FRESHENING UP FOOD LOVER'S MARKET'S 'BEST IN FRESH GUARANTEE'

Dear Readers,

Brian Coppin

          I don’t know if you shop at any of the 105 Food Lover’s Markets in South Africa, because if you do I wonder if you have had similar experiences to mine regarding their 'Best in Fresh Guarantee.'

          Founded by brothers Brian and Mike Coppin in 1993 they brashly claim their group holds ‘the honour of being South Africa’s undisputed leaders in fresh.’

          I’m sure you’ll agree with me that a brag like that takes a lot of living up to especially when you are in the business of selling fresh fruit and vegetables, products that can so easily go off.

          For some years now I have been buying our fruit and veges almost every Friday, first at the Food Lover’s, Tokai branch in Cape Town and more recently at the Long Beach Mall one from when it opened in 2012.  And being the conscientious Consumer Watchdog that I am I usually email the CEO Brian, if I notice anything that is obviously wrong.

          I believe that no business can be expected to put something right if you just complain to your wife and friends instead of a top executive, who can do something about it.

          As far back as March 2011 I emailed Brian saying that I had bought some pre-packed beetroot and carrots from his Tokai store in packets that you could not easily see through. "When we opened them at home," I went on, "the beetroot was of a very poor quality and the carrots were mostly rotten because they were so wet. I also bought five loose grapefruit and while picking these out I came across four others that were rotten. You badly need better quality control."

          He apologised, giving poor stock rotation as the probable reason. He described this as "inexcusable" and told me that they sell about 70 tons of these two products every week with very few complaints.

          “All our pre-packed products should have a sell-by date on to ensure good quality and I have instructed the Buyers and Regional Managers to investigate why this was not done, and to immediately ensure this practice is adhered to,” he assured me.

          Seven months later in November 2011 I told him that nobody seemed to be taking any notice of him because I was having a job finding any sell-by dates in the Tokai store. "This no doubt explains why there are pre-packet items like mealies on the shelves with black mould on the ends," I added.     

In July this year I raised a series of questions with Brian in an emailed letter. Here they are together with his reply and one from Regional Manager Demetri Gaffley.

I began by saying to Brian: "If your Long Beech Mall branch is anything to go by it seems your stores are not living up to the very impressive undertakings your group claims to live by.

"What’s the point in your stores promoting the slogan ‘The Best in Fresh guaranteed’ when, at least one of them, puts obviously vrot fruit and vegetables on the shelves at very reduced prices, as if that suddenly makes them fresh. And if your Long Beach Mall branch keeps doing this, is this the general policy adopted by all your 105 South African branches, as well as the others outside the country?

"On Friday 12/07/2019) when I was at your Long Beach branch pre-packed, clearly rotten bananas were for sale at the knock down price of R10 for two. Some time ago this store had punnetts of what were obviously rotting waterblommetjies on the shelf with the price reduced by 50%. They were removed after I complained.

"Your website tells us that your business was built by you and your brother Mike on ‘traditional family values of trust, honesty and integrity.’ You also claimed to be ‘South Africa’s undisputed leader in fresh.’ How does discounting what anybody can see is rotting food gel with any of these family values you are so proud of? 

"Then there is the case of the pears that are too fresh to ripen. I have twice bought two different types of pears that were just as hard weeks later, as when I bought them. But like the rotting fruit and vegetables your staff was fully aware that there was a problem with the pears concerned yet they still had them on the shelves. On the first occasion many months ago I got the manager to come down from his upstairs office and when I pointed to the tray of loose pears he immediately said: ‘Yes I know they don’t get ripe.’ This was before I told him what the problem was. More recently when I bought a different variety of pears that were pre-packed a similar thing happened. This time it was another member of staff who told me that these do not get ripe. If your staff know that there is this problem with particular pears why are they still kept on the shelves?

"On another subject: Friday is billed as ‘Pie Day’ at your Long

Beach branch, when pies are usually sold on the basis of buy two and get one free. It strikes me as being very bad business if you have a regular promotion like this and by around 11.30 in the morning the pie warmer is just about empty.

          "After I complained to you on May 31 about the fact that there had not been any steak and kidney pies for weeks you replied saying you could not believe ‘we are offering service like this’ and you would personally get hold of Demetri as well as the baking supplier to solve this problem of ‘piss poor service.’

