The Week That Was-ANC, DA, Gaza, Israel, Palestine, South Africa

Gerald Potash,

Hello again,

Our news is bleak. Two of the most depressing articles I have read in a while were published in Politicsweb yesterday (Wednesday). David Bullard’s article, “Whether you like it or not” should be a wake-up call to all of us but what can we do about it? ……emigrate? Then Ben Levitas’ article, “The clock is ticking for SA Jews” is extremely disturbing and with what is going on all over the world, as a result of the on-going Gaza war it is a warning for us to get out of here and go ……..but where?

Here are the links to these two articles for those who wish to better understand the reality of SA today:

https://www.politicsweb.co.za/opinion/whether-you-like-it-or-not?utm_source=Politicsweb+Daily+Headlines&utm_campaign=c303d74223-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2024_03_12_09_17&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_-c303d74223-%5BLIST_EMAIL_ID%5D

And Levitas’s article: https://www.politicsweb.co.za/opinion/the-clock-is-ticking-for-the-jews-of-south-africa

If either of the links don’t work I can forward you the articles.

A very sobering editorial in the Sunday Rapport wonders if the DA will still control the Western Province after the election. There has been a huge influx of (mostly black) people into our province and whereas some of them will not be voters this time round, the demographic here has changed dramatically since the last election. Then the perceived DA support of Israel in the Gaza war has offended many in the large local Moslem community. Jacob Rooi’s editorial called ‘Wag ‘n bietjie’ (wait a moment) is a wake-up call but can anything be done at this the 11th hour?

In his piece Rooi refers to The Strand where the town and the beach are so beautifully looked after (by the DA run municipality.) The coach and I walked on the beach for a little more than an hour early on Sunday morning. The tide was out and there was no wind at all and it was quite magnificent to be out in the open and taking our exercise there instead of on a treadmill. I took a photo of municipal staff cleaning bins and picking up papers from the beach early on a Sunday morning nogal!. Could that happen in Durban, Johannesburg, Benoni or any other of the cities controlled by the ANC?

Don’t be silly.

Rooi in his Op-ed referred to the very visible decay in all of the towns run by the governing party. Press photos of downtown Durban are sickening with the mounting rubbish in the city centre and Johannesburg gets worse every day with the trash mounting up on the pavements and even falling onto the streets. But not only the streets are dismal, the buildings like the National headquarters of the police has been banned because it is in such a poor state of disrepair that it is dangerous.

This is my photo of the Strand staff togged-out and gloved cleaning the bins, sidewalks and the beach at just after 8.00 on Sunday morning.

A poll released this weekend by the Brenthurst Foundation shows Zuma’s MK Party ahead in the race for the KZN province in the upcoming vote. The traditional Zulu party, the IFP is also marginally ahead of the ANC. Interesting!

The poll shows the ANC at under 40% of the National vote. That story made the front page of Business Day on Tuesday. Also interesting is that Zuma’s MK party showed a higher return than the EFF. It looks as if this up-coming election could be a real game changer. Of those polled by Brenthurst, 80% believed SA was headed in the wrong direction, while 17% thought otherwise and 3% did not know.

This weekend Jacob Zuma came to Cape Town to charm prospective voters. He promised the world and threatened violence if his party didn’t win. (Is that legal?). The MK Party have even threatened Ramaphosa’s life. Zuma left Cape Town grinning and satisfied that he had done his job for MK.

Paul Hoffman SC (Director of Accountability Now) had an excellent letter published in Business Day on Monday. He is highly critical of the ANC for abandoning their step-aside rule for party members who are tainted with malfeasance and are now on the Party list for election to Parliament. He believes that the ANC is showing a complete lack of commitment to doing anything about the corruption that is so prevalent in the Party. He writes that our voters are not fools and they are aware that the poor are severely prejudiced by the ANC’s ongoing feeding at the trough of the State. Hopefully the voting will prove that this is not an acceptable way to run a country.

But Hoffman takes his views further with a strong critique of the President’s weekly newsletter. Here he says that currently the ANC allows those suspected of corruption and even those negatively named in the Zondo Report to stand for political office unless and until they are criminally charged. This is not acceptable — but what is HE, Cyril doing about it ?

Johannesburg (among too many other cities and towns) is suffering a very serious water shortage. Municipal services, even basic ones like attending to old broken water pipes have been neglected by incompetent City councils and the most populous city in our country is now suffering. Water tankers are in short supply as Joburg isn’t the only town suffering these water shortages. Add to this our continuing electricity outages—-oh, these are less than usual and so it will surely stay that way until after the election— and you can see it’s not too easy living in SA with the ANC running the show.

Many of the Johannesburg residents are getting frustrated at the lack of positive action particularly about the lack of water for weeks and protests have now begun on the streets in several of the suburbs in our largest city.

This cartoon from Rico in the Daily Maverick a few days ago shows Joburg’s water situation simply: There isn’t any!

The DA, to the chagrin of the ruling party have suggested that Western (American) observers come and monitor our general elections in May. The ANC consider this a slap in the face for the IEC (the Electoral Commission of SA) and the debate is still making news here.

Yesterday I met up with two lovely young ladies from America. They are the daughters of the late John Savage and catching up over breakfast at Arno’s coffee shop in Stellenbosch was almost like the old days. From there off to Town to meet with that character of note, Dennis with Henry and John. John is a “newy” to our catch-ups but I am almost certain he will become a regular.

The news this week from UCT is upsetting. The Senate of the university is voting on a motion calling for an academic boycott of persons and institutions connected to Israel. Who will suffer more from such a ban?

The 46th Cape Town Cycle Race took place on Sunday with almost 30,000 riders taking part on a truly perfect day. That is the biggest timed cycle race in the world. The weather was perfect, the fans came out all along the 109 km course to cheer the riders on and everyone had a JFT.

I watched one of the best rugby matches I have seen in a long time this weekend. England, the underdogs won 23-22 in a 6-nations test where Ireland were out and out favourites. The game was won in the very last seconds of the test match and the running rugby made the test extremely exciting. Now that was rugby!

The coach had to go to the airport to fetch his wife back from Oz on Sunday afternoon so he was not on the couch to watch Spurs beat the team just above them on the log. Frankly they thrashed them and the 4-0 score was a fair reflection of the game played at Villa Park. Even the world champion, who is not much into football, agreed with me that it was a lovely game and now one of the important top 4 slots on the Premiership log is highly achievable for the Tottenham side.

So COYS,

As always,

Gerald

source:https://africaunauthorised.com/the-week-that-was-137/

Natalie