Damn those Imperialist forces!

Just in from serial government clown Fuckile Mballoona [sp.], the Secretary General of the ruling ANC party here in South Africa, this:

He’s been spouting this sort of nonsense for many years now.

And I mean, you never rule anything out in the politics of this country, because it’s like one constant Bob Mortimer story on Would I Lie To You?. It regularly seems completely fanciful and utterly unbelievable, and then it turns out to be absolutely true.

But this one? No.

Come now. The only imperialist and neocolonialist forces with any influence in the upcoming elections are the Russians and the Chinese, and they’re both right behind the ANC. But they’re got their work cut out, given that the actual voting public are fed up with the lack of service delivery, the loadshedding, the rising crime, the cadre deployment, the constant corruption, the dysfunctional state owned enterprises, the poorly-controlled inflation, the plummeting Rand, and the tossers in charge.

Could any (or all) of those be the reasons that the ANC has been singled out as a party that must lose power?

Well, it’s either that or it’s the CIA.

And I know where my money lies on this one.

Useless Government Ministers, Part 3074

After this, I also need to share this.

There was a horrific crash involving a truck (illegally overtaking on a solid white line) and a school bus in Pongola in KZN on Friday which resulted in 21 primary school kids being killed.

In any civilised country, this would be headline news for weeks and weeks. But that’s not us.

And then yesterday, there was this, just down the road from that same site. A truck crash (on the left), followed by another truck crash (you’ll see it):

Fortunately and amazingly, it seems that no-one was killed in this incident.

But suddenly, with this incredible video going viral, our transport minister – the self-styled “Mr Fix” ? – has noticed that two things have happened involving trucks and has worked out that there must surely be a better way of moving things from one place to another:

I think we can probably assume that “tiad” is “road”, and “ill” is “I’ll”. There’s a full stop needed in there, as well.

We might mock, but this is exactly the sort of direction that a new transport minister should be taking, getting South Africa’s underfunded, underutilised, much vandalised and crumbling rail network back to doing its job.

The problem here is this: Mbalula has been transport minister for 3½ years now. He’s overseen the demise and looting of the entirety of the SA rail system on his watch with hardly a peep, but now when he sees a chance to get some cheap fame and relevance, he suddenly comes up with a poorly-written, pre-morning coffee tweet with a promise (which he may or may not keep) of delivering a plan.
The chances of any follow through on that plan are non-existent, but by that time, the fuss will have died down and there will be no (personal) consequences for his continued inaction.

We shouldn’t be surprised.
He was useless as sports minister, and he was useless as police minister as well…

“I’ll take ‘Things that didn’t happen’ for 200 please, Alex.”

…so I’m not quite sure what we were expecting.

Anyway. Don’t be fooled by his 15 word statement on his amazing idea and faithful promise this morning.

Nothing – aside from more deaths because of trucks on the road – will happen. Again.

(Please also note that we will see images and footage of numerous truck crashes over the next week or so. It’s not a new thing. These were always happening, it’s just that the media will decide to take note of each and every one of them for a little while before normal service resumes and they keep happening, but no-one cares.)

One ocean and over a thousand kilometres of coastline

That’s what our erstwhile absolutely [redacted] useless Minister of Transport has apparently found and added to the nations seaboard.

I mean, it’s pretty well known that the Atlantic and Indian Oceans meet at Cape Agulhas, the former continuing right up to Europe and across to the Americas, the latter heading east to… well… India and across to Australia. That’s just two oceans though, and the name is well represented in SA, from wine to aquariums to marathons. Because there isn’t a third ocean around South Africa.
Google “three oceans” and your only real hit is a company in Hull UK, whose claim to fame appears to be making corrugated cardboard from fish waste.

I’ve no idea either.

But hey, maybe he’s talking about the Southern Ocean. Butno: that doesn’t touch South Africa at all. It’s WAY south of even us.

Ocean - Wikipedia

In fact, if you are going to suggest that we are “surrounded” by three oceans, you’re kind of implying that Namibia, Botswana, Zimbabwe and Mozambique make up that third ocean.