          "Your intervention brought back the steak and kidney pies but the service was as bad as ever on ‘Friday the pie day’ (12/07/2019) with the pie warmer being just about empty at 11.30 in the morning. I bought the last three steak and kidney pies, which left the warmer devoid of pies. All that remained were some sausage rolls at the bottom.

          "On the outside of your stores there are notices which tell us you have ‘Best Quality’ and under a ‘Best Service’ heading it says that if the staff don’t live up to ‘your expectations tell us about it and you’ll receive a R100 FLM shopping voucher.’

          "Well for some time now I have been telling you about how the your stores have not lived up to my expectations and not once has anybody even suggested that I should be given any kind of shopping voucher. My complaints to you were not motivated by the possibility of getting a voucher as I only noticed this undertaking a couple of days ago."

          I also asked: "Does anybody ever get one of these vouchers?"And : "Is the Long Beach Mall branch a franchise operation or one of your own?"

          Here’s Brian’s reply: "Thank you for your support and letter. I am obviously very upset that the Fresh Produce team continuously disappoints you. We at both Head Office and throughout the DC’S had a massive drive around our guarantee for over 15 months now, and it’s disappointing that you haven’t experienced any of the ongoing work being done. 

          "I can only once again apologize for the above and promise you that every Buyer, Regional Manager, Distribution Manager and Marketing Team will visit this store and get to the bottom of this. They are not living up to the guarantee.

         "I have also copied the Speciality GM, and Buyer and Baker Specialist on the pie issue.

         "I don’t know why you didn’t receive a voucher, but please accept one of R300 for your inconvenience.

          "We have given, and still give out 20/30 vouchers per month and will continue to do so to live up to our guarantee.

          "Long Beach is a corporate store and that disappoints me even more.

          "I trust we can win you over as a satisfied customer once again.

           "Kind Regards,

           "Brian Coppin." (He copied this to Karriem Fredericks; Demetri Gaffley; Paul Rauch (FNV); Warren Minnaar; Vito Polera; Sandro Gastaldi; Robin Wainright; Cecelia Wainright; Travis Coppin; Roxy Norman and Bonita van Niekerk).

          Shortly afterwards I received this email from Demetri Gaffley: "I would like to answer the last two 2 questions that Brian has not answered, and hopefully satisfy you.

Question: Is it acceptable to have pears on the shelf that the manager and staff know don’t get ripe?

The answer is NO.

Question: Is it your firm’s policy to discount fruit and vegetables that are going off?

The answer is YES, and at this stage up to the discretion of the store manager, but can be overruled by store visits/inspections from Head Office. We reduce and markdown to clear, which should be visible on price boards. As for the bananas, the exact opposite, unacceptable for sale and not at any price."

          He then thanked me for my valued feedback.

          After receiving those two emails I decided to pay a special visit to the Long Beach branch to see if there had been any improvement in the sell-by date situation compared to 9 years ago, when Brian first raised the subject.

          They were few and far between I can tell you. There were none on very perishable items like pre-packed strawberries, kiwi fruit or papaya, whereas the same fruit at Pick n Pay a little further down the Mall all had sell-by dates on their labels.

And this is at a Group that trails behind Food Lover’s in the fresh league, if the Coppin brother’s boast can be believed.

A member of Food Lover’s staff told me they only have sell-by dates on fruit salad and similar items that they make themselves, but not on pre-packed product they get from their suppliers.

Founders Brian & Mike
Coppin

I accept that fruit and vegetables tend to go off quite quickly and that if you are in this kind of business it’s inevitable that some items might not be up to standard on the shelves now and again. But that’s very different from trying to sell something at a reduced price because you know it has gone off.

          Also as a shopper you have to wonder why one group doesn’t have sell-by dates on certain items and another one, that has been in existence far longer, does.

          Regards

          Jon, the Consumer Watchdog who was extremely impressed with the frank way Brian and Demetri dealt with my criticisms. It seems that running a business like theirs is not as simple as pie.

P.S. They got the value of the R300 worth of vouchers they gave me back with interest because I put them towards the R360 I spent on 12 R30 hamburgers. I handed these out to men waiting forlornly at street corners in the rain for jobs that would never materialise.

