MORE INCONSISTANT INSISTING

Two rather important prices in the global markets are declining. The first is the price of US 10-year bonds. The second is the price of a US dollar. The temptation is to attribute this to the growing realisation that the USA has elected a new president. One who tends towards the idea that government spends money more wisely than its individual citizens. After 4 years of a president who held the opposite view, buyers of instruments where the government has influence are perhaps holding back. The ladies and gentlemen of our Cabinet simply just don’t get it, do they? Whatever the reasons might be, including forces beyond their control, the amount of tax income coming into the National Treasury is much much less than they had been warned to expect. And yet they still spend. The latest rolling 12-month total revenue figure for government is R1.2 trillion. In and of itself this might not be a problem except that across the ministry corridor, in the section that dispenses the money for the state’s expenditure, the current equivalent figure is R1.8 trillion. Not only is this 50% greater than the income, it is also R340bn greater than two and a half years ago. In this period of severe recession, even before the virus appeared and our leaders laid waste to the economy, state expenditure annual growth has been north of 10%pa. Stop it ministers. Just stop it! The calamity inherent in these terrifying but simple facts fails to reflect that most civil servants have been largely even more unproductive since the Corona Virus sent them to work from home. This is the topic and his proposed solutions that we need urgently to hear addressed by President Cyril. Not only is this economic situation causing conditions that are starving more South Africans to death than ever the virus will kill, but his lack of vision and leadership is promoting the most egregiously stupid behaviour amongst certain members of this team. From beneath his hat the Minister of Police, Bheki Cele has ordered armed policemen on to beaches where only sparse groups of white folk are rapidly reddening in the sun. To do what? Presumably to protect the virus from being harmed. After all, that tiny bug has helped so many connected cadres collect carloads of cash that it’s worth protecting. In the meantime, the minister of transport has suggested that motorists sound their horns at noon everyday this holiday to remind us that people die in traffic accidents. The scuttlebutt on the internet is that we as a nation failed to make the payment to secure any doses of Covid vaccines. Arrangements are being made for the Solidarity Fund to come up with some cash but that will cover only 10% of our requirements. Allegedly the state itself has directed all its reserves towards the SAA bail-out. That’s classy governance! But fake news is a scourge in all these sorts of stories. Like the survey that South Africans spend more time sleeping than any nation on earth. This is undoubtedly wrong as everyone knows that we spend more time hanging about in queues than any other activity. Waiting for a government service rarely takes less than 2 hours, often because vital pieces of information about what you need or should have done prior to joining the line are only revealed as progress towards the head is made. The particularly dehumanising element is the bum-shuffle where one’s place in the queue is reserved only by one’s posterior. A seat pre-warmed by a fellow supplicant for our government’s attention is not that pleasant. Tidemarks now has sufficient white hair and gravitas sometimes to be offered a free jump to the head. Talking of white hair raises the observation that shopping malls are this year free of Santa Claus grottos and bewildered terrified infants. They are also pretty free of shoppers too. We all talk wistfully of returning to “normal” one day and perhaps we shall. But in the meantime I wish you a very merry and safe and peaceful Christmas. James Greener Friday 18th December 2020