Which they don’t. Namibia is mostly sand, Botswana is mostly elephants, Zimbabwe is mostly corrupt politicians and Mozambique is our local Al-Shabab terrorist hangout. Those are land, and don’t represent the constituent parts of an ocean.

But that’s not the only thing he is wrong on: South Africa is big, but it’s not 3,900 kilometers of coastline big:

Now, I don’t expect anyone – even a government minister – to necessarily know that 2,850km figure offhand. But where did 3,900 come from, and why would anyone not check it before putting it on a press release and allowing this meat clown to tweet it?

It smacks of complete ineptitude. Almost like they don’t know what they are doing.
How surprising. /s

And finally, what a brilliant and innovative plan to try to capitalise on the strategic geographical position of South Africa as far as shipping routes are concerned. Just 370 years and a couple of weeks after one Jan van Riebeeck came up with pretty much the same idea. Of course, it turned out that Jan and his organisation weren’t the nicest guys around, and so Fikile and the ANC will be right at home in their company.

Day 125 – Bits of news

After yesterday’s unashamedly lazy post (hey, I was busy with other stuff – see below), let’s have some text on today’s effort, shall we?

The other thing I was busy with was a GooseChase. Basically, a fun*, interactive series of challenges which the teams have to undertake and complete within a given time period. This particular GooseChase is for the Virtual Quiz Groups that got together over lockdown, and while we’re still not allowed to see each other in the flesh or go round each others place and do things, I thought I’d lob one of these together for our entertainment. There is an app, but holey-moley it’s expensive. And expensive in USD – I can’t even work out how much it would be in ZARs.
Anyway, if you thought putting a quiz night together was hard work, wow. You ain’t seen nothing yet. An organisational nightmare.

But if it comes off, it has the potential to actually be quite cool.

What else?

Well, Garmin is half back. I was able to sync a bit overnight and although the interface looks (perhaps understandably) like it’s taken a savage beating and the cuts and bruises haven’t quite subsided yet, it is still breathing – just – and will hopefully continue its recovery. Amazing that it managed to find a ICU bed right now.

Talking of medical stuff, I need to go to a doctor’s office today and I’ve never been less enthusiastic about anything. It’ll be the smallest public space I’ve been to in months, and also probably the longest period of time I will have spent in any indoor public space all year. If you remember my Virus FAQs post, these were two of the things I suggested were best avoided, but sometimes, needs must. So I’m going to put on my Big Boy panties (and my Big Boy mask), take a deep breath (outside) and just do it. I’ll also have my Big Boy sanitiser along with me and won’t hesitate to use it.

Don’t test me.

I have been listening to The Lathums. They’re from Wigan, so the a is hard and harsh, just like all a’s should be (glass, grass, path, bath etc.)

Don’t @ me.

More here.

Finally, some more news on our shit government. This is an image from part of Andrew Mlangeni‘s funeral yesterday.

A true giant of Apartheid resistance, a Rivonia Trialist and an ANC stalwart, it obviously attracted a lot of attention. Hands crossed on the left there is village idiot Fikile Mbalula – currently the Minister for Transport.
Now I have nothing against a decent send off for Mlangeni: he certainly deserves it. But so does every other individual dying at the moment.
So the question is, why are there so many people there? And why are they standing so close to one another? That goes against the regulations for funerals which have been rigorously applied for everyone else.

And then Mbalula turned up on TV this morning saying that the situation “had been exaggerated”. With advance apologies to my reading audience: fuck you, Fikile.
I, like everyone else, can see from the footage that at least two of those regulations above are being ignored and that’s only out of three, given that it’s not nighttime.

Is it any wonder that the lockdown regulations are being so openly and regularly flaunted? The only difference is that there are fines, police brutality and criminal records for the general public. Fikile and his government chums get – at best – a gentle slap on the wrist.

It’s just another example of one rule for them, one for the rest of us.

Right. Rant over. I’m off to mentally prepared for this afternoon’s trip, and to see if I can sort out another couple of GooseChase challenges before lunchtime.

Have a nice day. Wear a mask.

 

 

 

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