The past few months have had no outstanding happenings in terms of news headlines. Most of what has made news headlines signifies just how much we have become tame as a society. This is what I happened to notice just after our National Elections on the 22nd of April. If I may say, the last big thing to happen in South Africa, in my mind, was the election itself. I say so because it would seem to that the mindset of all the South Africans was triggered to change course aafter that event.
Soon after the highly acclaimed election (that saw Mr Gez'eyihlekisa Jacob Zuma become the first South African President without ant form of formal education become President of the Republic), a party that was as new as a baby born yesterday, COPE, was hailed and glorified for registering just over a million votes at the General Election. This, I found strange, regardless of me, myself and I having associated myself with this baby, full of hope that this was a party that would be bring sanity back to South African politics. I was quite shocked at the results, I certainly had hoped for a bit more than that, as that would have affirmed a new political mandate.
There were celebrations, here and there, around the country. I was puzzled beyond all sane reasoning. What the General Election result said to me was that the South African voter was not ready for change, certainly not radical change. I found it quite difficult that the majority of South Africans were accepting the status quo. In my attempt to avoid making a mockery of the voters' intelligence, I will not even try and share my thoughts on what I think could have happened, why and how.
I find it mediocre though, that we as a society, are happy with the turn of events during and after the elections.
The silence of all the voices of reason before the new government is quite deafening. Yes, sometimes we are silent because all is going well. But, more often than not, silence is caused by fear, loss of hope, etc. I wonder which of these two scenarios is true in this case.
Instead, what I have been witnessing is what I refer to as a 'Me, myself and I' syndrome. Most politicians and so called philantrophists I have been listening to (making news headlines based on very lame and not so urgent issues) seem to have moved from working as a government collective (quite contrary to what was promised). Officials who hold very important and strategic positions (Commissioner of Police) are making headlines for the wrong reasons...this guy is acclaimed for shopping at Jimmy Choo for his new girlfriend who happens to be a Ngcobo, much like three of her other girlfriends who are Ngcobos including ex-wife..da da da da....If not that, it is his 'shoot to kill statement' that's putting him on the lime light. If that fails, it's him saying something about rigging crime stats...shu!!! Where are we going? All of this just goes to prove how in denial we are about the culture of mediocrity that we inherited from the past. Dr Mamphele Ramphele also commented on this in a Mail & Gurdian commentary, saying, "We don't take into account when we talk about what is happening in our education system. We also mismanaged the downsizing of our teaching corps. And that was on our very own icon Madiba's watch." She goes on to say, "we are still speaking about 'minorities' and 'majorities' in 2009."
We cannot forget the recent headlines around Caster Semenya. What a shame this has been. The whole saga was politicised so unnecessarily! Had it not been all this politicking, the international media and possibly the local media would not have put so much focus on this bright young lady. Or better still, Caster Semenya would not have had to face all this humiliation (for lack of a better word), had Athletics South Africa (ASA) done a proper job as an athletics body! I still do not understand what the issue was about having Caster tested, if that is what the practice of the Athletics fraternity is. ASA should have rather educated the athlete on all the challenges she might face and explained to her why she needed to be tested if that is what needed to be done. Like any other sporting code, an athlete should be educated on what is expected of her and so forth.
Instead, what I saw was the Mr Leonard Chuene (the ASA president) going on and on about what he did as a person to protect Caster, how he took on the international media ('Me, myself and I syndrome). You could see he was having so much fun and could not believe his luck at having all cameras focused on him. There is also the events co-ordinator (her name escapes me), who I saw on Motswako, going on and on about how she made sure that Caster was taken care of. It was obvious that she also saw a platform to market herself as the caring and efficient event co-ordinator! That is all mediocre, because it will take a very long time for Caster Semenya to forget all that has happened! Don't even get me started on all the politicians, young and old that saw an opportunity to ride the bandwagon!
Mediocrity has become the name of the game....so tell me, do you still get excited about going to the intersection on a Sunday morning...to get the weekly newspaper that will hopefully update you on all the week's events and hopefully keep you company the whole of Sunday afternoon? There you go....See what I mean?
