the state of the nation. But only he sees the joke as the Rand drops.

    

 Up tight Mathale

 Then when the Limpopo Provincial Premier Cassel Mathale gets moved to a slightly less plum job as an R800 000 a year Member of Parliament, the ANC’s spin doctor Jackson Mthembu announces that the party thanks Mathale for a prosperous, thriving and stable Limpopo.

     No doubt the party would say the same about the country under Zuma.

     I’ve just given you the TRUTH about the country. Now what’s the TRUTH about the Province that became notorious for its inability to deliver text books to its schools?

   

  The opposition Democratic Alliance MP John Steenhuisen summed up the situation perfectly when he wrote: Mathale has presided over one of the most corrupt and moribund administrations in the country.

     Five of his provincial departments are under national administration, while others are under investigation for corruption. While the citizens suffer deprivation the political elite has prospered handsomely.

     The greatest irony is that Mathale’s sacking appears to have little to do with his spectacular inability to govern effectively, but rather his outspoken opposition to No 1. 

THE ONLY HOPE FOR SOUTH AFRICA NOW IS TO VOTE THE DA INTO POWER. IT HAS ALREADY SHOWN THAT IT CAN GOVERN EFFECTIVELY IN THE WESTERN CAPE AND CAPE TOWN, WHERE THE ANC WAS PREVIOUSLY MESSING THINGS UP.

     Regards,

     Jon, a citizen hoping for a miracle.

Cape Town's Tourist Dump

Dear Cape Town City Counsellors,

           How about coming round to my dump next week for a cocktail party? You would all be very welcome especially you guys from the Democratic Alliance now that you are running the show after the African National Congress made such a mess of things when it was their turn.

          Let’s make it on Monday at 6.00 pm for 10.00 pm. Sorry for this short notice but I wanted you to come when the entrance to the suburb where I live is looking its best. It wouldn’t be truthful to say it’s blooming although it is very colourful.

          I’m convinced you’ll agree with me when you come that even the scent of the flowers at Kirstenbosch Botanic Gardens doesn’t compare with the aroma at my place.

          There’ll be plenty to drink and snacks for Africa. The money’s coming out of our  Housing Fund because us residents agreed unanimously, after several protest marches, that it was more important to get you councilors here at least once every 10 years than having more houses. You can then see the enormous progress that is being made right under your noses.

          To make the event as much fun as possible all I ask is that you bring a plastic, rubbish bag. You can bring more than one if you are totally committed to that greening the earth thing. As soon as you arrive I will organise you into teams. But don’t not come for fear that I will mix DAs with ANCs because nothing like that’s going to happen.

          The wining team will be rewarded with double the amount of wine of that is consumed by the rest of you in keeping with the true Cape tradition.

          Oh sorry I forgot the most important thing. At my age, born at the time of the great rinderpest plague, my brain goes off-line a bit more often than when I was two. You’ll be please to hear that it’s nothing onerous. All you have to do is fill up as many bags as you can with rubbish in the four hours between six and 10.

          You won’t have to go far to find it. There’s stacks at Masiphumelele (Masi to its friends) where I and my family have lived in the same conditions since 1895. If you’ve never been here, not to worry. All you do is drive along Kommetjie Road from the Fish Hoek direction and when you see huge piles of household refuse on the righthand side of the road that's where you'll find me. It's a well known landmark. 

          No end of tourists in those great big coaches and in their hired cars have remarked that this view has been one of the highlights of their visit to Cape Town because they’ve never seen anything like it. As you might know they have to pass it on their way to Cape Point.

          It’s just as well that Sir Francis Drake is no longer around otherwise he would have had to revise his opinion about this being the fairest Cape in all Christendom. I think that’s what he said although it was a bit before my time. Or was it that Vasco da Gama chap? No he didn't speak English did he?

          Anyway I hope you’ll all do the good deed thing and attend the party and enter into the spirit of the evening. I’m really getting sick and tired of my friends and relatives constantly saying, Are you still living in that dump?

          Drunkenly yours,

          Jon

*According to the False Bay Echo the head of the City Council's cleaning department, Claire McKinnon says the complaints are a lot of rubbish because the mess in Masi is the fault of the residents. She says it's civil disobediance as every resident has access to a weekly refuse collection via bins or free bags. So there!             

Literacy not required but Government to get 5% more

Dear South African Voters,

        Where in the world can you get a part-time job next to the beach that pays nearly R30 000 a month or R350 000 a year for only 20 hours work a week?
         Now they are expected to get a 5% increase.  

          Where can you get such a plumb job without being able to read or write?         
          In South Africa where else? And in picturesque Cape Town what’s more.

          Would you lend your car to somebody without a driving licence? Well that’s exactly what you voters are doing to our country. No wonder it’s in the ditch more often than not and the stage is fast approaching when there won’t be enough money to haul it out even for its scrap value.

          Sadly these words are wasted on a lot of you.

        Sadder still this is the deplorable standard we set for those who govern us.

          No wonder the African National Congress Government is not bothered about the edikasion sistam being in shimbles because with these kind of salaries who worries about schooling.

          We are a third, going on a fourth or fifth-world country with a population of 50-million.

