2019: some will vote, others still uncertain
WITH voter registration open this weekend, some residents in Durban have said they are unsure whether they will vote in the 2019 elections while others believe their vote is their contribution to the country’s betterment.
Durban University of Technology (DUT) IT student Keolin Nair said less corruption in the government in the next term would be progress for the country. He added that he believed Cyril Ramaphosa was the man for the job. “He still has that old ANC blood that Mandela had and he is a role model that we can look up to.”
Sabrina Manilall, a former UKZN student, said she would be voting and hoped to see South Africa’s economy improve.
“With Ramaphosa we’ll have no more Guptas; he has a higher intellect to take our country to where it should be economically.”
Dylan Manilall, another IT student, also at DUT, said that while he didn’t agree with some things in terms of how the country was run for the past five years, “it wasn’t all bad. There were some good things that happened, but I do believe there needs to be some improvement, like getting more people educated, having more people with tertiary qualifications and more jobs”.
Some senior residents of Durban were more sceptical about how the country had been run for the past five years.
Speaking to The Independent on Saturday, 79-year-old Paul Moodley said he was not sure whether he would vote or not because he was unhappy with how the country had been run for the past two decades.
“Nothing is happening… why are guilty ones not being prosecuted? Why are they protecting them? The man who was at the top of the country is being protected all the way and for what reason? What good has he done? Like Shaun Abrahams, what is his position?
“He is only just sitting there and yapping away not accepting any fault of his and contradicting other people’s accusations.”
Michael Simpson, 78, said the main things that the country had lacked were analysis, judgement, decisiveness, organised planning, empowerment and control.
“And I think we must look at the ratings we have from these agencies, particularly Moody’s.
“Yes, they are hammering us, but they have every right to hammer us; we have got to start and get that right and then build on top of that.”
Duduzile Kumalo, 74, said the country as whole had not moved forward and she had observed that, racially, citizens were not really together.
“The most important change I want to see is the reduction of crime. I would like most people to be employed.
“We need people to be educated. I realise that education instead of going up is going down. We were educated, we were struggling but we managed to get that little education. But the younger generation is becoming poorer in education and I am worried about that.”
Annette Dack, 84, said crime was the main challenge in South Africa, especially for an elderly person as they were easy targets. “I was born in the 1930s and we had a wonderful life, we walked freely in town. We can’t do those things anymore, life now is terrible and totally unsafe while the young people are busy with drugs.”
Edith Beckx, 80, said she believed the country had been run badly over the past five years due to dishonesty.