The Week That Was

Gerald Potash,

Hello again

You probably won’t be surprised to hear that Jacob Zuma was back in court this week and making all the news headlines again. This time, however the urgent court judgement was in his favour.  The courts have overturned an IEC (Electoral Commission) ruling that banned him from standing in the upcoming election because he is a convicted criminal. We don’t yet have the reasons for the judgement (Paul explained it clearly to the usual suspects yesterday afternoon) because the judges ruled that their decision was urgent in the light of the upcoming general election but that reasons can be given later. Zuma’s new Party, umKhonto weSiwe (MK) is deliriously happy and the serious losers are probably going to be the ANC.                                  

The Burger newspaper on Saturday is always a compulsory read for me. The editorial from Dawie is a must read and my favourite column writer, Dana Snyman, is also on the “Kommentaar” page with his weekly wisdom.  This week Dawie’s editorial is all about how the ANC have damaged parliament by appointing pliant Speakers. The recently arrested Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula may have been the very worst in a long line of obedient cadres who were appointed purely to look after the ANC and make it difficult for Opposition members to hold anyone to account in Parliament, as they are meant to do.

The ex-Speaker has handed in her passport and hopefully is preparing herself for a 15 year jail sentence. That is the prescribed sentence for being guilty in this matter. 

Earlier in the week Rapule Tabane, editor of City Press wrote on the same tack how poorly performing heavy-weight ANC cadres merely get shifted into different positions like what happened with the Speaker of the House, Ms Mapisa-Nqakula who was an atrocious Minister of Defence and broke a band of legal edits to get her way. She also performed poorly as head of the ANC Women’s League before being appointed a Deputy Minister and then a Minister. Occasionally she received a light tap on the knuckles. And eventually her role in Parliament as Defence Minister was changed to Speaker since she failed so miserably as a Minister. Now she is accused No 1 and hopefully will go to jail if the State can prove their bribery claims against her. The NPA (National Prosecuting Authority) are positive they have enough on her to make the charges stick, when asked by the press for an opinion. She, however, says jail is no place for her because of her health and age (67). She demands different rules than those for all other offenders! The arrogance of the cadres knows no boundaries.

For the manner in which Cyril treated an incompetent, dishonest cadre HE should be sacked. 

The cartoon I enjoyed most on this whole sordid affair was from Yalo in the Sunday World:

As I predicted some weeks ago power outages have almost not happened in the last two weeks. I mentioned in a previous newsletter that the closer we get to the elections the less outages there are likely to be. Our Minister of Electricity was quite buoyant in an interview on Tuesday when he put forward several reasons for the improved state of electricity affairs. Actually one important reason is that so many users have gone off the grid and are using solar panels. 

But we experienced the horrible effect of not having water in our taps on Sunday and that is worse than not having electricity. A serious pipe burst caused major disruptions which after only one day made us realise what Johannesburg and other towns up North are experiencing far too regularly. An announcement early in week told Johannesburgers that they will be without water for 14 to18 hours on Tuesday. But some towns in the North have been without any tap water for 14 days!

This past Sunday was unusual as we had a wind storm like I have never ever experienced. I’m not sure it shouldn’t have been called a hurricane. Roofs were blown off, trees were uprooted and the accompanying strong rain on Monday made the Premier of our Province ask that those of us living in the Helderberg Basin to stay indoors unless absolutely necessary. All schools in our area were closed and our Mall was closed when part of the roof came down in the roaring wind. The damage is going to cost millions to repair. 

The Burger had this cartoon by Dr Jack on Wednesday (yesterday). 

Translation: Thank heavens the boys are going back to school today. They did more damage inside these past two days than the storm did outside.

A story about the ineffectiveness (or criminality or corruption) of the police was published in BusinessLive this week. It is about an insolvency investigator who with his son was gunned to death in broad daylight on the N1 highway near Johannesburg. The police have a clear picture of the car and of the driver and his son (whom they have identified)  who was following the investigator and shot them.  A year later they have still not interviewed the driver for questioning and have not subpoenaed the driver’s cell phone to check the data thereon. The article goes on to confirm what we know;  that our police are so unable to perform even the very basics in investigation that it beggars belief. They put on their uniform merely to get paid at the end of the month. 

Almost every day we learn of some outrageous wastage of money by the government. This week we read that the Department of Defence is spending about R9 000 per month on a property that has been unoccupied since December 2021. And you really don’t want to know how many suspended cadres, not at work, who are still receiving full pay. 

The usual suspects, again at the behest of Dennis, that character of note got together twice this week. The first gathering was at Probus (a club for over 65’s…..we also all qualify) to listen to Paul Hoffman of Accountability Now take questions from the floor.  He was relaxed and had an answer for every question and the talk was as good as the excellent luncheon at the Clovelly Golf Club. John was with us again and it was lovely to have the full quorum of suspects present.

Then yesterday, all the suspects gathered at the CT Press Club to listen to Songezo Zibi. This is a seriously bright fellow who wants to save SA with his new political Party, Rise Mzanzi. He spoke and then answered questions and Paul suggested that I vote for the DA on the provincial voting paper but for Rise Mzanzi on the national ballot.
That makes lots of sense.
 

Have you seen what has happened to the gold price? 

Could that save SA? The ANC can’t. While on the good news, Cape Town airport welcomed more tourists this summer than ever before. That really is a great boost for our economy. And really wonderful news is that Boulders beach (with the penguins) was rated the 2nd best beach in the world out of 100 beaches rated by BeachAtlas’ Golden Beach Awards 2024.

The rugby was exciting. There was less of a crowd on the couch this week. The world champion and the coach were there and Oom Dawie from next door arrived in good time but that was all to watch a helluva game against, La Rochelle the current champions in the knock-out Champions competition. The game was played in Cape Town in the strongest wind you can imagine and it went down to the final kick that our erratic Springbok kicker, Manie Libbok missed and so The Stormers went down 21-22.

Spurs won on Sunday evening. They have now clawed their way back into that all-important 4th position on the Premiership log which, if they remain there will allow them to compete in the top European competition next season. They are only just 4th making it on goal difference but they do have a game in hand. 

As always,

Gerald