Friday 18 September 2020

 The chronicles of Matjhabeng: The Mafia, a broken city, and A Racist Mayor.

Growing up I had always heard my grandmother say “things were better during apartheid” I could never quite believe it, because how dare she say something like that? We are living in the time of “democracy” we are living in the time of the ANC. But there are a few things she was bemoaning the lack of jobs, no services to black areas and clearly ignoring the needs of the majority, the defence was always “the ANC is undoing apartheid so it takes a while to do it.”  This year I had to come to terms that the ANC is dead, the way 2020 is going some dead apartheid era mayor might rise from the dead and brag that things were way better in this municipality under his watch and it would be very hard to debate against him.

 

Although Pieter Louis Myburgh wrote a wonderful book about how the Free State was captured by the Ace Magashule it ignores the finer points of how the ANC in the Free State no longer exists and has been co-opted by a loosely linked mob like organisation, Ace might have precipitated this new wave of so called politician but it has gotten to a level where it is totally out of control. In the beginning ANC corruption was boiled down to incompetence, lack of accountability and greed but places like Matjhabeng have elevated the conversation to utter stupidity and definite criminal enterprise. The Most amazing of these is that Eskom has attached the municipal account to recoup the funds owed to it that amounted to about R3 Billion, this after the account was frozen in 2014, before we criticize the halfwits leading the town you would ask why have the people not paid their electric bills, well the allegation is that when bills are paid in cash the cash never actually makes it into the municipal coffers…….. it gets pocketed EVERY TIME!!!! No one seems to mind, and no one holds anyone accountable.

There is a group in this Municipality that needs deeper investigations they call themselves “zingu seven” it is alleged that nothing happens without them in this town, they are the mafia enforcers who have the premier’s ear. What boggles the mind the most is that a city with one of the highest unemployment rates had 136 unused farms.

Earlier this year the executive Mayor was caught on video asking soldiers who were deployed as part of efforts to help flatten the COVID-19 curve, he instructed the soldiers to “skop, skiet en donner” the coloured community while using a racist term in defining that community he went on to use another racist stereotype of claiming that Coloured people were drunkards,  

Wednesday 14 August 2019

THE LEADERLESS REVOLUTION IS HERE!!!! But it’s not what you think it is.



The leaderless revolution is here, but it is not what the zealots say it is both the far right and far left are wrong about what the leaderless revolution in South Africa would look like because both sides have no catalyzing figure to galvanize the cell like structure of such a revolution. A leaderless revolution is conventionally characterized by a martyr like figure taking a bold first step in creating a culture of individuals that work toward a central ideological imperative without direct communication links to a central point.
 A leaderless revolution by design is hard to suppress so the idea of a revolution such as this manifesting it’s self into a violent terrorist enterprise that runs a whole government ungovernable would be self-defeating, South African policing authorities are excellent at one thing and one thing only, the violent suppression of organisation in public spaces see; the Marikana massacre and the fees must fall protests. This means the South African neo-anarchist must be wise to this fact, thus leading the conclusion that the country being rendered ungovernable would be an unintended consequence of the actions taken by the individuals in the collective. The problem with the South African version of events is that desperation is a bigger driving force than an ideological position.
“When the system fails you fails you create your own system”- Michael K Williams. This statement characterizes the peoples plight and sums up the reasoning behind the revolution and justifies the attempt to usurp the power held by the centrist body politic of the country that is clearly broken almost to the point of no return.
Land Invasion and occupation
In the current era it seems that Julius Malema and his EFF have championed the task of bringing the landless masses to some sort of revolutionary tipping point, when actually all they did is bring one of the longest standing inefficiencies of governance to be debated as process of urgently needed development. Land invasion is one of the first forms of protesting inadequate governance which began with the department of bantu affairs of yesteryear, the people built on unoccupied land and claimed it as their own and in so doing usurped some power from the apartheid government, noticeably this was one of the building blocks of the resilience and audacity of the civil disobedience project and later the armed struggle. This is why most of the proponents of the armed struggle were transplants that came to Johannesburg as backroom and shack dwellers.
The EFF sought to co-opt this reemerging energy of the people and become the de facto center of the common man, but skepticism is rife among the electorate about how men and women who live in mansions can champion such a struggle. People grabbing land will become ever more prevalent as the people become ever more anxious.
The Water and electrical crisis
We are all know about the problems facing Eskom and in their desperation they raised tariffs on an already poor society, this inevitably demanded ingenuity from the society, a week or so ago Phakamani Hadebe of Eskom rightly diagnosed that one of the problems facing the ailing parastatal is South Africans going off the grid, there are a few options of going off the grid each method is deliberate in how it usurps power from the state (no pun intended) here they are:
First is the very expensive route of deep cycle rechargeable battery kits connected to solar panels which adequately takes the burden of high tariffs off one's shoulders in the long run. As I have already stressed that the exigent circumstances faced by the people demands ingenuity so poor people somehow noticed that cell phone towers run off deep cycle batteries and so they “liberate” the batteries and fulfill the needs of the power hungry market, they sell the batteries to legitimate companies that deal in alternative energy solutions.
The second method demands more of an organised effort it involves something called “bridging” where the meter system of a transformer is bypassed so that the particular transformer is not technically on Eskom's system, this essentially means the houses linked to the transformer get free electricity. This requires the whole neighborhood to switch off their power during the bypass process so some measure of cooperation is required.
The third process involves a similar bypass process to happen but this time at a house hold level either by tampering with the installed prepaid meter or creating a bypass in the box housing the circuit breakers, this method though leaves you liable to a large fine and the confiscation of your pre-paid meter by Eskom.
The fourth and final method is a new one where a small group of men in the Lejweleputswa district have found a way of creating counterfeit prepaid vouchers selling a thousand kW/h for three hundred rands basically creating a totally parallel system to the state run process if this trend prevails and I assume it will, Eskom will find itself in a real bind where the increase in tariffs would not yield the desired result of showing an entity in its way to solvency.
Lastly, I also found out that the water metering system can also be bypassed by replacing the municipal meter with a normal run of the mill pipe, now the city workers would not be able to take a reading of your water usage.
The creation of alternatives
South Africa’s economy is undoubtedly an oligarchy in any given sector you would be hard pressed to find more than 4 major players at any given time thus creating industries made up of monarchs of industry and their sentinels in whatever form they may come either as politicians or some out of the way black council of over paid gate keepers.
This is why the normal South African has opted for the creation of alternative means of wealth acquisition and service delivery whether fair or foul. The grand assumption has always been that the political class will be the first to fall at the hand of the poor but by all indications the people do not seem to hold political parties in any esteem, they seem to have realized that the political system in this country will not deliver tangible solutions to their lives.
It is a great fear of mine that we are heading toward a cliff of mammoth proportions on that would significantly alter South Africa’s political landscape forever. Many in the country seem oblivious to the ticking time bomb.

