NO ONE SEEMS THAT ANGRY

Market prices of shares, debt and the currency all fell quite sharply as clear signs that the Eskom developments were very very disappointing. Did President Cyril not have a small twinge of déjà vu yesterday when he set up a “special cabinet committee to deal with the Eskom crisis”. The last time that our national power utility switched out the lights he (then just V-P) was given the job of heading a “war room” to find out what was happening. Obviously, that plan failed to work, and so why it should do so now is unclear. The rest of us know that the problem is simply that there is insufficient electrical engineering knowledge and experience anywhere in the command chain that runs from the chap on the gate at the power station right up to the highest office in the land. Somewhere near the top of this pyramid clings Chairman Jabu Mabuza who seems to be a genial sort of chap with a fine collection of hats. But despite the Wikipedia description of him as an entrepreneur and investor, like most of us, he appears to have almost no clue about running a crucial element of an industrial economy. The most puzzling thing is our collective attitude of complacent resignation at this state of affairs.  The jokes on the internet about the power cuts seem to outnumber the sober assessments that the government’s discriminatory race-based policies are the root cause of this and indeed probably most of our woes.

A superficial analysis of just exactly what the country gains from the foreign travel undertaken by bureaucrats and politicians prompts the idea that everyone fitting this description should be required to surrender their passport immediately. Anyone contemplating an overseas holiday can retrieve the document for the duration of the vacation but only after they have proved that no state funds would be used for the jaunt.  The reasoning is not just to save (lots) of travel allowances but to be sanguine about the value to the nation of sending public servants either to sell or buy stuff. This also includes meetings and conferences, either as a speaker or a listener. Many of our representatives and delegates them are declared communists supposedly hostile to people making a profit, some are embarrassingly unkempt and dishevelled and almost all of them seem oblivious to what is actually taking place in their homeland or indeed their host country. It is time to end shopping sprees dressed up as fact-finding folderol.  Almost no one overseas will miss the South Africans some of whom have an unnatural interest in Fanta[1] while back home we shall watch with interest who still comes to visit us and why.

Meanwhile despite the much-trumpeted extradition treaty agreed with the UAE last year it seems that the police need no longer hang around Joburg International waiting for the incoming Dubai flights. Astonishingly the cases and allegations against the Gupta brothers have now evaporated. So still we wait for the arrest of someone – anyone—who stole all our money.

In those university towns where water saving is currently not a priority, it is puzzling that so little use is made of water cannon to clear the revolting students off the streets. Skilfully directed it could be used to flush out for arrest those individuals whose behaviour has been particularly vile. The insolent individual on a Durban campus this week who called his vice-chancellor a murderer should not escape punishment and the prospect of a career-affecting criminal record for doing so.

Unless one is playing close attention, one may have missed the changeover of sub-continental cricket teams. The Sri Lankans are now playing a test here in Durban and it looks as if once again tickets for day 5 will be useless.  The SuperRugby tournament kicks off today and runs until a final in July. Two months later it’s the World Cup in Japan.  Whew. It will be hard to find a place at the bar of the bowling club this evening as it is also home to many of the Duzi paddlers who now have just one more day to reach the finish. These lads and lasses are terrifyingly fit and thirsty too.

James Greener

Friday 15^th February 2019

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[1] Slang for bribe