No bread? Give them pet food
With the brouhaha about radical economic transformation, black industrialists, white monopoly capital and colonialism, one of the Insider’s colleagues reckons it is time to step back and appraise the hyperbolic state of the nation.
Quite apart from fears over wholesale land expropriation without payment, and the taking over of banks and the Treasury one way or another, a media release from the Department of Trade and Industry brings refreshing clarity in the heat of the debate.
Entitled, “Cape Town businesswomen [are] blazing the black industrialists trail”, one learns that three gritty ladies have defied the odds and made a success of Milnerton-based K9 Pet Foods, which they bought with the help of R20m in funding from the department’s black industrialists incentive scheme, and the balance with funding from the Industrial Development Corporation and Woolworths. This was used to set up a factory to produce long-shelflife pet foods for Woolies.
The department says the ladies are “shining examples of the radical transformation” government seeks to achieve through the black industrialists programme, with the support of the private sector and the country’s development finance institutions. Indeed. But the Insider’s colleague is more worried about the radical economic transformation that might come about as state-owned entities bankrupt the nation.
Perhaps the three Cape Town businesswomen could be seconded to PetroSA’s board, after the parastatal lost more than R15bn in taxpayers money in recent years.