Roll up the sleeves and get on with work to make SA great
Now that the long-awaited announcement of the cabinet has come and gone, it is time for us all to roll up the sleeves and get down to the business of making this country work for the benefit of the majority.
Politics is an important ingredient of the recipe to make a success of South Africa as a leading light on the continent but much more is demanded of us.
Most of the African peoples gained independence from their erstwhile colonial masters mostly in the 1960s, but the euphoria that spread across the mother continent with these winds of change was sullied by political leaders who often proved to be no better, and even worse, than the colonists they replaced.
Instead of progress, decay and rot set in, symbolised to the naked eye by infrastructure falling apart while the so-called leaders used the public purse as their personal piggy bank. The leaders grew rich, ironically shipping their wealth to banks and property in Europe while reducing their countries to begging bowls.
Maybe years of suffering has made Africans even more resilient and determined to better their lot instead of looking elsewhere for salvation, browbeaten into recognising that it would come from nowhere else but within themselves.
When South Africa was freed in 1994, shaking off more than 300 years of colonial and apartheid minority rule, hope sprang eternally that ours was the making of a country that would be nothing but exemplary, not only to Africa.
It seemed so for a while under the presidencies of Nelson Mandela and his immediate successor Thabo Mbeki. Mandela was largely a cere-monial president, having said so himself, as he pursued the necessary healing South Africa needed after emerging deeply hurt and wounded by apartheid, a crime against humanity.
Mbeki had, in effect 15 years at the helm to steer the ship in the desired direction that sensibly identified the true emancipation of the African from the economic chains bequeathed them by apartheid and preceding centuries of being denied meaningful participation in the economy and exiled from their land.
The Mandela years had papered some yawning cracks that would no doubt cause serious damage if not addressed. There were murmurs of disapproval when Mbeki spoke of our reality, a nation of two peoples: one rich and white and the other black and poor, very poor.
The less said of the Zuma years, the better. It seemed to follow the trajectory of most of liberated Africa, with wanton looting of the state.
There was nothing much left when Ramaphosa walked in to survey the demolition. The outbreak of Covid-19 did not help matters but the jury was largely out for most of his first term. Yet his spinelessness has been the definition of his stay in power. We need proper leadership. We doubt it will come from him.
When the jury returned the verdict on May 29, the disapproval was loud and clear. He now has to do a lot more on a hugely reduced majority that now sees the ANC sitting on a paltry 40% of the vote. His work is cut out for him, more so since he has to rely on the support of those who don’t have the interests of the majority at heart. Good luck; he’ll need it.
