South Africa: Is this a black empowerment timebomb?

Conversations, many

South Africa offered me a variety of opportunities for meeting people, making conversation, but mostly, there was much to observe and from that as an outsider draw some conclusions about the society the country projects.

The most engagement was on my Uber cab rides to and from work, from the Gautrain station or out for social engagements. Of the probably 40 or so Uber trips I had, there was probably one uninteresting and disinterested driver, I should have sat in the back and occupied myself with a more interactive reading material, my eyes darting from left to right as I read.

Where our journeys were short, it was quite honorific to have the Uber cab drivers express the desire to meet me again so we could have a longer chat. By osmosis and general interest, I seemed to know a lot about South Africa and its current affairs, along with seemingly alternative viewpoints to the events that occupied the newswires in the time I was there.

Signs and realities

However, it appeared I was only getting one perspective of things until last Saturday I witnessed both an interesting and an alarming incident on the concourse of the Johannesburg Park Gautrain station.

I had just missed the opportunity to go on the Soweto tour and so returned to the station to take the train back to Sandton Gautrain station. At the entrance, I had already seen that the next train was in 29 minutes time, it meant I had just missed a train.

I could have loitered around the station, but there is a sense of safety once you are beyond the ticket barriers. The seating on the concourse is really a design malfunction, aesthetically pleasing to the eye but uncomfortable to sit on, the two metal slats are angled for slouching for the able-bodied and literally unusable for those with assisted mobility or any other kind of impairment or strength, age or nature.

Malfunction feeding resentment

What transpired was the electronic signals on the concourse were not updating to tell exactly when the next train would arrive. What I saw as 29 minutes at the entrance was reading a minute on the concourse and it did not change for minutes.

A white lady then made to ask one of the guards on the concourse when the next train would arrive, the guard indicated it would be about 26 minutes. She then when on to ask why the electronic sign was reading different from the expected time. The guard had no answers, but she suggested the lady check the timetable, a cleaner who was chatting to the guard before the white lady interrupted buttressed the point of the view of the guard.

At that moment, the white lady flared up and rudely told that cleaner that she was not invited into the conversation, and so she should mind her own business. At which point everyone else on the concourse waiting for the next train was alerted to the fact that this might degenerate into an unholy fracas.

This must be one of many

The guard trying to reason with this gradually obstreperous lady, tried to aver that the timetable took precedent if there were problems with the electronic indicators, somehow, the context of the problem took a strange twist when the white lady said, “No problem? We don’t run the country anymore and the very simple things you people cannot make work, everything is a mess.”

Now, that caught my attention as the white lady walked away in apparent irritation at not being taken more seriously and began talking across to the other platform in mock rage and annoyance as if there as someone else listening to her grievance. Well, there was no one there, it was a loud soliloquy looking like the onset of some mental disorder.

At which point, I surmised that this was pent-up Afrikaner resentment being let out, apparently triggered by the frustration of not being in control or being able to control, situation, event or direction.

This in my view could not be the only place where resentment was festering and ready to be blurted out at any sign of ineptitude, incompetence, misdeed or malfunction. In my over three weeks in South Africa I had seen much of this with the impunity, the contempt of institutions and the cack-handedness of the President in replacing the Finance Minister in the middle economic turmoil with a complete tyro, all for political expediency.

Distrust in the rainbow nation

The week before, a survey had suggested that South Africans of different races distrusted each other, there was very little social interaction between the races except in the workplace, in schools or in the shops. It goes without saying, that if there were people of the stature of Nelson Mandela in power with the requisite competence to run the government for the good of all South Africans, there would be little room for resentment.

Then, on my way back from South Africa, as we waited for the embarkation of our delayed flight, I got to talking with a couple that were off to Italy via Paris. They were travelling with three generations of the family, 11 in total, but grandpa and grandma were travelling business class and the others elsewhere.

They expressed frustration at the seeming rudderless direction of the government, the rapid decline in the value of the South African Rand and it was precipitous in the last week besides the fact that the Rand had lost 30% in value against the Dollar in the year 2015 alone.

