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Jacob Zuma

The Arena Hildegarde
LITERARY critics define stream of consciousness as “a narrative mode or device that depicts the multitudinous thoughts and feelings which pass through the mind.”

That is quite voluminous, but this instalment is a result of that — an interior monologue where the writer touched so many issues around South African President Jacob Zuma and the evolution of the post-apartheid/colonial state.

What a way to celebrate your 75th birthday Mr President, with members of the opposition and the so-called civil society and some within the ruling African National Congress party baying for your blood!

And, how also unfortunate that you celebrated your birthday under the shadow of the death of one of the most inspirational and motivating young women the writer has ever seen — Ontlametse Phalatse, the 18-year-old progeria sufferer, whose birthday wish you fulfilled on March 23.

When President Zuma showed his seriousness about implementing the “radical economic transformation”, including land expropriation, we knew that he had stirred a hornet’s nest.

He became a “bad African”, while some of his colleagues used a cabinet reshuffle to paint themselves as “good Africans”.

It was not long before we all saw the apartheid system that has been lying dormant, coming to life and charging at him like a bull.

In this, they will use every method under the sun to try and bring down President Zuma and the economy is their main target.

If they make it “scream”, to use Henry Kissinger’s analogy of how they threatened to bring Zimbabwe’s economy on its knees, that is the prize President Zuma and his comrades will have to pay for seeking to empower the black people of South Africa, who have never known what it means to live in a country with the best rating, as rating agencies like Standard & Poor, Fitch and Moody’s have said.

Lindiwe Zulu

If there was a time when the South African economy might have been rated AAA, it made no difference to them.

White capital monopolists like former Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan suddenly want us to believe that the recent “junk status” rating is a language that is understood by all and sundry.

The economy should definitely perform very well and benefit all also, but as one black brother pointedly said, “How can we cry more than the bereaved, when we don’t have ownership of this thing (the economy)? How can we be asked to weep for the downgrades by S&P, Fitch and Moody’s, when they are the very instruments used to keep us at the bottom? If these people want an equitable distribution of the country’s wealth, they would welcome President Zuma’s radical economic transformation policy.”

Even cartoonist Zapiro and his obsession with the tasteless rape motif is fooling himself by coming up with bizarre illustrations on how three Indian brothers (the Guptas) have “raped” the wealth of South Africa, capture as they prefer. His revisionist approach to history will not hide the fact that white capital monopolists have raped the wealth of Africa for almost four centuries.

Even after Africa fought and defeated colonialism, the emperor still thinks he has an entitlement to Africa’s wealth, including its human resources.

The emperor also wants President Zuma out, as South Africa should be preparing to celebrate 23 years of democratic rule. What freedom will they be commemorating on April 27?

Is it freedom to effect illegal regime change?

This is harakiri!

Thus the scenarios playing out in South Africa are food for thought for the whole continent. White capital monopoly has also succeeded, as it always does, in using our very own to denounce each other.

The question that I have not heard anyone asking is, if indeed President Zuma is made to step down unconstitutionally, who takes over? Will it be Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa, whom they wrote off after the Marikana massacre?

The story in The Guardian/Daily Maverick of October 25, 2012 titled “Cyril Ramaphosa: Betrayal does not get more painful than this” summarised his fate: “What happened to Cyril? Did excessive wealth steal the soul of one of South Africa’s greatest political heroes; the one who rose from the very working class that is now being torn apart? The one who was a silent hope, the man so many people wished were the president? A star has fallen. Forever.”

Cyril Ramaphosa

I said this was a stream of consciousness.

It is also interesting to see that one of the groups in the forefront of trying to remove President Zuma from office is Save South Africa.

According to information on its website, “Save South Africa is a campaign made up of organisations, civil society groups, business leaders, prominent individuals, South African citizens and supporters of the founding principles of our democracy.

“The campaign was formed under the banner of holding government leaders accountable to the constitution and the values they have pledged to uphold as representatives of the people.”

The ANC and President Zuma should remember that a few months before he assumed office in May 2009, there was another “Save” initiative that was launched at the Central Methodist Mission in Johannesburg, South Africa on January 21, 2009.

This was a Save Zimbabwe Now. According to a MISA report of January 22, 2009, among the speakers were Graca Machel — Member of the Elders and wife of Nelson Mandela, Bishop Paul Verryn of the Central Methodist Mission in Johannesburg, and others.

The MISA report states that during the launch, the former Mozambican First Lady Graca Machel said: “Southern African leaders have the blood of hundreds of thousands of Zimbabweans on their hands for failing to solve the crisis.

“We trusted too long, it’s time we tell the leaders we lay the lives of all those who passed on, in the hands of sadc. They, as a collective leadership, took the responsibility to solve the conflicts. It (the Zimbabwean Government) has lost completely any kind of legitimacy…”

The Zimbabwean Government got this drubbing on South African soil, but little did they know that the same regime change tactics would be played on them.

They failed to be their brother’s keeper until they realised that just like Zimbabwe, they took up arms to fight the entrenched settler colonialism and repossess the stolen land and natural resources.

A thought also crossed my mind: If MDC-T’s Morgan Tsvangirai would have become Zimbabwe’s leader, whose side would he be on: President Zuma and the ANC, or the opposition?

Such is the matrix of regime change? You think of all possibilities and impossibilities.

It was also interesting to hear our sister Lindiwe Zulu complaining that the attacks against President Zuma were unfair and painful: “To see a newspaper headline with the president being portrayed almost like (Adolf) Hitler is actually unbelievable . . . We will continue to defend the president as members of the ANC, as long as he is a member of the ANC and as long as he remains the president of the country,” she said.

At least the lessons from 2013 when President Mugabe asked President Zuma to “silence” her during the run-up to the elections paid, so it seems, for she now sees that white capital does not have permanent friends, but permanent interests.

I will sign off by saying that the gimmicks being played right now are not only directed at President Zuma and the ANC, but for the whole region — destabilising it.

One thing that is clear though is that these are people who are not sure which method will bring them the desired results. If they believe that protests would make him step down, why would they table a no confidence motion in parliament?

If they have the people on their side, why also go to the constitutional court to ask that parliament has in place a secret ballot system, since they think that ANC Members of Parliament would not vote in favour of the motion in an open ballot?

Why try to set such a precedent when parliamentary rules do not have such a provision in place?

This is what happens when the land issue comes into play!