I don't want to believe that South Africans are hypocritical. But hypothetically speaking we may be found to be hypocrites.
Recently the country saw an uprising against the statues which have remained with us for the better part of our democracy.
Whatever that may have led to, the calls for the statues to be removed or demolished could be related to the greater topic of who we are and what we stand for, of what we stand to gain from our fight for liberation and how to make our country a place where our people can feel respected and well taken care of.
This would also require rapid responses being made to the way our democracy is becoming an endangered species due to political patronage, economic disempowerment and a disregard for energetic young people.
My deep present pain is about the deafening silence across the country and from the youth formations in particular about the destruction of the country’s status and economy by the most powerful man in the ANC, President Jacob Zuma.
I have never before seen such wanton destruction of the gains so painfully made for the sake of democracy as what I saw Police Minister Nathi Nhleko doing in his report on “Nkandlaaah”!
When I make reference to apartheid and its mistreatment of the masses, I talk from experience because I was there and I felt the abuse of the police force of the time.
Yet nothing could have prepared us for what we are going through today – after we have voted for our own government.
Patronage and nepotism have taken over in the movement and made a joke of the freedom brought to us by Nelson Mandela, Oliver Tambo and others.
Our country and our metros have been turned into the most ridiculous circuses I have ever seen, even since Boswell and Wilkie first came to East London.
Under the rule of the ANC we have all now seen that politicians rise up the ladder through the manipulation of ignorant voters, bribery of branch members and collusion with comrades in a bid to stay employed. They do nothing that will upset the bosses, even if it means breaking the rules of governance.
With this there is no turning back from a path of destruction. And we need to remember that there are a number of comrades waiting in the wings to get their turn at the feeding trough.
Whether we like it or not, we are part of Africa and we cannot escape what the other countries went through – civil war.
Civil wars are fought not only because of political powermongers but when the hungry witness autocratic leaders guzzling all the wealth in a country, leaving the poor even poorer.
Our president is unfortunately the master of manipulation and patronage and has all the law-enforcement agencies in his pocket.
JZ went to the branches to mobilise support in 2006, prior the notorious Polokwane 2007 ANC conference and played the innocent victim of the ANC elite then.
To make sure that this process cannot be repeated against him he has completely destroyed the ANC Youth League and has held the ANC Women’s League at ransom with a steady job for Angie Motshekga and a few connected influential leaders.
As if that is not enough, comrades who were frontrunners in his return to government are now mostly enemies, ultimately purged from their positions and thrown out of influential circles.
Whatever the words or idioms that we use to describe the Nkandlaaah saga and destruction of our democratic institutions, the status quo will remain.
We are now at a crossroads with our former liberators turned oppressors, with JZ the main protagonist in the wave of moral decay and reversal of the struggle.
It will not end here if we do not revive campaigns like #RhodesMustFall, but directed at the current leadership.
If the whole country is able to be consumed by hatred towards the statue of Cecil John Rhodes, a lifeless bronze object erected at the entrance of the University of Cape Town, how is it that we become silent when one man is destroying our freedom, plunging the whole country into poverty, raising unemployment figures and creating new moral lows for every public figure.
How can we be so hypocritical and ignore what our fathers died for?
I pose these questions to an electorate that I know has the power to change the status of our leadership and opt for caring and responsible leaders.
The ANC in parliament always boasts about being elected by the majority of the people in South Africa. But a question that I would like to ask is, do the people who elect the ANC to govern know what they are doing? Do they know the consequence of continuing to elect this organisation into power? Do people in rural areas know what is due to them in terms of services?
The world is a dangerous place, not because of people who do wrong, but because of those who look and do nothing while being strategically placed to have influence.
If we cannot shift our own paradigms and see the oppressors for what they are, we may well die in silence.
Moving towards 2016, the comrades seem so sure that they are going to get the vote because the majority vote them in, even if to embark on service delivery protests a week later. That is hypocritical. The SACP and Cosatu, the perpetual beneficiaries of a corrupt system, will not even attempt to condemn the Nkandlaah saga – that, too, is hypocritical
But the silent voters can teach the ANC not to take people for granted. Usana olungakhaliyo lufela embelekweni – so says the Xhosa idiom. We need to wake up before it is too late. We cannot countenance a continuation of the rot on our watch.