P.P.S. It looks as though the Long Beach Mall manager Karriem Fredericks either doesn’t get the boss's emails; he ignores them or he can’t get the message through to his staff. When I was at this branch today (Friday 16 August) the pineapple shelf was half full with the most horrible looking fruit. When I showed him two he said they were unacceptable. Half an hour later when I was back in the store to buy something else somebody was busy removing these. He had a trolley completely full, both top and bottom with ones he was about to take away.   

SOUTH AFRICA'S PRESS PROTECTION RACKET

Dear Newspaper Readers,

Pippa Green Press Ombudsman

          Did you know that large sections of our press are running their own protection racket unhindered by the Press Ombudsman or anybody else? And a Judge, who is currently heading a media ethics inquiry, is not prepared to consider this decay in our newspaper morality.

          The inquiry has been established by the South African National Editor’s Forum (SANEF) and the Judge’s treatment of my submission does nothing to support SANEF’s claim that it is there to “fight for the highest standards of ethics in the media.”

          The papers involved are the Daily Sun and the free People’s Post community weeklies in the Media24 stable as well as Caxton's The Citizen daily.

          Even Professor George Claassen Media24’s own Ombudsman had nothing good to say about the Herbalist advertisements that appear in his Group’s papers. "I agree with you, many of these ads are totally misleading and even fraudulent,” he said.

          Steven Motale the Editor of The Citizen at the time I wrote my story also agreed that the ads were not believable.

          They have people claiming to be doctors, professors and the like who can win you the lotto, enlarge your penis and do all kinds of other amazing things, almost over night. Some even offer a 100% guarantee. 
          Of course its illegal to call yourself a doctor when you are not one, but the papers don't worry about that. All they are interested in is making money. In the 17 May 2019 edition of the Sun there were two pages of these ads with 10 advertisers claiming to be doctors.

          As I knew the Press Ombudsman did not deal with advertising, another aspect of my campaign to stop these papers lying daily occurred to me. This was the editorial side of these, something this Ombudsman is definitely mandated to deal with, as she is there to rule on complaints against print and on-line publications. So I contacted Pippa Green, who became the new Ombudsman a couple of months ago.

This is typical
of the Herbalist
ads that appear
in the Daily Sun

          “I realise that your office does not deal with advertising,” I began. “But this is about the immoral way certain newspapers give crooks, who advertise in their papers, editorial immunity from having their activities exposed in their editorial sides.

          “At the same time a host of other dubious characters, who don’t advertise, get their comeuppance in the same papers.”

          My complaint, she told me, first had to go to the Public Advocate Joe Latakgomo. A former newspaper editor he was given this job last year to champion the complaints of members of the public, because one of the issues raised at a press commission was that the public’s voice was not being heard.

          The irony was that way back in 2011, when I was campaigning to get the Sunday Times to stop carrying get-rich-quick ads that promised unrealistic returns on investments, he was the internal Ombudsman for the Avusa Group, the owners of that paper. I upset him by suggesting that he was a lame duck ombudsman.

          An article he wrote in the paper, prompted I believe by my complaints, was headed Beware of dubious advertising claims. It looked as though the paper was finally going to stop aiding crooks.

          “These come-ons,” Joe told readers, “eroded the public's trust in newspapers and false advertising, or advertising that makes claims that are patently exaggerated, impact on consumer confidence.”

          He then gave this assurance, “We will continue as journalists to expose those who cheat and lie to our readers.” Nothing happened and it took several more years of my campaigning before the paper stopped taking this kind of ad. I’m sure it would never concede that my blog had anything to do with this change of policy. It did however have one lapse last year.

          Joe left the Group not long afterwards and as far as I know it has not had an internal Ombudsman since. It has changed hands several times in the last few years.

          I told Pippa that I did not think Joe was the right person to deal with my complaint in view of my dealings with him when he was with Avusa and she replied: “I cannot breach the Complaints Procedure by leapfrogging the Public Advocate in the first instance.”

          Guest what: she evidently did exactly that because I never heard from Joe and she effectively kicked my gripe into touch.

          She conveniently ignored what I wrote about the editorial side of these papers, even though this is the part of them that is the reason for her existence. “We do not at the moment have the jurisdiction to deal with advertising,” she told me.

Judge Satchwell

          Retired High Court Judge Kathleen Satchwell, who is heading the SANEF Inquiry with two retired journalists, took much the same view of what I had put to Pippa. She too completely ignored the editorial aspect.

