NEWS

Once Upon An Accident...

This past Saturday was one of those horrible days you don't want to remember the following day. It starts well until I listen to radio and hear on the news that there has been an accident and four people are dead. The newsreader glosses over the story as if it was a weather forecast. Well, we all know that newsreaders are not journalists so the emotion attached to the story does not really rub off on them. So, just as I'm digesting the details I get an text message on my cellphone that the Member of Executive Council for Mpumalanga, in charge of Education, Reginah Mhaule will visit the hospital where the injured are being taken care of.

Now, what I failed to tell you is that the accident involved a train and a bus ferrying learners who went on an outing to Pretoria (capital city of this country). They have been to the zoo, the Union Buildings and various tourist spots in the capital. And to make matters worse they were less than fifty kilometres to their destination after travelling roughly 500 kilometres unscathed.

Now, the news are that the bus was hit by the train at a level crossing. That worried me because the point behind a level crossing is to allow a train to pass since it can not make way for a car. Okay, the gist of the matter is that people died, some were injured and some escaped with trauma.

Now, I went to the Mapulaneng Hospital at 14h30 to cover the MEC's visit to the wounded. Ja, the people were pretty bruised, fractured bones, darkened foreheada. You just didn't want to be in their place. The MEC was accompanied by a pastor who prayed for every patient while the large entourage from education stakeholders bowed their heads.

After the visit the MEC left. Then another MEC, this time for Public Roads and Transport Dr Clifford Mukansi arrived, flanked by the mayor of the municipality where the accident happened. Now, what was refreshing is that Mukansi is a doctor by profession so his tour of the ward was informative. He spoke with the nursing staff, requesed to see the X-ray pictures to assess the injuries, enquired about medication they have been placed on and the availability of a doctor to take care of them.

The sister who was helping him comprehend the situation also had excellent comprehension of her work. She knew how to answer questions. I could see the doctor smiling - and I reckoned she fancied her working for him in the event that he decided to go back into medicine.

The tour ended well with information having been shared between the MEC and the hospital staff. And me as the guy from the media actually gained a lot from 'this' exercise unlike the first one. I had a convo with the MEC and we ended up crafting quite a good story for the newspaper.

Then on my way back home, I saw another car accident. A taxi and a bakkie had collided at a corner where six other accidents have happened over the last six years. I couldn't wait to ask if anybody died - it was just too horrible for me to be inquisitive. I couldn't ask, the same way I didn't ask when I was told that the day earlier, barely 200 metres from there a bus hit a person and killed her/him - nobody's sure since the corspse was covered.

I lacked the enthusiasm. It's not nice reporting on dead people, especially when that dead person could have been you. Ja neh, then late at night on Sunday I have a chat with my friend who works for the traffic department to find our where were they when some of these things happened. He told me that they have been told that the department does not have money to pay for overtime - which is weekends. And to think that weekends are the busiest time of the week. Ja neh!

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ARTS

Nkoto Malebye - Growing Branches with juicy fruitage

Mudaland funk music group Kwani Experience front lady Nkoto Malebye extending her branches by grooming a youth drama outfit to take over the world. The children, whose ages range between six and thirteen staged their premiere stage play at Narishe Primary School, a school whose staff component went through her grandmother's hands as a principal in another school.

The musical, which is divided into sub-genres of poetry, public speaking, dance and praise takes the children through self-inspiration that Nkoto says should groom them into responsible and proud African children. There are strong elements of Black Consciousness in the self-motivation that preludes the play. And the children looked very jovial and inspired at the premiere.

Nkoto is a graduate of the prestigious National School of the Arts (NSA) and a sought-after actor at the Market Theatre where she has starred in various plays, most notably Soweto Story alongside Aubrey Pooe. It was directed by veteran Malcolm Purkey who Nkoto says mentored her a lot as he advised her to find an agent who would scout auditions for her instead of her hoping to be unearthed in a disorganised fashion.

“I named this group Bana Ba Bongi (Children of Bongi) after my grandmother and mother who were both teachers and community builders. I feel that it’s my way of continuing that legacy”, she told the tens of first time patrons gathered before the inaugural gig. She has been funding the group from her pocket since it started and hopes to secure a sustainable funding model, even if it means a benefactor businessman or non-governmental funder.

Bana Ba Bongi were outstanding in their execution of the musical given that this is a sub-genre which is more difficult in the performance arts. It's not as straight forward as memorising your lines and rendering them infront of another character but often demands music skills. Assistant trainer Zakhona Mogane of Arts Explosion fame promised the parents attending that they should feel confident about their children not risking going astray.

“We put emphasis on teaching these kids about a religious lifestyle, about pride in themselves and respecting parents and society at large”, she said, adding that it is not only performance but life-skills as well which gets inculcated.

Patrons who attended the premiere included cosmetics entrepreneur Valerie Coglin who said she was impressed by the work that Nkoto and her troupe were doing. She added that there needs to be more emphasis on using the arts to transfer indigenous knowledge to the children as the future was with them.

