NEVER A GOOD TURN IN THE CORRIDORS OF POWER
ABSCONDING AL-BASHIR
South Africans are quick to move on. Schabir Shaik was once a synonym for a bribe. Gupta for loyal sponsorship. Number One for the top guy.
Name dropper meant the same thing as scapegoat. Nkandla meant corruption.
MaNtuli meant...Vera leaves that one for you to fill in. Now we have Omar Al
Bashir, that means “to escape ”.
All the definitions mean what you want them to mean, depending on where you stand of course.
But a warning to law enforcement agencies: any mention of Sudan in conversation means suspects might be conspiring to Al-Bashir away.
JEALOUS MMUSI M
Still on Al-Bashir, Vera is suspicious of Mmusi Maimane ’ s call for parliament to debate the great escape of the 21st century.
The other day Maimane was in Soweto to launch his vision 20-something. (Vera forgets exactly what the propaganda was all about of the man known for his broken, broken and broken everything speech).
But journalists were not there because they were trying to figure out whether Al-Bashir would be arrested.
All the broadcast airtime and print space went to Al-Bashir, who obviously ran away with it.
Now Maimane wants a debate about how Al-Bashir escaped. Tastes like sour grapes.
KNOW RAZZ FROM TAZZ
Someone really needs to tell Fikile Mbalula, the twitterist razzmatazz humdinger, to learn the art of differentiation.
First, he once chanced on a quote from “Karel ” (his pronunciation) Marx on the definition of lumpenproletariat (rabble).
“Alongside decayed roués with dubious means of subsistence and of dubious origin, alongside ruined and adventurous offshoots of the bourgeoisie, were vagabonds, discharged soldiers, discharged jailbirds, escaped galley slaves, swindlers, mountebanks, lazzaroni (the poor), pickpockets, tricksters, gamblers, pimps, brothel keepers, porters, literati, organ grinders, ragpickers, knife grinders, tinkers, beggars – in short, the whole indefinite, disintegrated mass, thrown hither and thither, which the French call la bohème.”
This was Mbalula ’ s colourful definition of the EFF members in Parliament.
KNOW YOUR PHOBIAS
In a second incident at a press conference called to denounce the FBI ’ s investigation of the Fifa scandal, he implied that R10-million is the same as $10-million.
In a third incident, speaking on xenophobia after the game between Bafana Bafana and Angola, Mbalula said: “We are not xenophobia ”.
Vera suspects Mbalula wanted to say: “We are not xenophobic ”. But then, the razzmatazz school has difficulty differentiating.
VERA S QUESTION OF THE WEEK:
’ Would parliament consider breathalysing anyone who wants to speak before Baleka Mbete “recognises ” them?