          There are 400 members of Parliament. MPs get R800 000 a year while President Jacob Zuma and his bloated Cabinet get double that or more while at least a third of the adult population have no salary at all. Zuma’s standard of education is a State secret and who knows how many MPs would get a job anywhere else.

           Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, the Mother of the nation proves the point. Flights to the moon occur more often than her appearances in the House.

          India, which has a population of more than a billion with around 200-million people in the A Income Group, has just over 800 MPs. Most of our A Income Group earners are in Government somewhere filling their boots.

          As the local government elections are coming up in South Africa it’s appropriate to talk about Councils. Take Cape Town, the only City controlled by the Democratic Alliance, as an example.

          It has 210 of these overpaid Councillors – more than half the number of the MPs who run the entire country - getting those salaries I mentioned to begin with. And the population is a mere 3-million.

          Tammy Petersen’s story in the Peoples Post opened my eyes to the way the spending splurge doesn’t end with ordinary Councillors. There’s the Mayor on over a million a year; his deputy taking home R789 355 and Mayoral Committee members and  sub-council chairmen each being paid R741 143. And there are 33 of these jackpot winners.

          And even some of these high rollers who are full-time employees can get permission to supplement their pittance by taking another job. That tells you just how diligently you have to work in a bureaucracy.

          A similar scenario is repeated at councils that are there to be plundered up and down the country. ANC supporters are fighting each other to be nominated for one of these, money for jam jobs where nobody has to account for anything.
           The country's Auditor-General's report for 2010/2011 gave a clean audit to a mere 13 of the 283 councils.. That's how bad it has got.

           It’s as though there’s been a gold strike and everybody is rushing to stake their claim. You don’t have to be educated to do that either.

        Literacy is a touchy subject. No wonder because all of our rulers should be deeply ashamed of the present situation.

          When I asked Alderman Dirk Smit (Salary R789 355) Cape Town’s Speaker (he’s there, I think, to make sure everybody behaves themselves) if you had to be able to read and write to be a Councillor his first response was "See Constitution." I asked his PA: "Surely the Speaker can give me the answer off the cuff." He came back through her saying it’s not a "Yes"or "No" answer.

          This was followed by a letter in which he referred to Section 158 and 47 of the country's Constitution to be read with Section 21 of the Local Government Structures Act no 117 of 1998 which sets out the qualifications required to be a Councillor.

          "You will note," he went on,"that there are no restrictions or prohibitions relating to literacy for Councillors and the legislation referred to is silent on this matter."         

          That’s the longest "No" I’ve ever heard. Heaven help us if every Councillor answers a simple question in this long winded fashion. Is that why they get paid such huge salaries?                             

          Not surprisingly the money’s running out. The Times reported that 20 ANC run municipalities have gone bankrupt; 30 ratepayer groups have refused to pay something like R10-million in rates and taxes because their basic services are collapsing.

       Realistically all that South Africa needs is a Parliament of 50 and Cape Town and all the other cities should have no more than 30 Councillors with the smaller places having proportionally less.

          Whatever party our rulers belong to you won’t hear even a whisper among any of them suggesting that we have far more MPs and Councillors than we can afford at prices that are ludicrous.

          WAKE UP! Can’t you see your taxpayer’s money is going down the drain faster than the sewage at a lot of municipalities? And the stink can be smelt internationally.

          Tearfully yours,

          Jon, Member of the Packing for Perth Party.

Note: This was first posted  on 31/5/2011 but I have updated it slightly as the 5% salary increase has been proposed.

Power corrupts in millionaires' paradise

Dear Helen Zille leader of the Democratic Alliance,

         As the leader of South Africa’s main opposition party you and your colleagues are always taking pot shots at our African National Congress Government for corruption and a host of other wrong doings.

         But if you are going to be a policewoman you should make sure that your own party’s record is perfectly clean and if there are lapses you should personally step in to put them right.

       The question is: Are you going to do that in Plettenberg Bay?

As you know that’s where so many of our country’s rich and famous have their seaside homes. And most of them are undoubtedly DA supporters.

         But that’s no excuse for turning a blind eye to what the Sunday Times has just revealed.

        It was quite shocking to see how Plett’s Bitou Municipality, which your party now controls after it had been run by the ANC for 16 years, is doing exactly the same dubious kind of thing that the ANC has been up to for years.

       Power corrupts they say and this is ringing ominously true at Plett.

         The paper told us that after the DA took over Bitou last year it found the R10-million IT system didn’t work. A common occurrence in ANC run government organisations.

         So the DA sacked the supplier Lefatshe Technolgies. This started another jobs-for-pals scandal so typical of our administrations all over the country.

         Big hearted billionaire Jeremy Ord came to the rescue of the beleaguered town where he has a home. He just happened to be Chairman of Dimension Data, a world wide IT company that was bought last year by Japan’s NTT for R22-billion.

         He undertook to get his firm to evaluate the council’s IT at no cost, although you would have thought this would have been done before the existing supplier was given notice.

         The DA was so delighted with Ord’s free assessment that in December last year it decided to bypass normal tender procedures and give Ord’s company a R4.3-million short-term assignment to sort out the mess.

