Where the girls are
Oom Krisjan has finally discovered why women Cabinet ministers have never joined him for a dop at the Dorsbult. It seems they prefer a hang out in the visdorpie called Marco’s Place, specialising in African cuisine and ambience. The evidence: a photo of a tête-à-tête between Manto Tshabalala-Msimang (health), Lindiwe Sisulu (intelligence), Stella Sigcau (public works) and Thoko Didiza (land and agriculture).
Speaking of our seat of government, they say the wheels of Parliament turn slowly. Obviously no one told anyone in the hallowed halls of the resignation of Andrew Feinstein, the African National Congress MP who resigned as co-chairperson of Scopa as political pressure came to bear in the arms deal scandal way back in 2001.
He is still listed as the member for the Sea Point constituency office, alongside none other than Speaker Frene Ginwala. A sheet headed Western Cape Constituency Offices stated: ”In an endeavour to enhance the relationship between parliamentarians and their constituencies, Parliament has published this list of MPs with their addresses and telephone numbers where they can be contacted.”
The list could do with a few other changes: ANC MPs Melani Verwoerd and Jan Momberg left a few years ago and, some time ago, so did Andre Gaum (New and Natty) and Pauline Cupido (Democratic Whatever, now African Christian Democrats) to join provincial politics. And then there’s Tony Yengeni who, after being criminally convicted, resigned from Parliament last year for lying to it during the arms deal.
Big Tony is watching you
Forthcoming elections are always a source of material for this column — it seems that most of the time, politicians are squabbling rather than telling the electorate of their plans for running the country. But maybe those plans aren’t worth knowing about.
These thoughts came to mind as Lemmer read about how the Democratic Whatever has hired private detectives in Tshwane to keep an eye on its election posters after (it claimed) about 70 placards were vandalised by members of rival parties.
For an undisclosed cost, cameras will monitor lamp posts in an effort to catch these poster terrorists. Now we know what ons eie Princess Tony means by getting tough on crime.
Square to be hip
The manne haven’t heard anything of the plans to erect an enormous statue of Madiba in Port Elizabeth’s harbour for a while, so Oom Krisjan was amused to see that Jozi’s northern suburbs have run off with the idea. Sandton Square, the toniest plek in the land, is to become even more hip by renaming itself Nelson Mandela Square — replete with a six-metre-high bronze statue of the man and a makeover in ”unique colours — Metallic Bronze, Gold Foil and Black”.
School for scandal
‘This place is no good for us because we watch prostitutes having sex in front of us in rooms with no curtains,” a 16-year-old schoolboy whined in the Daily Sun this week. Seems the boys at a sports academy in Egoli are complaining that ”the prostitutes do business right under [the pupils’] sleeping quarters and there is no way they can avoid seeing everything”.
This moved Krisjan to dust off ancient but stirring memories of Hannetjie Prinsloo moving prettily among the doringbome in her Groot Marico Laerskool jukskei outfit, and to wonder regretfully about What the Youth of Today Want.
A question that sharpened when the Oom read the above-quoted 16-year-old’s next complaint: ”Our soccer field is also not good enough for the money our parents are paying.” Now the manne want to know what it is these ingrates want to be watching through those uncurtained windows. The Moulin Rouge?
Which perhaps explains the terse response the Daily Sun delivered to a reader who earnestly argued in the same edition that ”we are humans, not baboons”, and that human sex should remain sacred: ”It is open to debate how sacred sex between a man and a woman is,” the paper snapped. The manne think the Daily Sun should now expect offers to lead this year’s Gay Pride march.
Harpies
Archbishop Desmond Tutu is getting under the skin of his fellow churchmen — for much the same reason. A sulky little e-mail made its way into Lemmer’s box this week from Rome (by way of Jozi): ”The Aids Office of the Southern African Catholic Bishops’ Conference expresses dismay at Archbishop Tutu’s criticism of the Church’s stance regarding condoms. The Archbishop has zoned in on the idea of the promotion of promiscuity and failed to note the wider positive and negative ramifications around the use of condoms.
”The Aids Office also regrets the continual harping on about condoms, by the public at large and by the media, as though that were the only thing to be said about the Roman Catholic Church’s involvement or lack thereof in the response to the Aids epidemic.”
Oom Krisjan regrets having to harp on about condoms — but if you don’t use one you might well be playing your harp sooner than you intended.
A plague on both
Oom Krisjan delights in those slips of the pen or the lip that cause unintentional hilarity. Here’s this week’s offerings — the first from the government site:
”18 Feb 2004 — N Mahlangu to attend Maputo Corridor Logistics Initiative inauguration. 24 Feb — The Premier will be unveiling a plague tonight at Polane Hotel, Maputo, during the Inauguration function of Maputo Corridor Logistics Initiative.”
And from Sapa: ”In two separate but almost simultaneous attacks, two men with explosives strapped to their bodies walked into the offices of the Kurdish Democratic Party and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan in the city of Irbil on Sunday and blew themselves.” Very kinky.