Tavernoftheseas

The ‘oops’ factor

ONE OF the things politicians and those in authority learn very quickly is the use of the “oops” factor. It is found to be very handy in official circles.

One could almost say our country runs on oopses.

Some years ago when developers wanted to build a new shopping centre in Muizenberg, they submitted plans which were passed on the express condition that one wall of the old hotel was retained, as it was considered a valuable heritage site.

This didn’t suit the developers so some clumsy machine operator bumped the historic wall “by mistake” and it fell down.

The historical society was indignant.

The developers said “oops”.

However, as the damage had been done, it went away and nobody heard any more about the historic wall.

We see this useful reaction increasingly these days, when one government official after another makes a boo-boo and when asked to explain it, simply says “oops”, (but in official terms of course. There are many useful ways of saying “oops”).

Somehow, for example, a plane load of wedding guests arrives at a military airfield and is given what looks like a VIP blue-light escort to Sun City.

Of course, this is completely unacceptable and those in authority say an “oops!” and promise heads will roll. They declare they will get to the bottom of this and find out who authorised this unacceptable deed.

Eventually the fingers point to some insignificant junior flag waver who happened to be on duty when the wedding party arrived and he is blamed for the whole fiasco. Because he was not told he should not wave that particular flag. He says the official “oops” and everybody agrees it was very naughty and shouldn’t happen again.

More recently members of a wealthy Indian family were suddenly awarded South African citizenship without going through the regular formalities. Questions were raised in Parliament and the minister in charge said he knew nothing about it.

The guy who granted the instant citizenship said the obligatory oops! He had had every intention of advising the minister, he said, but it had slipped his mind. Anyway the deed has been done now so there’s not much anybody can do about it.

It’s not easy to undo an oops. Oopses don’t come with “delete” buttons.

An interesting thing about official oopses is that once a matter has been oopsed it fades quietly from the scene.

If anybody raises the matter later the person in charge says indignantly: “Hey, that was oopsed. The matter is closed.”

I suppose you could say an oops is the eraser on the pencil of life.

Last Laugh

Two doctors were involved in a fist fight in the hospital corridor and the senior surgeon had to pull them apart.

“What was that all about,” he demanded to know.

“The receiver of revenue is in ward five,” said the one doctor, “and he only has three more days to live.”

“So why are you fighting?”

“I wanted to be the one to tell him,” said the other doctor.