          In my email to her I stated: “The gist of my submission is the immoral way certain South African newspapers have for years been aiding and abetting crooks to rip off those, who can usually least afford it, by carrying their advertisements that are clearly fraudulent. This media cancer has been compounded by the papers giving the shysters editorial immunity from having their activities exposed in their editorial sides.”

          She replied saying: “We consider that your concerns as to ‘fraudulent’ advertising falls beyond our remit. We have no powers to investigate criminal behaviour, which the connotation of ‘fraud’ certainly encompasses.”

          Her last statement was absurd as nowhere in my 13 page submission did I so much as suggest that they should investigate the fraudulent advertisements. It’s patently obvious that this is not something the Inquiry could be expected to do.

          I told her that in her reply to me Pippa Green wrote that they had another complaint from a man who lost a lot of money by responding to an ad in a community paper for a Profit. “We wrote to the editor of that paper,” Pippa continued, “and she has undertaken to help the police investigation and to speak to their advertising department about the type of advertising they accept.”          

          So once again somebody was ripped off with the help of the dubious side of the South Africa press, I stated in my submission to Judge Satchwell.

          I pointed out that Pippa Green did concede, however that: “We agree that many advertisements are problematic and undermine the credibility of newspapers. But we only have the tools of persuasion at the moment rather than instruction because we do not have jurisdiction over ads per se.”  

          She added that the Press Council’s Executive Director Latiefa Mobara had met with the new head of the Advertising Regulatory Board CEO Gail Schimmel, “who is also aware of the problem of misleading ads.

          “Will continue working with her and speak to editors to see what we can solve, but in the meantime, the ARB is the body to deal with such complaints.”

          The ARB replaced the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) that was so bad it was liquidated. When I complained to the ASA about misleading newspaper ads I got the complete run around. I was told they did not have the power to tell papers to stop carrying these, as they could only deal with the individual advertisers. They wanted me to submit a separate complaint for each ad that I believed was not kosher.  And I don’t expect the ARB to be any different.

          At one stage the ASA stated it had ruled against Herbalist advertisements "on numerous occasions, and it is hoped that the appropriate authorities will address this issue as it is no doubt causing harm to the credibility of legitimate healers and practitioners and this industry at large." As usual nothing happened.

Former Sunday Times
Consumer columnist

          These advertising authorities, like the Press Council (the Ombudsman is part of this) were established and financed by the industries they serve, so their impartiality is very questionable when it comes to dealing with complaints. What’s more they only have a tenuous control over those advertising agencies and media groups that are their members. They are essentially there to protect their masters, who pay for them and to give the illusion that they are looking after the interests of the public.         

          I ended my submission with: “It’s not surprising that newspapers go on printing the kind of lies I have referred to because the Press Council has little or no power to effectively police the press in South Africa. As the Independent Media (It owns papers like the Cape Times, The Star in Johannesburg and various others) showed, if a newspaper group doesn’t like Press Council decisions that go against it, all it has to do is resign as a member. It then has a free rein to go on doing whatever it likes or in this case appoint its own internal ombudsman.

You can’t get more absurd than having a Press Ombudsman, who concedes that the kind of advertisements I have referred to “undermines the credibility of newspapers,” but, conveniently,  she hasn’t been given the power to do anything about them.

        The terms of reference for the Inquiry that the Judge is heading state that its purpose “Shall include: Investigation of ethical breaches on the part of the media industry in South Africa and those obstacles to accountable and credible media practice.”

Well if ever there was an obstacle to “credible media practice” it was the Judge’s decision to refuse to consider my submission.

Regards

Jon, the self appointed Poor Man’s Press Ombudsman.
See also (sunday times at it again; lies lies and more lies & 
sunday times will never expose this)

