‘Don’t call me Mrs Zuma!’

May Blues

It’s been a tepid past few weeks for President Jacob Zuma. First, boos and heckles stopped him from addressing a May Day rally in Bloemfontein. Then he failed to show up as promised in Vuwani, a town in Limpopo whose residents are violently resisting being incorporated into to a new municipality. Before long, the good man might only feel safe while addressing members of his family.

Mrs Zuma? Me?

“Mrs Zuma” is the fastest way to get under the bonnet of the immediate former chair of the African Union, Dr Nkosaza Dlamini... er, Zuma. While it’s obvious she enjoys the full support of her ex-husband, Dr Zuma has been quick to lash out at those who’re belittling her own achievements. “I divorced him in 1998, when I was health minister, and long before he became president,” she said in an interview with the The Star last week. “He wasn’t even deputy president. He was an MEC in KwaZulu-Natal. I was already in government and had a career for myself. But people are quick to forget. I was never first lady of South Africa. And I have no aspirations to marry a president. I have kids with him, so it is inevitable that I will see him from time to time. When you are divorced, you don’t have to be enemies. But I am not his wife. Even when we were in exile I hardly saw him; we lived together only in Lusaka.”

Sorry, Cyril

State Veep Cyril Ramaphosa, who irked many workers with his hand in the events that led to the Marikana