Throughout the ANC's history, it has created its own monsters, only to squash them when they really get out of hand. Julius Malema is one; Jimmy Manyi is the other. Willing to act as stalking horses for the ANC, the two JMs regularly throw out polemical utterances into the public domain just to gauge public reaction.
Imbued with unrestrained power from the party bosses, they often get out of hand, needing to be reeled in as soon as they cross the line. Malema is now in that situation and awaits party discipline while he is kicking and screaming to retain his position.
Manyi, on the other hand, continues to be used, shifted sideways, and promoted as long as he does the party's bidding. Twit that he is, he takes on the honourable Pravin Gordhan, who rightly suggested to a conference of internal auditors that government's rigid labour regime was a hindrance to reducing South Africa's unemployment rate of 25.7% and makes the achievement of four million jobs by 2025 very difficult. This indisputable empirical fact, corroborated by the world's major economists, is contradicted by an idiot who does not have an iota of Gordhan's experiences and expertise.
The Alliance partners predictably take sideswipes at Gordhan, labelling such sensible ideas right-wing, proposing as, is their wont, even more and more redistributive tax measures. True to form, Manyi claims that he was not speaking on behalf of the Minister of Labour but of the Cabinet.
We all know what this means - imbued with power from above, the democratic adolescent instructs the seasoned democrat and financial expert how to articulate and deal with the unemployment challenges facing South Africa.
Lest we forget, the recent posting of former labour minister Madlalana to Burundi must have brought a sigh of relief from Zuma Inc and the ANC's multitudinous tendrepreneurs. Sidelined in October last year, Madlalana lost in a bruising battle with his spokesman, Manyi. The cause of his political demise was obvious.