Bantu education all over again?

However, what concerned him most was the affirmation action that was to encourage black empowerment and emancipation in South Africa. Now, the Bantu Education Act was a rotten Apartheid policy that provided not useful education to the black population as means of lifelong subjugation with no prospect of elevation in life.

“There is no place for [the Bantu] in the European community above the level of certain forms of labour ... What is the use of teaching the Bantu child mathematics when it cannot use it in practice?” Dr. Hendrik Verwoerd, the Dutch-born architect of Apartheid.

Yet, according to grandpa, during the struggle against Apartheid, the kids of the chief activists went to the best schools elsewhere, whilst the activists instigated the students left behind to burn their schools in protest and insurrection, leaving the students in the midst of the struggle bereft of education and consequently subjugated to the children of the activists who have returned to rule over the masses.

Marking up failures to pass through

He continued by saying, the affirmation system, whilst apparently giving opportunity to blacks to access education and qualifications, none of it appeared to test their aptitude, challenge their mental capacity or equalise their achievement with mainstream standards of education expected of anyone who has passed through an educational system from primary school through to the end of tertiary education.

He said many black South Africans in affirmation schemes were being given a full pass at 33% and conveyor belted through university to have a degree in three years whether they made the grade or not. Whilst I have no proof of this, on an anecdotal basis, I had seen many instances of people being trained and failing to perform when without direct supervision at hotels, in shops and elsewhere, it is concerning.

Dishonesty in presented qualifications

In my time in South Africa, after the scandal that broke in May when I was there that trains ordered from Spain for South African railways were not of the right specification, the speculation about the qualifications of the head of engineering of the Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa (Prasa) was confirmed.

Dr Daniel Mtimkulu had not studied at the university he said he attended and was not registered with the engineering body that was supposed to validate the qualifications that made him eligible for the role he was in. There no asking how he scaled through the due diligence processes of the people who interviewed him and promoted him to the role he assumed until he was found out when a procurement process was bungled creating serious embarrassment for all concerned.

Likewise, at the South African Broadcasting Corporation, the COO was found to have misrepresented his qualifications by a public prosecutor whose institutional responsibility of oversight and regulation was ignored that other parties had to seek orders from the courts that enshrined and supported the authority of the public prosecutor.

Yet, integrity and honour were left by the wayside as the system appeared to give support and succour to dishonesty and fraud in the face of incontrovertible facts.

It does not augur well, at all

All of this will give cause for resentment amongst South Africans, especially when those in power seem to forget the great responsibility of nation-building and unifying a nation bequeathed them by the likes of Nelson Mandela for the politics of expediency and a descent to hedonism and opulence at the expense of the majority of South Africans that placed confidence in their government bringing lasting prosperous change into their lives.

One is appalled to say the least and it simply corroborates what I wrote in another blog titled, South Africa: Rubbish!

There are many stories in South Africa, but if the decline by indifference and indolence of government egged on by comfort oblivious of duty and attention to the purpose for which they were called to serve continues, Zimbabwe will be nothing compared to the disaster that is looking like the charted future of South Africa on this avoidable trajectory.

South Africa: Malema, the glaring face of the worst of Africa's youth

Love the Boer

It was heartening to read this morning that the ANC had advised its members to refrain from singing [1] the liberation struggle song “Shoot the Boer”.

There was a time when the song was one to sing to enjoin the oppressed black people under the utterly repressive apartheid rule to rally to a cause beyond the peaceful struggle for majority rule.

If I heard an old man sing the song it would be a recollection of exploits but with the wisdom and gratitude for the fact that times have changed for a new kind of song asking the government to do more for its people - all of them.

No doubt this advice was particularly directed at the leader of the ANC Youth League, a controversial yob in leadership with populist rhetoric tailored to cultivate strife, animosity, discord, riot and division; in these times, the song is hateful, can incite to violence and is outrageously intemperate.

