We have such poor leadership in every part of South African life that when aliens land here and say “Take us to your leader,” we’ll have no one to point to, argues Gasant Abarder in a new #SliceofGasant.
Abarder, who recently launched his book, Hack with a Grenade, is among the country’s most influential media voices. Catch his weekly column here, exclusive to Cape {town} Etc.
I counted about ten days, using my journo maths, before the wide-scale looting in KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng was brought under control. By then, scores were killed, hundreds of shops and businesses were looted, almost 50 000 vaccines were destroyed and even a blood bank was hit. WTF were these looters? Vampires?
A whole President Cyril Ramaphosa was wringing his hands in the midst of a crisis. His cabinet ministers were squabbling about intelligence provided ahead of the looting. Intelligence… sigh!
All the while, Indian aunties and boeremag wannabes were ready to take up arms and stop law-abiding black people from entering their own neighbourhoods because they had to be part of the looting mob, right?
Leadership paralysis was on full display all over South Africa when we were desperately in need of a leader.
The looting was followed up by taxi unrest in the Western Cape which seemingly took employers by surprise. But if you were paying close attention, you’d have known it was preceded by weeks of trouble brewing between warring taxi bodies over routes.
Read also: Taxi violence claims seven lives, 71 taxi-related shootings since January
Last week, a bus driver was shot in the face when Dorothy and Sipho didn’t pitch for work from their homes in Mitchells Plain and Khayelitsha respectively, the taxi violence was now a problem.
Read also: Bus driver shot through the mouth as taxi violence continues in Cape Town
How did some bosses respond? With unpaid leave, threats of firing staff and hiring casual labour. Zero compassion when Dorothy and Sipho had given you years of service and put their lives on the line to take crap from customers while working in your store or cleaning your garden. During a pandemic, nogal.
Would it have been so bad to fetch Dorothy and Sipho from Mitchells Plain or Khayelitsha and see how the other half lives? No, they’re not lazy. They just couldn’t get to work out of fear of being killed.
I like Alan Winde as a Premier of the Western Cape and he’s been among the best we’ve had since 1994.
Read also: Taxi violence simply “unacceptable” says WC Premier Alan Winde
He intervened in the taxi violence and showed some leadership when the mayor of Cape Town, Dan Plato, was probably busy fining homeless people. Unfortunately, Winde came into the game late. But given the chance, he is decisive, listens and hardly plays politics. A rare breed.
Further down the ranks, finding leadership is tough.
My ward councillor recently forwarded me hurrah WhatsApp’s from happy residents because the roads in the neighbourhood were being re-tarred. He followed it up with a message that said something like, “At least some residents are happy.” Next, fish are going to be seeking out applause when they swim!
There are other countless examples of poor leadership and a lack of accountability. No one gets fired in South Africa and heaven knows, no one will resign.
Proteas coach Mark Boucher had the temerity to say he would wait to get home before answering serious racism allegations against him levelled by former Test spinner Paul Adams at Cricket South Africa’s hearings into transformation (or the lack thereof). For now, he had the important task of beating Ireland (yes, Ireland!) in a dead rubber T20 match.
The Proteas are going nowhere slowly under the weak leadership of Graeme Smith, CSA and their level 2 coach (a qualification that allows you to coach an Under-19 national side, at best).
CSA should have immediately recalled and suspended Boucher the way the England and Wales Cricket Board did with two players who made alleged racist social media posts. But instead, Boucher is emboldened by the lack of leadership and does what he pleases – including having the team look ambiguous in their stance on Black Lives Matter. I wonder how Kagiso Rabada and captain Themba Bavuma feel knowing they’re coached by an alleged racist?
In stark contrast, Rassie Erasmus – the legend who made miracles in 2019 in a galaxy far, far away, pre-COVID – oozes leadership.
He prizes our diversity and makes the Springboks better for it. He handles the mind games so the players can focus and unlike SASCOC, fights for his players in a way that the sports federation never fought for Caster Semenya.
Read also: Federal Supreme Court dismisses Caster Semenya’s testosterone ruling appeal
In Rassie we trust and it’s not all doom and gloom (even though he took off the front row prematurely when they were bossing the Test match on Saturday and got his bomb squad on way too early).
Of course, leaders make mistakes. There are other bright sparks in leadership in all sectors of South Africa.
But when aliens (given everything going on, this is very plausible!) land here and say, “Take us to your leader”… who are we going to point to?
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Picture: Twitter