         Bitou’s manager Terry Giliomee justified this by saying they got no other quotations because there was not enough time. Ha! Ha! Ha!

         Council’s letters showed that as far back as August last year Lefatshe had been told its contract would end on December 31. Not enough time. Ha! Ha! Ha!

         It looks as though the ANC has been gleefully feeding the paper the dirt. They didn’t have to look far. One of your councillors Johann Brummer gave them just the ammunition they needed.

         In a December email to Bitou officials about a problem at Plett’s poshest restaurant he wrote: Remember that Lookout is a Plett icon and hang out for some very powerful people – like Jeremy Ord and others who have supported us generously in the past.

         That sent your members scrambling to find a reasonably explanation for this political gaffe. One of them said, We don’t confirm who our donors are. Nobody told Brummer about that. Ha! Ha! Ha!

And Ord was not saying anything either. Ha!  Ha! Ha!

         Everybody knows that No comment means YES.

       Please Helen don’t let the DA go the way of the ANC. There’s enough skulduggery in Government already without your party starting.

         Regards,

         Jon, a concerned tax payer and specialist IT illiterate looking for a Government job, who won’t say which party he donates to for fear of victimisation. 

P.S. Do you mind if I send thanks from the Poor Man’s Press Ombudsman to Rob Rose and Bobby Jordan for a very comprehensive report.  I presume they won’t tell you which party they support.

Read my book 'Where have all the children gone' on Amazon.com  It's a thriller with an underlying love story that defied generations of prejudice.

Whites get the best seats in Toilets-with-a-View row

Dear South African Voters,

          It’s rubbish that only poor blacks are getting the short end of the toilet roll by having to make do with walless Council toilets.

          The ruling African National Congress has gone one better at the Witblikkiesfontien Municipality, which they have controlled for the last 17 years. As you know this is a town on the coast in the Northern Cape.

          There the enlightened Black dominated Council was determined not to be accused of racial prejudice so it has built 5 000 open plan houses for Whites only. They are lined up along the coast so that all of them are only meters from the sea.

          So as not to get bogged down in another toilet saga the Council decided to put these in first as soon as the foundations had been laid. The project has so far cost 50-million in a place where the only people who have a job work for the Municipality.

          Their biggest drawback is that the development is tailor made for nagging wives. Since we got our house my Mrs has been on at me constantly to get hold of the Mayor.

          One hundred and twenty phone calls and 30 visits to the Council offices later I managed to corner him as he was about to go fishing. He exploded as if it was all my fault.

          You whites, he screamed, are all the same. We try to do our best for you and risk riots from our followers and all we get are complaints, Lucky Lobengula, who owns a sanitary ware shop in the town went on.

          When you Whites come to live by the sea all you worry about is a view. So that’s what we’ve given you. You can see right across the Indian Ocean to America from those properties. So what more do you want?

          Don’t you mean the Atlantic Mr Mayor?

          You might think you can speak to your garden boy like that but don’t try it with me Whitey.

          To try and calm him down I replied, Mr Mayor I don’t want to be critical but we’ve had our houses now for two years. When are you going to build the walls?

          That’s news to me, he said picking up his fishing reel. I thought you people had agreed to put them up yourselves. The Council doesn’t have money for that you know.

          Our rules handbook is what we have to go by. And that says that before we do anything else, me, my deputy and our five most senior officials must all have a Mercedes Benz costing at least a million. And these must come complete with toilets because of the enormous distances we have to cover in this part of the country.

           We've got beyond going behind a bush you know.

          Sorry to have bothered you Mr Mayor, I retorted. In the interests of racial harmony we’ll just have to be content with enjoying the view. And of course we’ll go on voting for that AWC party of yours.

          That’s me in the picture doing my toilet training while reading  the Sunday Times. It gives you a good idea of what the Council means by open plan houses. But I must say they’ve saved us a packed on air freshener.

          Happy sight seeing,

          Yours faithfully,

          Jon, a Town Planner of repute when I’m not sitting on my Blog.

PS. For those of you who don’t keep up with the news the Democratic Alliance, our second largest party, exposed itself by installing unenclosed toilets in a black township in Cape Town. This is the only City in the country it controls.

          This was done after the people concerned agreed to enclose the toilets themselves. Most of them did this but some didn’t get round to it.

          With an election just round the corner this delighted the AWC’s youth wing rabble. When the DA put up structures to hide its embarrassment they kept smashing them down.

          The case went to court where a judged ruled the City must enclose them once again. Inexplicably he didn’t say what with so we can expect a lot more sewerage to hit the fan there.

        Meanwhile the DA is flushed with success having caught the AWC with their trousers down and you can appreciate they couldn’t stand the smell. It turned out that one of the ruling party controlled towns in the Free State had 1 620 uncovered bogs going back to 2003.

          The Sunday Times reported that a spokesman for the Moqhaka Municipality said they had covered 378 of these since last year and were busy doing the rest. It would cost R8-million to do them all but they only had R4-million available.

       There is nothing like a pending election to get Councillors everywhere off their arses.

Buy my book 'Where have all the children gone?' on Amazon.com  It's a thriller with an underlying love story