DURBAN - “Protector dealt a huge blow”, screamed the front page (headline) of The Mercury yesterday.
On the same page we read of a blast going off outside the city hall of, Pietermaritzburg.
“Thieves ‘hijack’ empty (thank goodness), train”, almost seems like the pudding off a three-course disastrous meal reflecting the state of our nation.
It seems that we are “putting out fires with gasoline”, here in South Africa, as state institutions, once well-funded, methodically run and staffed by those who had the knowledge to do the work they were employed to do, have been overtaken by a lunatic brigade hell-bent on “getting their turn to eat”, as the saying goes and still not satisfied, overturn the tables and walk all over what remains of their ill-gotten banquet.
What flawed, “quick, get the interviews over, Thuli Madonsela’s time draws to a close and we need to find a replacement, any replacement” process brought this excuse of a public protector into such an important position, one may ask?
From what appears in the news this far, seems to be someone who has been overcome with self importance and drunk on too much power.
The breathtaking speed with which reports on half baked investigations have been formulated and presented as fact, on selective cases, seems to reveal someone hell-bent on not only placing themselves above the highest state of governance, but like a “speed-fuelled cuckoo”, hammering at a stone wall, thinking it to be a pine tree.
Like many placements into positions of importance, in both civil and private enterprises, this one was flawed from the start and like a child who is left to plough through life without proper parental guidance, it has now become an anarchic entity, difficult to reign in and retrain.
I have often over the past 10 years or more, written about the fact that anarchy is gaining too strong a foothold in South Africa and if it is not stopped dead in its tracks, it will pull down every pillar of democratic advancement, faster than they are erected.
Yet some words apparently fall on deaf ears.
The blast in Pietermaritzburg, is just such a show of disregard.
And as expressed by those who were at the meeting when the “bomb” went off, those in charge of security apparently only cared for the principals and not for everyone who was affected by this brazen show of disregard and anarchy.
One wonders what the chances for proper control and protection would be, if such a show of terrorism in its base form would be expounded for larger effect by those who formulated it.
The Zondo commission, which certainly has me enthralled, needs to be supported and those who feel the pinch, must be happy that it is not yet, the sound of their cell door, banging shut. Surely, it is time to clean out those who perpetrate these acts of transgression and treason, or there may be a domino effect, when the pillars start to fall.
Forget party politics, insecurities and divisions and let all parties start working together in earnest for the good of the whole country and its deserving citizens.