Roguish youth

Mr. Julius Malema [2] who is just 29 could have symbolised a bright future for the young South African but all he has been able to do is court controversy after controversy with brashness, recklessness and demagoguery.

His extreme views are unhealthy, unwholesome and atrocious, basically a mirror image of the worst of the oppressors that were on the other side of that struggle. However, a somewhat timid ANC leadership has been reticent about tackling the whippersnapper head on and calling him to order. Such an untrammelled attack dog can be useful for ulterior political ends by malevolent persons with influence, power and money.

Mr. Malema only last week arrogated the right to sing the liberation song though he was just 13 – hardly a liberation struggle veteran – when the Madiba assumed the presidency of South Africa and worked to reconcile and unite the peoples of South Africa - In Malema is a rabble rouser in manifestation not a man of vision and great ideas, a brute, if you ever saw one.

It is obvious that he sees no role model in the very revered Nelson Mandela as he was only last week being feted [3] by the Grand Despot of Africa – Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe – only an idiot would see any benefit accrued to Zimbabwe after those deplorable land seizures.

The need for better leaders

The youth of South Africa really have to decide once and for all the kind of person they would want to lead them, one that portends to align with history whilst being an idiot of the present or one that has qualities that unite, encourage and uplift all the people for greater expectations for the future.

Mr. Malema lacks all those good qualities by miles, he should begin to lack followership by the millions too.

What we have is an egotistical megalomaniac [4] in the making with despotic inclinations that would with heartless retribution silence any criticism no matter how constructive, fair or just – Africa needs none such any more and this example needs to be shorn of all its influence forthwith. Lest I forget, one song down, the machine gun song of President Zuma needs to go too.

Sources

[1] BBC News - South Africa's ANC stops singing 'Shoot the Boer'

[2] Julius Malema - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[3] Malema lauds Bob, says SA will copy Zim's land seizures - Times LIVE

[4] ANC's Julius Malema lashes out at 'misbehaving' BBC journalist | World news | The Guardian

Bargainers and Challengers

The white driver of bus 21

I overhead this on Bus 21 shortly after getting on from a meal at the 805 restaurant – usually, I take a black cab from London Bridge to the restaurant and the hop on Bus 21 back to London Bridge – black cabs rarely ply South London routes and I am rarely keen on mini-cabs.

Two (Nigerian) ladies, most likely grandmothers in their late 50s or early 60s and looking like they have been in London since year dot.

1^st: I am going to Manor House, is Bus 141 the right bus?

2^nd: Yes, it is, you can get it at Newington Green. It is better because of the cold than London Bridge.

1^st: Thank you. I thought so too, when I asked the bus driver, he did not answer me. I ignored him because I knew when I ask my people they would know.

2^nd: They are always like that.

1^st: He just looked at me - imagine this is the job he is paid to do.

2^nd: Don’t mind him, he is a white man.

Deep-seated feeling of discrimination

I squirmed and shifted in my seat as I tried to understand how a simple enquiry had turned into a full racist put-down, I have never been able to understand or appreciate how some people see everything through the lens of race, oppression, rights, deprivation, discrimination and antagonism.

Each time I have tried to reason this matter, I have almost always been branded a sell-out in extreme cases, otherwise the more benign but insulting moniker of coconut or bounty bar has sufficed even though it is just as damning.

I ruminated over this conversation to see ways in which I could sympathise with these women at the expense of the driver but could not arrive at any objective reason why the bus driver should attract such opprobrium – I felt the women had issues that they needed to deal with, but it was probably too late to re-educate them on these matters.

Don’t blame the driver

There might be reasons why the bus driver was not able to give the woman an answer apart from probable abruptness, rudeness or his inability to understand her because place names in London can be quite funny – Manor House however should not trip anyone like Southwark (Sudork); Leicester (Lester) Square or Marylebone (Marleborn) would.

Bus 21 runs a long route from Lewisham in South-East London to Newington Green in North London – a journey of 45 minutes. Bus 141 runs from London Bridge to Palmers Green going through Newington Green and Manor House Station which are just 6 minutes apart.

