Opportunism Is:

South African Cabinet Ministers.

Cabinet is appointed by a president. S/He appoints ministers to various portfolios, these are not guaranteed or elected by public posts.

Ministers with a spine, tendered their resignation not really in solidarity with Oom Thabo, but rather because their "contract" is effectively over with the exit of a president. Gripe of the post: Ministers of the like of Manto Tshabalala Msimang.

This woman, enjoys the dubious honour of widespread unpopularity.However, despite her garlic-lemon-olive oil brand of treatment of terminally ill patients, she enjoyed a free reign and total support from Oom Thabo. Some quarters even go so far as considering his support and loyalty to her part of his demise. However, at crunch time, when the President is "recalled", does she hand in her resignation? No.

Being a Minister is not a right, it's a privileged office which is supposed to allow you to put your skills at work for the betterment of the people. Evidently for Ministers such as Dr Beetroot, putting your own position of power, your pension is far more important than having a spine or showing some loyalty to the man who put his career in jeopardy for you to continue running amok. This critique doesn't only apply to her, but to all of those who kept their cushy jobs despite the fact that they might not be deployed back to cabinet under Motlanthe. Shakespeare needs to be paraphrased at times like this, something is very much rotten in the State of South Africa. It is precisely this kind of complacent behaviour which has filtered down from the top that has resulted in our all round poor service delivery for us plebs at the bottom of the gravy train.

In other news, I was utterly appalled to be faced with the shocking reminder of APLA cadres still incarcerated (more on that in another post). This was quite strange, because I was thinking about them over the weekend as I ran through my voting options.


Right, now I await the list of who will serve under Motlanthe, whom I hope will begin work as though he is a proper president and not merely a stop over. Congratulations Mr President. I hope your wisdom, diplomacy and work ethic supercedes your ambition.

So help us God,
rah*

Armchair Politics

My 8 year old of the next generation, somewhat displaced and extended holder of shared genetic-material found an errant abaya the other day and wore it; at first pretending she was a judge by sitting at the dining room table and pointing fingers at everyone and handing out sentences. Then she decided to be a part of some imaginary graduation ceremony and the abaya became her academic gown. Needless to say these non-fun situations soon passed and she found much more entertainment pretending to be Count Dracula (I did mention she was related to me, didn't I?) and then running up and down the passage singing the Darkwing Duck theme song with her "cape" flying behind her.She was warned about the dangers of being irresponsible and reckless. Yes, she did trip and fall and get hurt. And went back to being a Judge.

She is 8, she stopped and understood the meaning of reckless behaviour. Apparently it is quite a difficult concept to grasp. My gripe for the post: Julius Malema.

Not only is he well over 8 years old, but I find it very hard to believe how this uneducated moron can be considered "youth". Fikile whatshisface was about 45 and president of the Youth League, but hell, when did a few decades make any difference to semantics. I would venture to suggest that perhaps the immaturity of his statements qualifies him as Nduna of the masses. Statements along the lines of killing for Zuma (and then wondering how anyone else could possibly find his statement offensive?), let us not forget the latest one of how the media should stop focussing on the arms deal now, because in his esteemed opinion "it's old news and it's gone boring now".Need I point out that it was PRECISELY The Arms Deal which got us into our current predicament anyway? Does no one ever LISTEN to the utter rubbish that comes out of his mouth?

I find the hypocrisy way too blatant. This big mouthed, small brained, skivvy has proven to us that the ANC cannot rein him in (as Mr Harvester has pointed out). But that is besides the point, his antics at the ANCYL elections did more to publicise his ineptitude as a leader than his statements ever will.

This is the man who demands JZ is president, for the sake of the "poor". However, at tax payers expense him and his cronies have what seemed like a drunken brawl and threw around beverages such as R8/ 500ml bottled water? All in the name of the poor in SA, some of whom in the rural areas do not have taps or running water. But yes, that total waste of tax payers money was not enough. No sir. ANCYL top brass, probably including this fuckwit, needed to drop their trousers in protest over some policy or the other and give journalists present a shot of their nekkid butts. Which as some of you might recall, made front page of The Times the next day.

If that is the type of shamless behaviour he condones and considers appropriate on winning an election, then I think I speak for all of us when I say that this dude might just be the undoing of SA. It was the Marquis de Sade who said, "One is never so dangerous when one has no shame, than when one has grown too old to blush". And that is exactly the mentality of the ANCYL leadership headed by this "counter revolutionary" character. I agree with The Organharvester, regardless of what Thabo's done or how aloof or arrogant he is or was, this jackass has no right to humiliate him and should have a basic sense of respect for the man.


Trying times for SA indeed, but this has been perhaps the most fascinating political week since 1994. And I'll be damned if I let Malema (split that into it's Latin and Greek components and you get Mal or Male- wrong, evil, bad (Latin) such as that in Malleus Maleficarum, Ema or Eme is from the Greek meaning to vomit, I think the word emit probably takes its root from here...Shall we play spot the irony?) have his say without throwing in mine.

Aaaah bleh, I'm out of time now. When I return, more on the Ministers and their resignations and Motlanthe.

BRB (I mean it this time)
rah*