They say, “the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, and expecting different results”.
Since the news of the rape of a 28-year-old Johannesburg woman by an animal masquerading as Jeff Rals on Facebook, followed immediately by the murder of Olorato Mongale, this phrase, often attributed to German-American physicist Albert Einstein, has been reverberating in my mind.
As a detour, when the news of the discovery of Mongale’s body broke, I was driving with my wife to celebrate her birthday. As we were digesting the sad news, we concluded that as a society, we had to do something new to try to protect our daughters.
Now, when our daughters go out on a date, we as parents must insist that the boy who knocks at the door takes and sends us his selfies so that we have his picture, not a fake one from social media.
I have heard black parents say they don’t want to meet their daughter’s dates because they would rather meet “the one”.
Our new thinking must be “which is worse – knowing the many suitors or going to the police station to file a missing daughter report?
I know what my family and I choose. We will be trying something new.
Then I started thinking: what new ideas have I heard from our leaders on how we can protect our daughters?
Let me congratulate Col Athlenda Mathe, the national police spokesperson, for most probably saving the life of a 28-year-old woman.
Apparently, when the friend of the woman got a frantic message from her, he called Mathe, who immediately jumped into action.
Yes, serve and protect is the job she signed up for, but many in the public service would have directed this distraught man to the nearest police station. But Mathe didn’t.
Though she missed his call, she called the stranger back to obtain the information she needed to do something. Again, this is something new.
Where are the new ideas from Minister in the Presidency for Women, Youth and People with
Disabilities Sindisiwe Chikunga? True, Chikunga didn’t kidnap, rape or kill anyone – these atrocities were perpetrated by others – but Chikunga accepted the high calling of protecting women, and she has failed, at least for these two.
As South African parents, we need to take advantage of the disunity the government of national unity (GNU) has given us to drive the necessary change.
In the past three months, for the first time in South Africa, members of the cabinet voted against the budget proposal by their colleague.
This week, ActionSA called for Minister of Employment and Labour Makhosazana Meth to fall on her sword or be fired for the unemployment crisis. In case you have forgotten, it was ActionSA that came to Minister of Finance Enoch Godongwana’s rescue and saved his budget. This is teaching us that it is possible to be friendly and demand accountability.
Maybe the GNU is the cure we didn’t ask for. Maybe it’s time that we vote people we hate into power so we can ruthlessly get rid of them when they fail.
We elect leaders to be our brains, to solve the problems we can’t, even the ones we create, like this one. Chikunga accepted this responsibility, for which we reward her handsomely.
We have a violence problem in South Africa that didn’t start with Chikunga, but her colleague Kgosientsho Ramokgopa is showing us that a minister can rack up more wins than losses.
The problems are still there, and he probably will not end them, but nobody can say he hasn’t given us hope.
Unfortunately, under Chikunga, our gender-based violence problem is getting worse.
For far too long, as blacks, we accepted that 30 years is too short to right the 400 years of colonial and apartheid wrongs. Then Ramokgopa came along, and, in a few short months, showed us that with the right aptitude, competent people can turn things around.
We know who killed Mongale, and we must deal with them one by one.
While we deal with these animals, we must also chew and maybe spit Chikunga out, because under her, there is no light at the end of this grim tunnel.
If those we elect to protect us and work for us are happy with the same old, same old, we must try something new.
Gauteng Premier Panyaza Lesufi is speaking about drones to protect citizens. He is talking about a dash cam on every official public car – by the way, he should expand this to mine, the dash cams civilians have installed on their vehicles give police more “eyes” in the streets.
It doesn’t mean that Lesufi or Ramokgopa will be successful, but there is evidence to suggest they are looking for solutions. Some of the solutions will be stupid, some might even be slammed as “illegal” as Lesufi found out.
Where are Chikunga’s ideas?
What use do we have for her if she can’t protect our daughters?
Why should the pockets of our leaders be safe from our rage?
• Mzwandile kaBizokwakhe is a columnist at large with obviously too much time on his hands to think silly things