Probably, the man should have known, but his bus company is run by London Central whilst Bus 141 is run by Arriva London. Bus drivers are not necessarily guides, they might be able to tell you where to get off along a route but do not expect them to how to get beyond the limits of their route.

They are not like black cab drivers who do the knowledge and twice in one day I did catch black cab drivers out, one can only memorise so much of all the streets and routes in London.

The two masks for gaining advantage

I have always counted myself fortunate for being born in England, but most importantly for growing up in Nigeria, it meant I was not subject to the race and deprivation politics of the 70s and 80s and my identity as a black man was never at issue.

That is one part of my story that I can explain to some extent, though people have different perspectives of having Western citizenship albeit with African parentage and how to thrive in those societies; there is another perspective that amazed me when I read an article about Barrack Obama in the Time Magazine under the title, The Identity Card by Shelby Steele.

It explored the issues of Senator Obama’s mixed race parentage; the conflicts and balance between his white Mid-Western values and the Black Value System. Now, the American society is quite entrenched in race we can still find marches very much like in the 60’s happening - Jena, Louisiana is case in point in Septmber 2007.

However, there are some clear and interesting points this article raised when it talked about how black Americans gain advantage in the mainstream through bargaining and challenging. Reading this piece, I realised that it did not just apply to just blacks or Americans – it applies to every minority in means, status, ability, creed, idea or number in the whole world.

Bargainers and Challengers

I acknowledge the authorship of Shelby Steele in the excerpts below, because there is no better way to depict this than in the words of the author.

“

Bargainers make a deal with white Americans that gives whites the benefit of the doubt: I will not rub America's history of racism in your face, if you will not hold my race against me. Especially in our era of political correctness, whites are inevitably grateful for this bargain that spares them the shame of America's racist past. They respond to bargainers with gratitude, warmth, and even affection. This "gratitude factor" can bring the black bargainer great popularity. Oprah Winfrey is the most visible bargainer in America today.

Challengers never give whites the benefit of the doubt. They assume whites are racist until they prove otherwise. And whites are never taken off the hook until they (institutions more than individuals) give some form of racial preference to the challenger. Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson are today's best known challengers. Of course, most blacks can and do go both ways, but generally we tend to lean one way or another.

Putting this in the context of the conversation on the bus, I would think I fell on the side of a bargainer and the ladies were challengers. It goes on to say that Obama is a natural-born bargainer and that is why his quest for the Presidency is plausible, whereas the Sharpton and Jackson quest could not have garnered the broad spectrum needed to make a good run for that office because no one would want to vote for a scold.

Making ones way

In a broader context, the bargainer-challenger issue is not black-and-white but shades of grey, there are people who are more bargainers than challengers and vice versa, I do not have statistics to show which end is most successful but I would think the bargainers can secure a better deal than challengers.

Ditching the black and white labels and applying this to circumstances in life one can surmise that a challenge indicates you want to take ground - you then have to be equipped to take that ground off the occupier who is entrenched, equipped and strongly defensive of their position – very few win those kinds of conflicts and programmes put in place to address issues like that in terms of immigration and affirmation do not in the long term address root-cause issues.

Bargaining requires dialogue, seeking common-ground, education and civil action by peaceful means as employed by Gandhi in India and King in America, it is how to accommodate each other for the common good. Indeed, those who wield power sometimes have to be goaded into realising the duty, responsibility or just plain ethics and humanity of doing the fair and just thing.

Need for more analysis

A blog cannot in anyway properly address this deep social issue, but we can see bargainers like Mandela and challengers like Mugabe and Chavez and those in the middle like Gaddafi and begin to understand why a deeper study of this needs to be made.

This begins to give meaning to why Mugabe as a challenger is being revered for giving the white man a bloody nose but in the process failed to bargain for the sustenance of his country. It is sad however when a whole people gravitate on the excitement of the challenge, the clash or the confrontation as it makes good press unlike the quiet and slow activity of bargaining and diplomacy.

