The god of small minds
Daaronder in piesangland, Michael Sutcliffe, the king of Durban, is at it again.
In his City Manager’s newsletter last week, Sutcliffe accused Durban’s Daily News editor Dennis Pather and senior reporter Veven Bissetty of ”pursuing a campaign to discredit the municipality”. Not only that, but he hinted they were in league with the devil, ag, the Democratic Whatever.
Among the ”scurrilous” articles carried by the Durban rag was one questioning the city’s appointment of one Visvin Reddy — notorious party hopper and recent convert to the broad church of the African National Congress. After the elections, Reddy was caught without a seat, but was accommodated by kindly Comrade Mike as a well-paid ”consultant” to the city.
Then Bissetty had the temerity to ask for details of overseas travel by city officials and office bearers. This was too much for Sutcliffe.
”Until the Independent Newspapers clarifies the orientation of the Daily News, we will no longer have any official dealings with the editor or journalists from the Daily News,” he thundered. He also threatened to withdraw council advertising.
Well, there’s nothing like a squeeze of the financial testicles to get the beanz empire’s management to wake up to the need for the media ”to act responsibly”, as Chairman Sutcliffe put it.
Independent management arranged a meeting with Dr Mike so swiftly they forgot to include Pather and Bissetty, and they solemnly promised to study Sutcliffe’s claims of ”biased and unsubstantiated reporting”.
Jonathan Moyo will have to watch out if he wants to keep his spin crown.
This Sutcliffe ou is good. He may be white, too, but he’s dark white.
Chivalry unrewarded
Oom Krisjan has been following the Nadine Gordimer versus now unauthorised biographer saga with some interest. During his regular browsings of The Guardian, Lemmer happened upon a letter from Ronald Segal, who wrote in furious defence of Tannie Nadine and her New York publisher, Farrar Straus and Giroux. But he naughtily failed to tell Guardian readers that his own books, including such titles as The African Diaspora and Africa’s Other Diaspora, are published by none other than Farrar Straus and Giroux. In the Guardian letter he sought to suggest that Gordimer probably regretted ever having called Ruth First a ”silly bitch”. This may be true, although he should have checked with Gordimer first (she has not apologised).
No doubt much after-the-fact sorrow also clings to the following appearance, made by Segal himself, in Gordimer’s correspondence with British journalist and Mandela biographer, Anthony Sampson. In December 1956 Sampson, newly arrived at the Observer newspaper in London, wrote as follows to Gordimer in Johannesburg: ”What else happened? Oh dear, Ronald Segal, that mannered little man from [the periodical] Africa South came in the office the other day, and was AWFUL: I felt bad, because I gather he is in fact quite a courageous chap: but he was so bumptious, and telling everyone what to do, that I found it hard to keep my temper.”
While Segal has jumped bumptiously to Gordimer’s defence now, Gordimer herself merely chuckled quietly at Sampson’s remark: her reply, alas, contains no defence of the chivalric Mr Segal.
Mzi Onassis
For all you toilers glued to the TV screens to watch the Olympics in Athens, here’s the way to do it in true former-strugglelista style.
The truly well-heeled have sailed off to Athens aboard the Christina O, chartered by oligarch Mzi Khumalo. The ship, reports the Financial Mail, has hosted the great and the glamorous in its time.
Once owned by Aristotle Onassis and named for his daughter Christina, its guests have included Frank Sinatra, John F Kennedy, Winston Churchill, you name them, they’ve been on it. Now on it are Jeff Radebe and Mbhazima Shilowa among a host of other luminaries invited by their buddy Khumalo — once of Robben Island fame.
White gold
Would it be unkind for Lemmer to wonder whether South African Olympics boss Sam Ramsamy’s stolid expression during the gold medal ceremony for our victorious swimmers reflects his views of the complexion of our Olympic team?
Label of truth
Bushbaby’s alienation of several European nations has had some amusing side effects. This is a clothing label (below) from a small United States company that sells its product in France. After the washing instructions, which are identical to the English part, there are two extra statements in French that translate as: ”We are sorry that our president is an idiot. We did not vote for him.”
Porn again
Oom’s tickled blue by Parliament’s home affairs committee chairperson Patrick Chauke who managed to get a porn store outside Parliament shut down. We wonder if he’s told his comrade, MP Nyami Booi, who is being probed by the Scorpions for watching a soft-porn movie in his hotel room and billing it to the house?