P.S. I wasn’t optimistic that my submission to the SANEF Inquiry would get beyond first base. But if you don’t try you never know. SANEF represents editors and senior newspapers journalists and other people in the media. So I could hardly expect my views to be taken seriously because, if they were, the papers concerned might have to do without a good slice of their income. In my one man, 10 year long campaign to stop papers from continuing to print what are obviously money making lies I sent emails to SANEF’s director at the time Mathatu Tsedu, as well as the current director Kate Skinner to try to get them to do something about this. I didn’t even get a reply. 
P.P.S. The two journalists with the Judge on the panel are described as being 'retired from the industry.' They are Nikiwe Bikitsha and Rich Mkhondo. In an email to Nikiwe I told her I presumed this was done to emphasise their independence. But if Google is up to date she is the founder and CEO of Amargi Media and Rich also has his own public relations company. From what I know about public relations firms, keeping in with the press is very much part of what they do when they want to get maximum exposure for their clients. So people who are still in this business can never be described as being 'independent,' if they form part of a panel that is investigating newspaper and journalistic ethics, even if they were once journalists of some kind and have since moved on into the public relations world. Some might argue that even journalists, who are retired  and are in no business at all, can't be described as 'independent' when heading an inquiry of this kind. I sent this to her on 21 July  and on 24 July I emailed her again saying that if I did not hear from her by the week-end (27 July) I would assume that everything in this email was was correct. I heard nothing from her, although she was 
the person who acknowledged the receipt of my submission.

TEAM SPORTS: WHY DOES LITTLE NEW ZEALAND HAVE SUCH A WINNING FORMULA WHILE MUCH BIGGER SOUTH AFRICA LOOSES

Dear Sports Lovers,

Kane Williamson

          New Zealand is a tiny country with a population of a mere 5-million, yet it shows up South Africa’s 58-million badly when it comes to producing team sport winners.

          After reaching the final of the Cricket World Cup for the second successive time earlier this month its Silver Ferns have just won the Netball World Cup for the sixth time having been runners up on 8 previous occasions.

South Africa came fourth. It had some consolation when wing defender Karla Pretorius was named Player of the Tournament. The team’s best performance was second way back in 1995.

In cricket South Africa has never even reached the final of the World Cup in this sport. At this year’s event its Proteas faded so badly that they were lucky not to come last. Meanwhile the Black Caps added to their sterling performance when their captain Kane Williamson, who scored more than 30% of his team’s runs with 578, was named Man of the Tournament.

Another Kiwi batsman Martin Crowe got this accolade in 1992. The best that South Africa could do was when Lance Klusener picked up the trophy in 1999 for his top notch all round 281 runs and 17 wickets.

Lance Klusener

         In rugby South Africa was getting the best of the All Blacks at the World Cup up to 2007 with a win in that year as well as in 1995 when they narrowly beat New Zealand at Ellis Park. At that stage the All Blacks had only won once in 1987 when the tournament started. The Springboks were excluded from that because of apartheid.

More recently the Springboks haven’t featured at all at the centre of the podium with New Zealand taking the title in 2011 and 2015. In 2015 the All Blacks became the first team to defend their title and the first team to win it twice. The Springboks snatched a miserable third place.

It’s hardly surprising then, that the All Blacks are odds on favourites to win again later this year.

In 2011 the Boks, the defending champions, were eliminated in the quarter finals by Australia, another country with a very much smaller population than ours at 24 million. Their rugby not only has to compete for players with the country’s most popular sport Australian Rules football (Footy) as well as Rugby League and soccer.

South Africa’s men have had some good results in sevens rugby but again our team has been very much overshadowed by the All Blacks. The All Blacks kicked off the World Rugby Sevens Series in 1999 by leading the series for six successive years. So far they have accumulated 12 wins to South Africa’s three. 

New Zealand has won the women’s version, which began in 2012, five times out of seven, with Australia taking the title on the other two occasions. South Africa doesn’t seem to feature in this at all.

Evidently with its small population New Zealand can’t be expected to win everything so thankfully it has given soccer a miss.

In South Africa football is the most popular sport, but after the national team Bafana Bafana won the African Cup of Nations at home 23 years ago it has had one poor showing after another.

Karla Pretorius the World's
best netball player

It set what is possibly the worst record in this sport when it became the first host nation in FIFA World Cup history to exit in the group stage. It was when the tournament was held in South Africa in 2010. This was the first time it had been staged on the African continent.

Things got so bad that in 2014 the then Minister of Sport Fikile Mbalula described the team as a “bunch of losers” after it could not even make it to the group stage in the African Cup.

So it seems that South African coaches in many of our sports should be sent to New Zealand to learn how to produce winners. But we first have to get rid of our ridiculous quota system that is hampering our rugby and cricket sides in particular, and forcing white stars to continue their careers elsewhere in the world. There can’t be another country that insists on picking players based more on their colour than their ability.

This takes the cake

      This is being done in South Africa by government decree to ensure that blacks, disadvantaged under the previous whites only apartheid government, get places in the teams. The tragedy is that when they get picked they can’t be sure if it is because they are good enough or because they happen to be the right colour.

