HOGA RT H
No one’s at home in Moscow
Hogarth would like to offer his belated congratulations to Deputy President David Mabuza on his appointment as special envoy to Russia. But the whereabouts of the deputy president have been unclear since his deployment. The brief of the special envoy was also rather unspecific. A statement from the Presidency said The Cat would be going to Russia to congratulate President Vladimir Putin on his re-election. During Mabuza’s time in Moscow, Putin seemed otherwise engaged, driving a truck across a new bridge to Crimea and hosting his Syrian counterpart, Bashar al-Assad. On Thursday EFF Gossiper-in-Chief Julius Malema tweeted a missing person’s alert for Mabuza, describing him as being 57 years old, having black hair and red eyes, and last seen two weeks ago. If anyone bumps into the deputy president, please be sure to check his pulse.
And Mabuza not missed at home
The Cat’s, um, “special envoy duties” in Russia apparently kept him away from the president’s budget vote in parliament this week. The deputy president did not participate in the debate, and it was up to the two ministers in the Presidency, Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma and Bathabile Dlamini, to be President Cyril Ramaphosa’s supporting acts. Ramaphosa did not appear to be too daunted by his deputy’s absence, though, still milking the New Dawn for all its worth. In his response to the debate on Thursday, Ramaphosa offered thanks to his colleagues in the Presidency as follows: “I wish to conclude by expressing my gratitude to ministers DlaminiZuma and Dlamini, the directorgeneral in the Presidency, Dr Cassius Lubisi, my acting deputy director-general, Mr Busani Ngcaweni, my advisers, staff, secretariat and protectors.” Hogarth assumes he thanked Mabuza privately — in Russian.
Close, but no cigar
It seems some bromance is developing between President Thuma Mina and the Desperate Alliance’s provocative John Steenhuisen. They were at it again this week during McBuffalo’s budget vote following the presidential “shut up” a fortnight ago. The DA chief whip on Thursday complained that the president had reneged on a Wednesday undertaking to give him a cigar.
“Mr Steenhuisen, yesterday I had your cigar but when I sought to offer it to you, standing here, you looked most unhappy. And I don’t know what caused your unhappiness. So I donated it to somebody else. Depending on how you and I do today, you will have a box of cigars from me,” the president said. Cheers to the peace pipe!
Beauty thinks Barca a bad sport
The new sports minister, Tokozile Xasa, has a gang of cheerleaders. One of them is the chairwoman of the portfolio committee that is supposed to hold Xasa accountable, Beauty Dlulane. Instead of engaging with Xasa’s budget policy statement, Dlulane went on a ramble, singing Xasa’s praises as the first woman sports minister. Just when we thought she was done, Dlulane complained that Xasa was denied an opportunity to take a selfie with football maestro Lionel Messi. “We know how the ministry was treated at the recent Nelson Mandela centenary match between Mamelodi Sundowns and FC Barcelona where the ministry was not part of the entourage welcoming the European team. We say that not in our name shall that ever happen again. We have only one minister of sport and recreation.”
How dare you, Patrice!
DA MP postpones victory
During the same debate, Desperate Alliance MP Tsepo Mhlongo listed the many failures of the ANC government as far as making sports accessible, safe and available to everybody. He complained about how, with the sports budget, the country would not be able to realise sport infrastructure in poor communities and could not build sports facilities or change apartheid spatial planning.
He promised that the Desperate Alliance would change all this when it gets into power. “The DA will bring total change come 2029,” he declared without flinching.
There you have it! The blue party has given up on 2019.