Monday, March 24, 2014

Is President Zuma really to blame for everything?

 
Letter to Business Day March 24 2014
 
Sir -
 
Your leader, 'Nkandla reports just not the same' (March 20), shows admirable good sense and self-control in the face of very considerable provocation, except that it should by now be clearly wrong to claim, or to accept, that this is 'really all about JZ.'

Nkandla, nothing more than the most egregious abuse among a great number of abuses, is about one-party rule and the sense of impunity it breeds; it is about cultural deference to the prince or chief; it is about the lack of professional training and standards of SA's public servants; it is about the lingering belief in the liberation party's entitlement.

Above all, it is about the absence of a democratic alternative to the ANC in a society that is not democratized and will return the party to power again.
 
The last condition is the most intractable and the best hope is that Nkandla will help to speed up change.