It’s hard to think of a better way of hobbling a nation’s sports performances.

Regards,

Jon, an avid sports watcher who, like our previous Minister of Sport, is getting sick of rooting for losers.

STOOD UP BY SUNE` GRIESSEL THE PUBLIC PROTECTOR'S WESTERN CAPE REPRESENTATIVE

Dear Readers,

          Calls for the Public Protector Busiswe Mkhwebane to be fired are getting louder and louder after a second court hearing found against one of her investigations.

          In his column in the Sunday Times headed “Mkhwebane is a public menace, not a public protector, and she must go" Barney Mthombothi wrote that Ramamphosa must make sure that parliament takes the necessary steps to remove her. A subsequent editorial in the same paper was headed: “This rogue investigator is what the public most need to be protected from.”

          If she must go so should Sune` Griessel who is in charge of the Western Cape Protector’s office in Cape Town, together with some of her useless staff.

          As far back as June 2017 I received an acknowledgement that my complaint to the Public Protector office in Pretoria had been received. I was trying to initiate an investigation into the way the Cape Town City Council had been wasting millions.

          For nearly four years I had personally documented, with my own pictures and posts on my blog, the way Council had been spending huge amounts on ineffective ways to try and keep the sand dunes in place above a municipal rubbish dump, next to the kite surfing beach at Witsands not far from Cape Point. The dump was closed more than 30 years ago, but there is still tons of plastic and other non-biodegradable material under the sand. The Council has been spending all this money to try and prevent this from getting washed into the sea.

          What I discover was that the Council’s net fences erected to ensure that the remains of the rubbish was always covered were getting blown away by the strong winds that are endemic to the area. Sometimes they were flattened as fast as they were put up. From time to time costly earth moving equipment was brought in to shift dunes around only to have the sand blown back to its original position.

This is how the ratepayer's money is being wasted

          At the end of last year Greg Oelofse, Cape Town’s Head of Environmental Policy told me that this maintenance work on the dunes would have to continue ad infinitum. What they had been doing had been successful because since 2006 none of the buried rubbish had been washed into the sea.

          What he neglected to mention was that in the last few years we have not had enough rain to wash anything into the sea.

          He was not in favour of vegetating the area with alien Port Jackson willow because in the unlikely event that they would be given permission to do this by the appropriate government department they would still have to spend money on an ongoing basis to make sure it did not spread to other areas.

          Meanwhile on the other side of the mountains above Witsands the lower slopes are covered in a forest of Port Jackson. They have been like this for more than 10 years and nobody has done anything about it.

          So what would be better – go on spending millions to try and keep the constant shifting sand in place at Witsands or plant Port Jackson? This would be self perpetuating and cost not a cent extra once planted. It already grows naturally in patches around the 19ha rubbish dump site and what’s more important is that it does not need any watering to get it going.

          My complaint to the Public Protector contained details from six of my posts about what has been going on at the dump site as well as links to the posts. Many of these included the replies I got from the councillors concerned as well City officials.

           But this was not good enough to even get the ace sleuths at the Public Protector’s Cape Town office started. A year after my complaint was received they were still trying to work out whether the “law allows your complaint to be investigated.”

           After I was told that my complaint had been shelved because I had not supplied enough information I came across a quote from the Public Protector herself that made nonsense of what the Cape Town office had been telling me. She said that even if her office is not provided with the evidence to support an allegation this did not stop it from being investigated.

          When I pointed this out to Griessel she phoned me and asked me to come to her office in the centre of Cape Town. I told her that I was not prepared to do this as it was quite a trek from where I live near Kommetjie. So she asked for my exact address as she said she had been visiting the township of Masiphumelele (Masi), which is in the same area, almost every week. When I gave it to her she undertook to come and see me at my home and made an appointment for the following week. About an hour before she was due to arrive somebody from her office phoned to say she would not be able to make it because the authorisation for the trip had not yet come through.

          Hers is such a humpty dumpty department that the office manager apparently needs an authorisation to travel from the centre of Cape Town to a place in the Southern suburbs. I told the caller to tell Griessel to tell me in an email what she wants me to give her. I never heard from her again.

