Comfort Ngidi.
Public protector is not above question
One finds it difficult to understand the hostile and hysterical reaction to the proposed challenge to the public protector's report ("Lawyers rush to bring comfort to Number One").
We live in a constitutional democracy where decisions of the courts and chapter nine institutions can be taken on appeal and review.
You quote unnamed "top legal figures" believing that this legal challenge is "a travesty of justice" and "undermining [Thuli] Madonsela and the office of the public protector", but they don't say how approaching a court of law undermines the public protector.
Another "respected attorney" feels that the concerned lawyers must "feel obligated" in some way but gives no basis for alleging this. Does the "respected attorney" know whether these lawyers do human rights work or not? In any event, what difference does it make if the lawyers who are mounting the legal challenge do human rights work or not?
As for staff at the National Prosecuting Authority being "appalled" about the involvement of Comfort Ngidi in the challenge, it would be interesting to know why they are appalled. Ngidi believes, like others, that aspects of the public protector's findings are reviewable.
One cannot see what concerns they have because he undertook an investigation into alleged irregularities in the office of KwaZulu-Natal's director of public prosecution.
Was one of the requirements of the investigator to agree to the findings of the public protector? Are only those who agree with her findings deemed to be fair and impartial?
Did anybody doubt the bona fides of advocate Mike Hellens, who, as an acting judge, found for the Democratic Alliance in the "Zuma stole" SMS case, despite the fact that he deposed to an affidavit in support of Glynnis Breytenbach, who is now on the DA's parliamentary list?
What is the basis then for questioning the bona fides and integrity of Ngidi?
It is unclear why public protector Thuli Madonsela believes that their legal challenge or campaign would "cheapen the dialogue" about the report and one would have thought that she would welcome a review of it by the courts.
We must eschew an alarming tendency that is developing, which holds Madonsela's decisions as beyond question and sacrosanct, because she, like judges, will on occasion make mistakes and render incorrect decisions. Ngidi and others have a right to challenge the report in a court of law and it is for a court to decide whether their arguments have legal validity or not.
We live under the rule of law and a Bill of Rights and the courts are the final arbiter to hold all of us, private citizens, the government and the public protector, to account. – Progressive Professionals Forum, eThekwini region
'Luck' is down to hard work
The choice of words in the article "In Marlboro, living is no life at all" reveals one of the contributing factors to the problems faced by unemployed people living in the abandoned factories of Marlboro.
"The story is always the same upon their return, he says. No luck … Nkosinathi Ndlovu is one of the lucky few. He is a self-taught car mechanic."
That does not sound like luck. That sounds like initiative. Perhaps the "lucky" unemployed do not want to be victimised for doing better so they put their earnings down to "luck".
This letter is not meant to diminish the enormous hardship faced by the unemployed of Alexandra and Marlboro.
But little will change if people shrug and put their circumstances down to "luck" and "fate".
A privileged person did say: "The harder I work, the luckier I get."
A yuppie radio station sometimes features an astrologer on a Friday evening. Many people want her to predict their futures. She replies: "Why don't you decide what you want your future to be and make it happen?" – Enza Kuqala, Kensington
ANC 'mutiny' is a crafty bid to keep DA out of Gauteng
As a former ANC and vacillating minority-party voter, I believe South Africans are being hoodwinked into thinking Ronnie Kasrils and his fellow mutineers are either going to destroy their vote or place their crosses next to "anyone except the Democratic Alliance" ("Don't waste your vote on May 7").
The specific exhortation to rule out the official opposition is a clever political blindside because a "no" vote will not reduce the ruling party's majority much, but it dissuades disaffected or former ANC supporters from crossing to the DA.
Why did these dyed-in-the-mould ANC stalwarts not break ranks and make a stand against corruption when the news of Nkandla, Guptagate, Travelgate and so on first broke years ago? Why now, just before an election that threatens to shake the ANC's majority?
The ANC (and its mutineers) are waking up to the fact that it could lose the richest province in the land, Gauteng, to the DA. They will stoop to any chicanery to prevent this. Kasrils is helping to ensure the ANC doesn't lose Gauteng and other vacillating provinces.
Kasrils, a true revolutionary with long-term vision, is basically saying: "You can choose the far left or even the far right, but don't vote for a truly viable opposition." – Ian Hugh Fleming, Sophiatown