Nkoto requested organisations and businesspeople committed to the arts to help by chirping in with funds to sustain the activities of the group. “Next month we must take them to Durban to perform and we would appreciate any help we can get”, she said.

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NEWS

The Freedom Charter Has Been Shredded

During the weekend of June 26, 2010, a ball named Jabulani and twenty-two men from Ghana and the United States of America stole the thunder from under an important milestone. Many people will be surprised to learn that it was the 55^th anniversary of that historical event when a document that by default became the African National Congress blueprint was founded at the Congress of the People in Kliptown. That was the day South Africans finally gave their vision a name and a preamble. It was that dream which culminated with 27 April 1994, which incidentally became Freedom Day.

If FIFA took the World Cup to Israel on October 2014 you bet your last dime the spectacle would come to a halt to make way for the celebration of Yom Kippur Day.

The apathy that is recently shown towards the Freedom Charter as the founding document of this country’s democracy is somehow reflected in how some proponents of it ridicule its stipulations at every given opportunity. What was envisaged that cold winter day seems to be drifting away from ‘we the people of South Africa’ with every passing election.

In a speech by former President Thabo Mbeki nineteen years ago he said, “The struggle that we waged over the decades has been directed precisely… at ending white minority rule and realizing the perspective contained in the Freedom Charter that no government can justify authority unless it is based on the will of the people”. However recent developments in various provinces indicate that the authority in those spaces is not based on the will of the people.

Quite telling is the situation whereby political infighting in the ruling party has a direct barring on provision of service to the people. Such an attitude of elevating the political party above the people became apparent when Reconciliation Day in 2007 was not commemorated because the ANC was engaged in its civil war at Polokwane. The question was; why can’t the people be allowed to commemorate this important day while the ANC is engaged in its battles? When did the ANC become ‘government’ instead of ruling party?

Such instances have seen provinces such as Mpumalanga experiencing service delivery protests partly emanating from party squabbles. At Bushbuckridge Municipality an ANC ward councilor who won an SACP position by beating an ANC mayor was reportedly punished with incapacity. A regional manager was appointed ‘to frustrate his efforts’ to develop the ward and make him unpopular at the next SACP elective conference. It meant five years of two bulls fighting much to the detriment of the people.

Recently Bushbuckridge Municipality suspended its municipal manager Canzi Lisa accusing him of gross incompetence. Allegations, which Mayor Milton Moreme refuted are that Lisa refused to allocate tenders to companies submitted to him by the local ANC leadership.

The Freedom Charter did not mince words on governance that it should be ‘the people’, not ruling party elites. It never advocated for a hierarchy whereby councilors took instructions from political bosses and not the electorate.

Such a telling situation confronted the Democratic Alliance in the Cape Metro with the pit toilet saga. Mayor Dan Plato alleged that ‘the people’ chose the toilet model. The Human Rights Commission argued that the Metro shouldn’t treat the right to sanitation as a privilege. When the ANCYL demolished the corrugated structures it claimed that it was ‘the people’ protesting against shoddy infrastructure. But what were ‘the people’ saying? Nobody asked them – so nobody knows.

Recent developments indicate that ‘the people’ no longer really matter. The ANC’s Imvuselelo campaign is a case in point. The party goes out unashamedly to get one million kilograms of voting fodder. It does not seek one million unemployed youth to train and employ.

Today there are ANC members who have never read the Freedom Charter. Remember, the Pan Africanist Congress of Azania split was rooted on differences between nationalists and charterists. It seems currently there are no longer charterists nor nationalists in the organisation. Only a fraction of what was advocated has been realised because for a reason known to successive leaderships the document fails to inform genuine government policy.

It advocated that “All people shall be entitled to take part in the administration of the country;” however you now have the Cadre Deployment Programme which has placed in strategic positions comrades who can not successfully get through the eye of the needle. The programme is not informed by a Cadre Skills Database the party has but mere loyalty.

Some are placed to undermine the stipulation about all people sharing in the wealth of the country. In an interview given to SABC TV during the 2009 election campaign ANC Secretary-General Gwede Mantashe shared a scenario of an old comrade who is introduced to decision makers in government to access business (obviously tenders). Mantashe labeled such a corrupt practice ‘facilitating’.

Unfortunately the party which should realise the charter is split into two; those who join to access business and those who genuinely want to advocate for a better life for all. The former are the ones who love to shout about the ANC going to be in power until Jesus Christ comes back. This means by hook or crook, even when the people no longer want it. The people have become secondary while the ANC should find being voted out not such a bad idea as long as that will accelerate the realization of the charter.

“And we pledge ourselves to strive together, sparing neither strength nor courage, until the democratic changes here set out have been won.”, it says in finality. That’s the challenge that faces the ANC as observers already allege that once the glue that holds the broad church together named Jacob Zuma is gone – the church is headed for a painful ideological split.

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