I celebrated a cold and wet freedom day in front of a log fire with no electricity and a pile of uncollected refuse in front of my house. But as those dreary white lefties never tire of pointing out, I should be grateful. There are many people in this country that don't even have electricity, who live in shacks without the luxury of a log fire (or even a wine cellar) and are perpetually surrounded by uncollected refuse. And this is supposed to make me feel better? Well, it doesn't.
Sixteen years ago, on a sunny day, I joined the snaking queue to cast my vote in the first democratic election in this country. Unfortunately the KISS party didn't get in but I was still happy that the people's choice, the ANC, were now the new government. Obviously there would have to be some changes made and what had only been available to the privileged white part of the population under apartheid would now be available to the entire population. That would obviously cost money but you get a warm feeling knowing that your taxes are going towards bettering the lives of those less fortunate.
The best thing about the new South Africa though was that it would be non racial. People would be appointed to positions based on their talents and skin colour or religion wouldn't be a factor. Of all the burdens lifted from our collective shoulders, that had to be the best reason to celebrate the 1994 election. Obviously there would be a few minor adjustments to repair the damage of the past but, by and large, South Africa was a shining example to the rest of world....the rainbow nation.
Standing in that election queue in 1994 and watching President Mandela's inauguration a few weeks later I confess to having a warm feeling about this country. With hindsight, the same sort of warm feeling you get when you invest in something like Masterbond at 3% higher than your neighbour is getting.
The first real smell of rotting fish came with the announcement that we needed to buy a large quantity of expensive weapons. There had been earlier minor scares such as the late Peter Mokaba (spiritual guide to Kiddie Amin) who had come up with the brilliant idea of taxing departing foreign tourists to make them pay for the fact that the tourist industry was 95% white owned. But it was the now notorious arms deal that really gave an early indication that things were starting to go badly wrong within the party dedicated to bringing a better life to all South Africans.
Surely a greater priority would have been to build more power stations. That's hardly with the benefit of hindsight either. If you aim to provide 45 million people with electricity as opposed to providing 10 million you need at least four and a half times your current capacity (no pun intended). But the ANC either didn't understand that or thought the acquisition of weapons was a greater priority. So Alec Erwin was told to placate the stroppy whiteys and explain that so many jobs would be created locally if we bought weapons from the Brits, the Swedes and the French that it would be unpatriotic and probably even racist not to do the deal.
Nobody wants to be thought unpatriotic or racist so we just shut up and waited for all those jobs to be created as collateral for our weapon buying spree. We're still waiting. To use a favourite phrase of mine....we were royally rogered. And it wasn't just the tax paying South Africans who were rogered....it was the people who had voted ANC and believed that Alec was bringing them jobs they wouldn't have otherwise had.
After the success of the arms deal things got steadily worse. I should perhaps explain my use of the word "success" here. I refer, of course, to the government's success in covering up this grubby little episode, of getting rid of the whistle blowers within the party and of concealing all evidence of who received what as "commission". I doubt there has ever been a clean arms deal but ours apparently is exemplary. Except for the fact that we now have lots of expensive equipment that nobody knows how to use and that we are under economic attack in this country and not military attack.
It would be delusional for any South African to pretend that our corruption in this country is anything other than on an epic scale. Tax money that should have improved the lives of millions of South Africans these past 16 years has either been frittered away on nonsense like the arms deal and the FIFA World Cup (what are we going to do with all those expensive stadiums?) or disappeared into the bank accounts of the party faithful, often disguised as legitimate "tender" deals .
Sadly, there are no indications that anything will change which means only one thing. We are destined to go the same way as Zimbabwe. And Kiddie Amin could even be calling the shots (pun intended). So forgive me if I don't fall for all the Talk Radio Pollyanna schmaltz and celebrate Freedom day with you. I've got other things on my mind....such as survival.
After 24 years as a trader in the global financial markets David Bullard decided to opt for an easy life and became a journalist. His iconic "Out to Lunch" column has been running for 15 years and is as offensive as ever. Not that he gives a damn...He can be followed on Twitter here.
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