Briggar



Monday 22 July 2019

SASSA, SPORTS BETTING, PROSTITUTION AND A FAILED MUNICIPALITY A RECIPE FOR DISASTER.


Welkom was once a thriving mining town with the potential of being a well functioning medium sized city, in recent times it is a town plagued by rampant governmental corruption exacerbated by an absentee government. The lack of clear governmental leadership and political will compounds the national problem of youth unemployment tenfold, the economic prospects for youth in this town are almost nonexistent unless you are an illegal miner which is a chat for another day. The summary of government here is our mayor absconded from crucial ANC caucuses to go play cheerleader for Jacob Zuma at the state capture inquiry.

The SASSA flex
Young people in South Africa are all caught in the pressure social media creates, where we can all have a peek at the best moments of someone’s week or month and assume they are living “their best life” which often includes posing with alcohol and good looking people, young unemployed women in Welkom in seeking out Instagram worthy moments have to carve up their children’s child grants into budgets for food, clothing and alcohol and this doesn’t serve you well if you only have one child because the budget becomes smaller.
This creates a significant problem in the area of social grants do we stop social grants to stop the pernicious culture that surrounds them? Welkom clearly can’t afford to take in young children or the elderly unless we want to see something worse than the life esidimeni tragedy. So the cycle keeps going.
So here is how people “hack” the system if you can call it that, first have 2 or more children you now have a budget of R800 or more to work with next step, find children orphaned by the death of some obscure or close relative that’s an additional R400 a child then the third and final step, find an elderly relative the senior citizen grant is a little better than a child grand meaning the senior citizen bears the brunt of the financial burden of the household. Then essentially the “good times” can begin or at least for the time being.

Prostitution
So the story is about to get a little darker than exploiting orphans and old people. The issue of prostitution in small towns has been well documented, Welkom has a building that sits next to a taxi rank called Khune village it’s a weird hybrid between a tavern, strip club and brothel which is willfully ignored by all authorities.
But a different kind of prostitution has taken root, I know I painted a bleak picture for employment in this town but there are those who are employed by both legal and illegal means. These become purchasers of sex from the mothers who run out of SASSA grant money and younger unemployed women so as far as I have worked out there are tiers to how the system works; the “lower” tier is in the Industrial area of the town a stretch of Chinese and Portuguese owned bars frequented by criminal types and low level illegal miners and truck drivers. Most of the women who go here know most of the men in these places are desperate for sex and make for easy customers, ready to buy 2 bears and pay 50 rands for a few minutes with a woman oh by the way you pay R100 if you don’t want to wear a condom and it’s at least R300 if you want to spend the night.
The second tier are the more reputable places with the middle class, politicians and high level illegal miners, where there isn’t an overt drive for sex for cash but more an expectation of expensive alcohol and “Mavuso” in the morning and sometimes being a side chick if some arrangement can be arranged.
The sex for cash phenomenon is an even deeper conundrum that benefits all spheres of patriarchy in this town and you will not hear any loud calls from the men to help lift women from the material conditions that plague women.

Sports betting
 The first part of this piece focused on women now question is what if you are an unemployed man in Welkom who chooses not to be associated with illegal activities?
Well you enter the often under regulated world of online sports betting since you don’t have access to any SASSA money you do odd jobs and bet on sports religiously to make a living and try to live you “best life”.
The average unemployed young man in Welkom has more than one sports betting app or website on their phone often because the sites have some sort of initial credit for entry which is R100 or so. Admittedly at first I thought in a less than ideal situation you get your money and living any way you can, but it dawned on me how predatory these sites and apps can be, I’m not a sports betting expert I always thought the winnings from betting depend on the odds and the bet you put down but with these sites it seems like a hybrid between betting on odds and the lottery, it seems there is a large pot and your winnings depend on how many other people won so at times you win as little as 1 rand. Meaning to get any substantial winnings you have to bet on more obscure leagues turning the betting into more of a gamble than a well thought out act based on statistical data analysis and personal experience.
Gambling addiction is a plague but it comes harder to detect when you are poor and loose everything you have every other week.

The economic prospects of this town are not about to change anytime soon and so this game of prey and predator continues to the detriment of the most vulnerable among us.