THE WEEK IN WORDS
COMPILED BY LINDSAY SLOGROVE
When I started as a registrar, a gunshot wound meant that if the guy was shot more than three times, the guy who shot him was very angry. Now we don’t even classify it as multiple gunshots if the victim was not shot more than 10 times. If it’s a single gunshot, it is suicide until proved otherwise. – Professor Johan Dempers, forensic pathologist and head of the division of forensic medicine and pathology at the Tygerberg Forensic Pathology Laboratory, speaking about the backlog at state mortuaries.
Oh, wow. – AmaZulu coach Cavin Johnson’s response when told that his team had last won a trophy in 1992, having thumped Kaizer Chiefs 3-1 to lift the Coca-Cola Cup (now the Telkom Knockout). The teams clash at Durban’s Moses Mabhida Stadium at 8.15 tonight. Our parastatals have become massive ATMs from which the leeches who feast on our precious resources suck money every month. This is done not only with the knowledge of our government, but with their assistance. – DA leader Mmusi Maimane says SAA is a moneymaking entity for cadres and comrades.
To me, both of these renowned individuals have made some of the greatest contributions in the history of HIV/Aids in public health and epidemiology relevant to prevention and care of infected people. – Dr Robert Gallo, who discovered HIV as the cause of Aids, on the awarding of the Institute for Human Virology Lifetime Achievement Award to Professor Salim Abdool Karim, the director of the Centre for the Aids Programme of Research in South Africa (Caprisa), and Professor Quarraisha Abdool Karim, its associate scientific director, for their contributions to the global Aids response. The government has dug itself into a hole over time with bad policies. You don’t get out of a hole by continuing to dig. – Steven Nathan, chief executive officer of 10X Investments, after Finance Minister Malusi Gigaba presented his Medium-Term Budget Policy speech this week. In KZN, we don’t just have crime, we have a crime epidemic. Criminals are a step ahead of law enforcement agencies. – IFP spokesman for community safety and liaison, Blessed Gwala, after the release this week of the national crime statistics. Lawfare is the abuse of the legal system against an enemy. This includes frustrating one’s enemy through the use of delaying tactics. In Zuma’s bizarre behaviour in the state capture case, the enemy are the people of South Africa and their wellbeing. – Cope spokesperson Glacier Nkhwashu says the president is waging legal warfare to not comply with the public protector’s remedial action as set out in the State of Capture report.