Most of these claims didn't feature in my experience

          My response was to send her an email in which I told her that as head of the Western Cape office she sets an appalling example. “You told me among other things that your officer doesn’t deal with blogs. So you are evidently behind the times in that area of technology as well. Who does one complaint to about rotten service from your office?”

          While the City Council continues to blow money on a grand scale at an old rubbish dump site 40 000 Blacks live in Masi not far away, in what the Public Protector herself described as: “The most disgusting conditions I have seen in my life,” after she visited the township a couple of years ago.

          Regards,

          Jon

P.S. Thanks Sune`Griessel and your staff for doing your bit to tarnish the already besmirched name of the Public Protector.

See also:public protector's crazy requirements

SICKENING: the warped view of humanity displayed by Notre Dame's generosity scramble by the very rich

Dear Readers,

          People experiencing all kinds of unspeakable horrors in natural disasters don’t get anything like the same reaction from the billionaires, who fell over one another trying to be the biggest giver after the Notre Dame fire.

          When did you last see all the international television news channels reporting on a giving race that went up, not by millions of dollars at a time, but by hundreds of millions? In a few hours it had topped $900 million and climbing.

          It shot up faster than the fire at the Cathedral.

          All this was to restore an 800 year old building that the French Ministry of Culture is responsible for maintaining. It’s such a dodo that the French Government can’t afford to pay for its upkeep so there’s a charity trying to make up the shortfall.

Nobody was injured in the fire; nobody was made homeless; no children were orphaned; millions of poverty stricken people didn’t find the entire area where they live well above head high in water that remained there for weeks; it didn’t cause widespread famine; nobody had their home and all they possess burnt to a cinder; so how could this philanthropic frenzy possibly be justify? 

Great Minds think alike

Was this just a chance for these business leaders to do what they know best – flaunt their wealth and get one up on their monied rivals? “Ha!, Ha! I’m richer than you,” they could have been saying like little kids, if not publicly then under their breath.

The embers were probably still warm when Francois-Henri Pinault, who is married to actress Salma Hayek, announced that his family would donate 100-million euros ($112 –million). He is the CEO of Kering the luxury goods firm that owns brands like Gucci and is estimated to be personally worth $17-billion.

One of the problems of leading a race is that you are always likely to be overtaken from behind before you realise it, and I’m sure no billionaire likes to be beaten, but that’s exactly what happened.

Not to be outdone his rival in the fashion industry Bernard Arnault, the world’s third richest man and head of LVMH pledged to double Pinault’s miserable amount. This was hardly surprising as he himself is said to be worth $94-billion.  LVMH has brands like Louis Vuitton and Christian Dior

Then the BettercourtMeyers family that controls L’Oreal matched Arnault’s pledge.

'That shows real enterprise which I admire. They are obviously
more than capable of looking after themselves.'

          The French government allows companies a 60% tax rebate on donations to promote culture, but the billionaires were quick to deny that they would be getting any tax breaks for their big hearted gestures.

          This hard to believe display of wealth came at the worse possible time for the French government battling to quell a mini French Revolution. It’s the peasants against the rich with the Yellow Vests brigade protesting, violently in some cases, all over the country for economic justice. This Easter was the 23^rd consecutive week-end that they had rampaged through the streets.

          Philippe Martinez head of Frances’s CGT trade union federation complained that if tens of millions could be given to rebuild Notre Dame they must stop being told there was no money for social upliftment.

'Don't give me that story about these kids being among
the needy, you can see they're just being naughty.'

          It is a terrible indictment of the human race that repairing a building comes well before alleviating human suffering of mammoth proportions in every corner of the globe. This is especially so as fixing Notre Dame is likely to take five years or more. It will then be an even more expensive millstone around the neck of the French people, who have evidently had a gut full of luxury spending at the expense of the likes of the Yellow Vests. 
         At the time of the fire extensive maintenance work was going on judging by the amount of scaffolding around the cathedral. So is seems more than likely that the blaze was started accidentally by one of the workers.
   

'It's clear these people don't need any money from me. That
house will be fine once it dries out.'

         Regards

         Jon

P.S.  In March this year Cyclone Idai killed more than 300 people as it swept through Mozambique, Zimbabwe and Malawi. The harrowing pictures of some of those affected have quotes from an anonymous billionaire.

AUGUSTA GOLF CLUB IS STILL PLAYING ITS MASTERS OF WOMEN GAME

Dear Ladies,

Martha Burk who
got death threats

          How have you allowed America’s Augusta National Golf Club to continue treating you as nobodies for just about all of its 86 year existence?