It is all well and good to challenge if you can win that fight, it is however necessary to be smart enough to choose the battles you can win and bargain on the ones you cannot.

Rushing to the refuge of racism as a means of making progress is a function of the burden of history we all carry; the community and society in which we have been raised; the possible ignorance of all parties involved and sometimes the lack of confidence and low self-esteem.

One group I have not covered here are the fundamentally defeatists who can neither challenge nor bargain, even both sides have a duty to inspire those to greater heights. Like I have written before, when social disadvantage is yoked with the feeling that the circumstance is destined and ordained - there is much work to be done for our humanity as a whole regardless of race.

Gubernator in Terminator IV

CNN – Breaking News!

As I packed my bags yesterday to exploit an advancement of civilization I had one eye on the television observing a very interesting debasement of civilization.

This issue had been bothering me for a while, but it represents an interesting aspect of what is called closure when a very dramatic and bad event in some people’s lives dominates every waking moment in the quest for “closure”, though I am doubtful that the completion mercifully brings release to their troubled souls.

The United States with its warped democracy stands at the vanguard of the death penalty where a man in the position of governor has the right to exercise mercy or resolve in completing to act of withdrawing life from someone convicted of a crime that exacts capital punishment.

Not three weeks ago, there was a clamour about the death penalty in Singapore, where a 23-year-old took to drug smuggling to pay off the debts of his Australian twin brother, got caught and then hung 2 years after.

One can contend that calling Singapore a democracy is a misnomer, but that is another debate which can also question the real efficacy of the American version.

At just the same time in , another was being given a lethal invention having failed to get political sway to have the sentence commuted by the governor.

This is because the death penalty just as abortion and gay marriage pull at the heart strings of what makes the American society comfortable within its own skin.

Actors in Terminator X

As I once commented, some men in leadership have not consummated their leadership without having exercised the ability to send men to their deaths. Presidents achieve that through wars both necessary and unnecessary; governors do that in at the behest of crime and punishment.

So, having spent almost 35 minutes trying and eventually successfully putting a man to death, where the activity could have just been filmed and relayed on some pay-per-view channel, we were offered a number of witnesses to the judicious murder to relay what happened.

Only 12 in a Jury

A cavalcade of 6 journalists were brought on stage to tell of what they had witnessed, each introduced themselves by name and spelling each name out their representation and gave a view of what happened.

Then another 6, until 24 journalists had given their views – I doubt if there were up to 24 witnesses that sent the man to the gallows, and a jury only comprises of 12 people.

The man was walked to the gurney and strapped down to be killed and some maintained that he was trying to intimidate the audience.

Intimidate? The guy was being lead helplessly to his death and he was intimidating – sometimes journalists should just stick to news giving than analysis.

Probably the man being killed had the grace to face his punishment, for the journalists who observed the intimidation; they might as well be filling their pants at the thought a visit to the dentist.

More blacks as CEO?

Suffice it to say that almost equal percentages of black and white people are on death row, the discrepancy is in the fact that 12% and 69% are the respective population distributions in the USA.

When the man was first sentenced it was 11% and 79% respectively. Go figure! However, more whites have had the sentence carried out than blacks though.

It is impossible not to see a race issue here, but then if any social scientist can explain this demography and suggest how to bring the numbers to proportional representation then speak up.

The great unwashed looking

One can commend for not setting up their activities as some fanfare reminiscent of the Bastille and guillotine days, where the mobs witnessed executions baying for blood and the Taliban did by filling stadiums with witnesses that saw people being shot in the head.

Feeding Christians to lions was a pastime in ancient Rome; in modern the family of the victim are accorded front-row seats with journalists as the unwashed onlookers.

We have come a long way from barbarism only to become decent barbarians – civilisation can only do so much for converting basic human instinct, fascination and curiosity still reign especially when witnessing the putting to death of another man even though man would cringe at the killing of a cow.

Getting back to civilisation, I have a plane to catch.