Yes, to tell you the truth (now I come to think about it) I am sick of hearing myself moaning. I am sick of not walking tall and not going out to buy South African potatoes with “Proudly South African” stickers on them. I want to hug myself and perform random acts of kindness to strangers in the street, even if they are carrying guns and appear to be looking threateningly in my direction.
Yes, yes, yes! Today, November 1, being National Be Positive Day, I have declared myself a “Whinge Free Zone!”
Let me explain. An outfit called the International Marketing Council, cunningly set up by the government
to spread the good news about the New South Africa, has been circulating an e-mail with facts and figures that demonstrate why we are such a great nation, and why we should be proud of these facts. Unbeknownst to anybody, it suddenly announced the good news about November 1, declaring it National Be Positive Day. “Stop whining,” it says, “start winning!”
Here are some of the reasons it says we should feel, for one day at least, that there is everything to be positive about:
South Africa, the marketing council informs us, is just about the only country in the world where I can drink water from a tap. Secondly, with our country glorying in having the longest wine route in the world (that’s “wine”, not “whine”, OK?) we can rejoice in the fact that we are also one of the world’s greatest wine (not “whine”) producers. (The fact that it hasn’t found a way to make wine freely available on tap, like our unparalleled water, is in itself no reason to whinge.)
Not only that, we (at least our offshore giant South African Breweries) produce 50% of all the beer consumed in China — that’s beers all round for half a billion Chinese men, women and children. That makes me walk tall.
The fact that we have the world’s highest bungee jump makes me fall tall, too. That’s something for me to hug strangers about. Not to mention “the impact of Abdullah Abrahim [sic]” (who he? Ed). Furthermore, the late Professor Chris Barnard.
South Africans have invented kreepy kraulies, Mrs Ball’s chutney, and biltong. We also have the world’s most progressive Constitution (although 40% of the local population still can’t read it) as well as magnificent highways and “warm, friendly, vibrant rainbow people”. (Who they? Ed.)
Who are we to think of packing for Perth when none other than Ray Ackerman, CEO of Pick ‘n Pay, is proud to announce: “I’ve got four children and 10 grandchildren and we are staying right here”? Whether they like it or not, the children can forget about Australia. Besides, the paterfamilias has enough potatoes to be able to afford to buy potatoes, whether his fellow citizens can or not. Hell, he’s got a few hundred shops where they market dozens of them every day.
“For every guy who holds up a gun, there are 99 who hold out a hand of friendship,” one Dennis Beckett, journalist, is quoted as saying. Heck, he’s a friend of mine, and I couldn’t agree more. In fact I’d go further, Dennis (although as I understand it, the name should be spelt “Denis”, not “Dennis” — just one of thousands of spelling mistakes in the council’s feel-good document, but never mind). I’d put it like this: for every 99 guys who hold up a gun to me, there are actually 9 801 (that’s 99 x 99) who hold up the hand of friendship.
You see, looked at like that, with proper and correct statistics under your belt, you have to say to yourself: “Blimey, the odds in favour of us nice, tree hugging, bunny hugging, ubuntu-minded types are so overwhelming it almost makes you want to cry.”
But today we don’t cry! No! Today we are happy, whatever trials may seem to overwhelm us. Because today is National Be Positive Day.
It’s a countrywide thing. From Namaqualand to the Atlantic Ocean, and from Somerset West to Pampoensfontein, South Africans are saying they are proud to be who they are. That’s if they all got the message, of course, and are in a position to be aware that today is a day like no other.
Heck, what human being doesn’t want to be positive about life? The problem is this campaign comes across rather in the manner of Margaret Thatcher instructing the great British public to “rejoice!” at the conclusion of the disastrous and ignoble military campaign to win the paltry Falkland Islands back from the dodgy Argentineans.
If people have something to rejoice about, they will do so without being told. If not, no amount of blows with a handbag will change their view of this miserable world.
In both tone and tackiness, there is certainly something reminiscent of the handbag brigade in the approach of whoever is behind this self-congratulating initiative to market South Africa. And it’s a shame that they can’t even get their facts right.
For example, in the midst of all its glowing commentaries about Nelson Mandela being “our favourite son” and “Charlize Theron continues to dazzle Hollywood” (although she wouldn’t be seen dead in her native suburb of Benoni, however much you paid her to join in all this positivity) it goes on to make this outrageous claim:
“The Lion King,” it burbles on, “played to packed houses two years into its run in the West End with music co-written by our Todd Matshikiza.”
Don’t get me wrong. I’d love to be able to cash in on the fabulous royalties of The Lion King. But the fact is that it’s just not true that my father had anything to do with the writing of the music. And Lebo M (who’s probably the other native songwriter the handbag brigade confused him with) should be hopping mad that anyone should be claiming he did.
Which raises the question: who are these clowns running the government’s crack think tank on the glories of the Rainbow Nation on our behalf?
I think we should be told.
John Matshikiza is a fellow of the Wits Institute for Social and Economic Research
Archive: Previous columns by John Matshikiza