          Notorious for its racial prejudice and sexist views it has been changing at a snails pace that is the antithesis of the current century. This is particularly appalling considering that its membership includes some of the richest men in the world like Microsoft’s Bill Gates.   

          Home of The Masters that has just been played this championship began life as the August National Invitation Tournament. Even its founders, amateur champion Bobby Jones and banker Clifford Roberts had misgivings about giving the tournament its current name.

          It had hardly started when Roberts proposed the change. Jones felt this was too presumptuous, but five years later Roberts got his way.

          Other words for presumptuous are arrogant, egotistical, insolent and cocksure and the club’s male members that have been running it have certainly lived up to these unenviable characteristics.

          Ironically Tiger Woods, who has just won his fifth Master’s title, would never have been allowed to hit a single shot on the course in its earlier years. As an African American he would only have qualified to have been a caddie. Up to 1983 competitors were compelled to use an Augusta Club caddie and these were traditionally all African American.

          In 1975 one of the club’s worst prejudices began to crumble when Lee Elder became the first African American to be invited to compete in the championship.

          But the club still had a women problem: How to go on keeping them out. With millionaires, and billionaires as members their mothers, wives and other female members of their families were evidently too subservient to their Masters to call them out for their blatant sexism at Augusta. 

          It was left to Martha Burk, a syndicated columnist and women’s rights activist to stir things up among the chauvinist pigs in their cosy Augusta pigsty where some 15% of members are CEO’s of massive corporations. Golf was incidental in this fight. It was about power.

          In 2002 she clashed with the then Chairman William “Hootie” Johnson. He responded by telling the world unashamedly that Augusta was a “single gender” club. He then had the gall to liken it to the Boy Scouts or the Girl Guides.

          She failed in her initial attempt to get the club to accept women as members, when she was refused a permit to protest at the gates during the 2003 Masters.

          Her luck changed later, however. Two gender discrimination law suites brought by her organisation, The Women on Wall Street Project, against companies associated with Augusta resulted in a $79-million settlement.

            Presumably if you treat women badly at your club you more than likely do the same in your company.

Condoleezza Rice

          Burk had to contend with death threats and being called all kinds of names like man hater and lesbian. This did not deter her. She won. Her efforts evidently embarrassed the Augusta Board of Directors into changing their admission policy on women. Grudgingly in 2012 they invited Condoleezza Rice, the Secretary of State in the Bush administration and Darla Moore, the former president of the private investment firm Rainwater Inc that was founded by her husband Richard, to become members.

          They were more or less forced to invite “Ginni” Rometty to become a member after she became Chief Executive of IBM, one of the main sponsors of The Masters.

The men at the top of this stuffy 300 member club could then congratulate themselves on how well they treated women. After all what more could anybody ask for now that they had three female members?

          Yet the Masters still did little to encourage woman once things had settle down after Burk’s attack.

          For some reason or other the current Chairman Fred Ridley announced a pathetic sop to them that did nothing to eliminate the Club’s clear female prejudice.

          The Augusta National Women’s Amateur Championships would be held just before this year’s Masters. This he claimed was to “inspire greater interest and participation in the women’s game.”

          It fell rather flat when he added that the Club was not contemplating holding a tournament for women similar to The Masters.

          The winner of this year’s event received $2-million for the first time. But the way things are no women will ever win any money at Augusta. That would be going too far in this male reserve.

          It is particularly deplorable that so many leaders of industry should have thought it was okay to prevent people from playing just because they had the wrong skin colour and that women could not be members for being…. women.

          These men proved that in spite of their lofty positions they were not nearly responsible enough to be in a so called “Land of the free.” And I can’t think it can be much fun being one of so few women among all those chauvinist pigs. It’s mucky in there.

          Regards,

          Jon

P.S. One of the Club strange idiosyncrasies involves the green jacket that is presented to every Masters winner. They are tailor made for each winner. Then they are only allowed to keep it for a year before returning it to the club for safe keeping in a special green jacket store room. It seems they can’t trust their winners to look after them on a permanent basis. Nothing could be more terrible than if one got into the wrong hands and a tramp was seen rummaging through rubbish on the side of a road while wearing one of those hallowed garments.

See also augusta-champion-chauvenist-pig