Viable solutions needed

The daily exposure to people who are employed to find solutions to the country’s problems and their obvious lack of capacity is getting depressing,

Take two examples. First, Mineral Resources Minister Gwede Mantashe who on his vision of expropriation without compensation lives in an incoherent world of his own and clearly does not understand that the rule of law, as championed by the constitution exists to protect citizens from arbitrary acts of government — especially those that are irrational, exclude the “just and equitable” and “general application” elements that are anchored in the constitution.

Short of dumping the constitution (and good luck surviving the consequences of that), a provision to allow for confiscation of the portion of any farm exceeding 12,000ha, or any other arbitrary size for that matter, would not pass muster as constitutional, even if 75% of votes were achievable.

Second, the idea of a sovereign wealth fund floated by the EFF’s self-appointed economic genius Floyd Shivambu has been picked up by ANC people who clearly don’t have even a basic knowledge of what they are trying to talk about.

The thinking goes: Singapore has one, as does Norway; they are rich countries; therefore if we have one we will be rich.

They should explain to those they are trying to impress with “their plan” that those countries have surplus funds to invest, whereas SA is up to the eyes in debt.

Sydney Kaye Cape Town