Mkhululi Milisi is from Mdantsane
Dead end for hypocrites who undermine the vote
Recently the country saw an uprising against the statues which have remained with us for the better part of our democracy.
Whatever that may have led to, the calls for the statues to be removed or demolished could be related to the greater topic of who we are and what we stand for, of what we stand to gain from our fight for liberation and how to make our country a place where our people can feel respected and well taken care of.
This would also require rapid responses being made to the way our democracy is becoming an endangered species due to political patronage, economic disempowerment and a disregard for energetic young people.
My deep present pain is about the deafening silence across the country and from the youth formations in particular about the destruction of the country’s status and economy by the most powerful man in the ANC, President Jacob Zuma.
I have never before seen such wanton destruction of the gains so painfully made for the sake of democracy as what I saw Police Minister Nathi Nhleko doing in his report on “Nkandlaaah”!
When I make reference to apartheid and its mistreatment of the masses, I talk from experience because I was there and I felt the abuse of the police force of the time.
Yet nothing could have prepared us for what we are going through today – after we have voted for our own government.
Patronage and nepotism have taken over in the movement and made a joke of the freedom brought to us by Nelson Mandela, Oliver Tambo and others.
Our country and our metros have been turned into the most ridiculous circuses I have ever seen, even since Boswell and Wilkie first came to East London.
Under the rule of the ANC we have all now seen that politicians rise up the ladder through the manipulation of ignorant voters, bribery of branch members and collusion with comrades in a bid to stay employed. They do nothing that will upset the bosses, even if it means breaking the rules of governance.
With this there is no turning back from a path of destruction. And we need to remember that there are a number of comrades waiting in the wings to get their turn at the feeding trough.
Whether we like it or not, we are part of Africa and we cannot escape what the other countries went through – civil war.
Civil wars are fought not only because of political powermongers but when the hungry witness autocratic leaders guzzling all the wealth in a country, leaving the poor even poorer.
Our president is unfortunately the master of manipulation and patronage and has all the law-enforcement agencies in his pocket.
JZ went to the branches to mobilise support in 2006, prior the notorious Polokwane 2007 ANC conference and played the innocent victim of the ANC elite then.
To make sure that this process cannot be repeated against him he has completely destroyed the ANC Youth League and has held the ANC Women’s League at ransom with a steady job for Angie Motshekga and a few connected influential leaders.
As if that is not enough, comrades who were frontrunners in his return to government are now mostly enemies, ultimately purged from their positions and thrown out of influential circles.
Whatever the words or idioms that we use to describe the Nkandlaaah saga and destruction of our democratic institutions, the status quo will remain.
We are now at a crossroads with our former liberators turned oppressors, with JZ the main protagonist in the wave of moral decay and reversal of the struggle.
It will not end here if we do not revive campaigns like #RhodesMustFall, but directed at the current leadership.
If the whole country is able to be consumed by hatred towards the statue of Cecil John Rhodes, a lifeless bronze object erected at the entrance of the University of Cape Town, how is it that we become silent when one man is destroying our freedom, plunging the whole country into poverty, raising unemployment figures and creating new moral lows for every public figure.
How can we be so hypocritical and ignore what our fathers died for?
I pose these questions to an electorate that I know has the power to change the status of our leadership and opt for caring and responsible leaders.
The ANC in parliament always boasts about being elected by the majority of the people in South Africa. But a question that I would like to ask is, do the people who elect the ANC to govern know what they are doing? Do they know the consequence of continuing to elect this organisation into power? Do people in rural areas know what is due to them in terms of services?
The world is a dangerous place, not because of people who do wrong, but because of those who look and do nothing while being strategically placed to have influence.
If we cannot shift our own paradigms and see the oppressors for what they are, we may well die in silence.
Moving towards 2016, the comrades seem so sure that they are going to get the vote because the majority vote them in, even if to embark on service delivery protests a week later. That is hypocritical. The SACP and Cosatu, the perpetual beneficiaries of a corrupt system, will not even attempt to condemn the Nkandlaah saga – that, too, is hypocritical
But the silent voters can teach the ANC not to take people for granted. Usana olungakhaliyo lufela embelekweni – so says the Xhosa idiom. We need to wake up before it is too late. We cannot countenance a continuation of the rot on our watch.
Mkhululi Milisi is from Mdantsane
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