The radical economic transformation (RET) faction of the ANC is again threatening a national shutdown next Monday, August 23. Given the chaos our country experienced last month, which started like a rumour by faceless people, we cannot afford to ignore such threats.
Hopefully, our security forces are now wide awake to infiltrate the plotters and thwart their evil plans before chaos erupts.
On our part as ordinary citizens, especially us black people, we need to have an unsettling conversation with ourselves.
Is there something wrong about us that makes us so vulnerable to instigators who, in the end, ruin our very own lives?
Look at the people of Zimbabwe, for example. A small group of black state looters (politicians) told the masses of black people that their biggest problem was white farmers who owned land at the expense of black people.
Black people heeded the call and unleashed mayhem upon white farmers who eventually left Zimbabwe. The chaos resulted in hunger and suffering for the same black masses who were used by the politicians who profited handsomely from the mayhem.
Where are the masses of black Zimbabweans today? Many of them are economic refugees in SA; they are called all sorts of derogatory names by black South Africans who think Zimbabweans are taking their jobs.
It is as if we black people are incapable of learning. Having seen what has happened to our fellow black people in Zimbabwe, here in SA we are repeating the same thing that brought hunger and suffering in Zimbabwe.
Maybe the conversation among us black South Africans must begin in KwaZulu-Natal. That is where our collective madness as a race reared its ugliest head.
Think of what we did in our own townships and rural areas. We looted and burnt down the very same businesses that give us our daily bread.
At the end of our madness, the world laughed at us when we stood in long queues to buy necessities that were in short supply. Motorists among us had to drive out of KZN for fuel in the Eastern Cape.
Just like Robert Mugabe in Zimbabwe, those who instigated the chaos had good food in their homes, while we ordinary black people continue to suffer.
We were driven mad by Jacob Zuma’s arrest. Zuma’s children flooded our cellphones with WhatsApp messages, encouraging us to burn down our own livelihoods in defence of their father.
Now that Zuma is in jail, maybe it is time for us to ask uncomfortable questions about our own madness.
What exactly were we defending? Was there something to gain by defending Zuma? Is there something Zuma did to improve our daily lives when he was SA’s president? Is it us who became rich or Zuma’s children? Zuma built his palace next to our dilapidated huts in Nkandla. Even his goats and chicken were happy to live in better shelter than ours. Duduzane Zuma became so rich that he bought himself a mansion next to the Guptas in Dubai.
Is that what we the people of KZN looted and burnt shopping malls for? If the poorest among us were to go to Zuma’s gate in Nkandla and ask for accommodation in one of his royal rondavels, do you think Zuma would allow us to sleep there?
Does anyone think Duduzane can accommodate a group of poor Zulus in his mansion in Dubai? Yes, he can accommodate his Gupta friends – certainly not us. So, why have we allowed ourselves to be misled by such crooks?
Here is the most painful thing about us black South Africans: if we were to destroy our own country, there would be no neighbouring country for us to escape to. Would the people of KZN run to Mozambique or Swaziland for jobs?
Encouragingly, only people in KZN and a small part of Gauteng were fooled last month. In the rest of SA black people defended their jobs and services. You see; not all black people are mad.
Here is a heartfelt message to my fellow black people in KZN: Please, do not destroy the future of your own children. The Guptas, Jacob Zuma and his children did not give you a cent of what they stole.
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