BURGLARS, THIEVES AND POLITICIANS
SOUTH Africa’s population is made up of such widely different groups of people that it’s easy to forget we have anything in common.
Some years ago a woman called Florence used to come to my house once a fortnight to try and tidy the mess around me. She lived in Khayelitsha and on her way to me in the morning she used to rummage in dustbins in case she found something useful. She soon discovered that I enjoyed mending broken things, and would bring me fixable odds and ends to mend.
One day she arrived clutching a broken jug of a particularly hideous design. It was crudely decorated in garish flowers and the handle had been broken off. I told her I’d go shopping that morning and buy her a better jug, rather than mending the ugly one. A replacement jug would have cost only a couple of rand. “Oh no!” She said.
“Rather mend this one for me.” I asked her why and she said, “If I take home a new jug they’ll just steal it.
“They won’t steal an old mended jug.” I didn’t ask who “they” were but I was saddened to think of a life where even a cheap milk jug made you a target for robbery.
Some months later a young man who helps occasionally with the gardening phoned to tell me he would not becoming to work that day because he was going with a friend to find the people who had stolen the front wall of his shack.
“Stolen a wall?” I asked in disbelief.
“Yes,” he said, “they came while he was at work and took away the whole wall of his house, complete with the door and window.”
When I saw him a few days later I asked whether he and his friend had found the stolen wall.
“Yes, we found it,” he said. “And?” I asked.
“They will not steal walls again,” he said quietly, and I thought it best not to ask for too many details.
I’ve had several burglaries here in tranquil Fish Hoek, but so far I still have all my walls and doors. But of course the really big crimes don’t involve milk jugs, or even walls. The major crimes are those committed by corrupt politicians who think they’re entitled to scoop up as much money as they like from the country’s coffers.
I don’t think anybody was particularly surprised to read this week that the suspended Sars boss Tom Moyane paid out more than R4million in so-called “performance bonuses” to his cronies. I mean, that’s not serious, like stealing a wall or a milk jug, is it? The money was lying there not being used, so we might as well swipe it and have a moerse party. That’s one of the perks of politics. Last Laugh
A man called the attorney’s office and asked to speak to his ex-wife’s lawyer, Mr Jones.
“I’m sorry sir,” said the receptionist, “but Mr Jones died last night.”
“Well, could I speak to Mr jones, then?”
“I’ve just told you sir, Mr Jones is dead.”
“Well, could I speak to Mr Jones?”
“For the last time, Sir, can’t you understand that Mr Jones is dead?”
“Yes, I heard you the first time, but I just can’t hear it often enough.”