OUR NEWEST CHUM: TROPICAL TRUMP
How will Ramaphosa handle Brics meetings, because Brazil’s Bolsonaro, if he wins, is a rather nasty piece of work?
I’m sure many of you will remember the good old days when this was a food column. Looking back at all those years of gorging, it pains me to say that it was all in vain. I was looking at absolutely the wrong place for political insight.
Instead of looking at what politicians might be eating or ought to eat, I really should have been looking very seriously into what it is they are putting into their regular drink. It must be some strong stuff.
Last week I nearly fell off my chair when I browsed through Business Day. It reported that our errant immediate former head of the SA Revenue Service (Sars) (whose bodyguard once locked an executive in the boardroom, prompting him to shout “kidnap!”) says he is the most successful
Sars commissioner in democratic history.
I wanted to eat my newspaper, but I held off to read further in case I wasn’t getting the joke. Alas, this arrant nonsense continued.
“By any lawful measure or standard, my tenure at Sars was the most successful in the democratic era. For example, I was the first and only commissioner of Sars in the history of the institution to reach the psychologically important revenue milestone of R1-trillion and to break that hitherto elusive barrier three times in a row,” Tom Moyane was quoted saying in his 700-page application filed at the Constitutional Court. This from the man who broke the revenue service. What do they put in the water cooler at Sars?
He is not the only one who believes in his own superpowers. You will remember Hlaudi Motsoeneng, the former head honcho at the SABC. Motsoeneng says he is underwhelmed by SA’S current leaders and is even eyeing a presidential run himself. “The day I become the prez of SA‚ you’ll see real change and impact in the lives of our people. Because I’m just watching people playing games …
“How do we allow a situation [where] small people‚ who are in parliament‚ remove Jacob Zuma? Zuma was elected by the people of SA‚” he said.
Oh dear. Where does one even start?
Anyway, if you think we have leadership problems you may be interested in our Brics (the “consortium” of Brazil, Russia, India, China and SA) partner, Brazil.
In elections at the weekend the far-right candidate, Jair Bolsonaro, won the first round of the presidential race. He will face the leftwing Workers Party candidate, Fernando Haddad, in the second round on October 28 after he failed to win the 50% of the votes needed to win outright. With almost all the votes counted, Bolsonaro had 46% and Haddad 29%.
Bolsonaro has stirred controversy with racist, homophobic and misogynist comments and there have been mass demonstrations against him.
It will be interesting to see how our Cyril Ramaphosa will handle Brics meetings from now on, because Bolsonaro is a rather nasty piece of work. Referring to quilombolas, the black Brazilian descendants of rebel African slaves, he said: “They don’t do anything. I don’t think they’re even good for procreation anymore.”
He says that he is “pro-torture, and so are the people”. Further, he says: “If it’s up to me, every citizen will have a gun at home.”
For someone who is taking part in a democratic election, Bolsonaro is no fan of democracy: “You won’t change anything in this country through voting. Unfortunately, you’ll only change things by having a civil war and doing the work the military regime didn’t do. Killing 30,000 [people], starting with FHC [former president Fernando Henrique Cardoso]. Killing. If a few innocent people die, that’s all right.”
That’s the man who is on the verge of becoming one of our best friends. He clearly imbibes from the same water cooler as our Motsoeneng and others.
October 28 will be interesting for emerging markets. By the way, Bolsonaro is known as “The Trump of the Tropics”.
He clearly imbibes from the same water cooler as our Motsoeneng and others