Rough times, Malema times

As a South African in 2008 I know for certain that my once wonderful country will go down the history books as a country whose president was basically 'ousted' by a 27 year old boy from Seshego township in the Limpopo Province, and that we, as South Africans also stand a chance to be led by someone whose reputation is more frightening than his message, as Newsweek once said about our prez to be, Jacob Zuma.

We also live in times where politicians are afraid to serve the people who got them into power in the first place because they are afraid of being eliminated (and being embarrassed in the process), or simply because they are not of a certain faction in the same ruling party. Crazy times times indeed.

With former President Thabo Mbeki's tenure made short, most Ministers bowed out with 'grace', or was it really? One thing's for sure though, they were going out anyway, but as egotistical humans they had to find a less embarrassing way out, in the process protecting their own images more so than simply 'believing in everything former President Thabo Mbeki stood for.

As the Premier of Gauteng, Mbhazima Sam Shilowa recently tendered his resignation it became increasingly clear that the new power was indeed in power at Luthuli House where our country is recently ruled. Politics, just like the SABC 3 television series, Survivor, is a game of scheming against the other members of the house or tribe because there is a price for only one member in the end. The only difference, however, between the two is that in games such as Survivor we know from the get go that there is going to be lies and deceit between members for that one particular price in the end of it all, whereas in politics such scheming and lies can lead a country in turmoil.

While Survivor is about the survival of the individual, politics involves people, millions of them in this case, honest taxpaying people. At the moment the ANC is like Survivor, but unlike in the classic case of Survivor where only the fittest survive, in the ANC only the loyal do.

Back to our JZ, our Mr right who is also a singing sensation of note. Zuma just recently denied the obvious when he said that there was no crisis, by the way, he of the umshini wam' fame was referring to the recent developments in our country, and to qoute him, he even went as far as saying that crisis was in the heads of those who were talking about it, with applause from his loyal fans of course.

I felt bad because I am one of the millions who believe the events of the past few weeks deserving of a political crisis tag. And come to think of it, when Mbeki denied as crisis the Zimbabwe situation he was seen as a bad guy, maybe deservedly so.

Everybody who can breathe, read, write and or see will agree that the recent developments can't be ignored or regarded as a non crisis by such a leading politician as Zuma. In his dreams, isn't he already at the Union Buildings at least? Now the inconsistent South African media have been very harsh on former President Thabo Mbeki, particularly the white-consumed newspapers like the Citizen, a classic case of kicking an already-kicked dog.

Most white people, particular Afrikaans speaking white males, the elite to be exact, hated Mbeki because he did not pretend to love them. To them he was an angry black man who was also very smart, and never compromised. For an intellectual who lived most of his life in a western setting he never forgot the reasons that forced him to exile in the first place.

Most whites support Zuma not because they love or believe in him as a politician, but simply because they cannot stand Mbeki, and also because Zuma is an easy target of ridicule and a 'simple tribes' man. They would rather have South Africa ruled by a man that kind of a man to the ground, than to have an economically competent South Africa by a man they grew to fear because of his nature as an Africanist to the core.

White South Africa is wounded by lack of political power, and that is evident because 90% of white commentators have nothing good to say about the state of our government, sometimes rightfully so, but most of the times their criticisms are just based on hatred to individuals. It is rather irritating to hear references to the times of Nelson Mandela when he still reigned supreme every time they attack the current leadership, or just Thabo Mbeki.

Mandela is a god to most whites and Mbeki a monster because of the kind of a leader he was. Mbeki's tenure as president was dogged by comments of how the educated white youth were leaving the country for better career prospects elsewhere in the world. Whites left this country when they (wrongfully) thought that this country was going to be in flames, maybe because they thought it was deserved, and also because they could as they had the money to live in bigger currency countries.

And of course, former colonial powers will always offer you a good career, education and better living conditions if you can afford to live there. And that was basically the preserve of whites. When their 'favourite' Zuma was acquitted of rape in 2006 there were whispers of how the judiciary might have been tempered with, but when the Honourable Judge Chris Nicholson declared Zuma's prosecution by the NPA as invalid because of the now infamous reasons given it was seen by most whites as a victory because it painted Thabo Mbeki and his cabinet as violators of the law.

It really is interesting how most whites feel about our government. Lately the right thinking whites have turned their attention to praising president Kgalema Motlanthe . Is it because of his reserved nature as a politician, or is it because he takes from their number one enemy? I wonder what it is really.

This opinion was first published by the Cape Times