April 4 to 10 2008

Pilots on a crashed jumbo

As a Zimbabwean in the diaspora, I have been influenced by Barack Obama into following the United States presidential debate for the first time. I found US politics very refreshing compared to African, and specifically Zimbabwean, politics. The candidates debated real issues that affect the American people.

I now have a better idea of what Obama and Hillary Clinton would do in their first year in office than of what Morgan Tsvangirai or Simba Makoni would do. (No one really knows Mugabe’s objectives, if he has any.)

Makoni promises to liberalise the exchange rate — how is he going to do that, by going cold turkey, or gradually? To what extent is the exchange rate going to be managed, if at all? How is land tenure going to be reviewed? What policies are going to be put in place to encourage investment in agriculture? What about manufacturing, underinvested in for a decade, with machinery that is obsolete and globally uncompetitive? Large-scale foreign investment will be needed to pay for the importation of capital.

What about the recent law providing for the 50% takeover of foreign-owned firms — how are they going to be motivated to reinvest in Zimbabwe? Every economist will tell you that property rights are essential for investment.

The MDC promises to reduce the patient-doctor ratio, but no details are provided. It takes at least five years to train a doctor and it costs to retain one, as doctors are globally mobile. Why on earth are the opposition candidates setting objectives they clearly cannot meet if they win? And they haven’t provided timelines as to when they intend to achieve what. This creates a loophole for politicians not to be accountable.

Regardless of the outcome, Zimbabwe will be in the same position it has been for a decade when the smoke clears. — Stephen Chisadza, Arcadia, Pretoria

It doesn’t matter who wins the election in Zimbabwe — the economy is destroyed beyond repair. Makoni, Mugabe and Tsvangirai are three half-qualified pilots arguing over who gets to captain a jumbo jet that crashed and burned a long time ago.

A new economy will have to be built, which will entail getting some of the formerly productive land back into trained hands, rather than those of untrained peasants and party politicos. But having given the land over, I do not see how any popularly elected government will be able to get it back.

Secondly, a significant financial injection will be needed to get the industrial economy moving again.

Thirdly, there will now be a skills crisis, because many qualified people, black and white, have left. Skills will have to be imported from outside. The logical thing would be to entice the whites back, but the chances of that succeeding are minimal.

So there is a danger that the economy might be like Mozambique’s — growing at an impressive rate, but off such a narrow base that most ordinary people have no hope of being included.

Ordinary Zimbabweans should not delude themselves that a change of government will lead to better times. By tolerating the Mugabe government, they have allowed their country to be assaulted for more than two decades. It will not recover overnight.

If Zimbabwe gets a new president, the populace will have impossibly unreal expectations of him, and they are bound to be disappointed. — Ron McGregor, Mowbray, Cape Town

Makoni ally Ibbo Mandaza’s claim that Zanu-PF has hired Mossad to rig the election is disappointing and embarrassing. How can Mossad, and by implication the Israeli government, want to help Mugabe stay in power when he is constantly attacking the US and the United Kingdom, strong supporters of Israel?

Israel has nothing to gain from forming an alliance with Mugabe. One would have expected more responsible electioneering from the Makoni camp. It appears from such statements that perhaps they may not be so different from Mugabe. — Kombe Sikazwe, Kyalami, Johannesburg

Who wouldn’t be hostile?

Mike Berger (Letters, March 28) should consider the following statistics, all drawn from reputable websites:

Berger complains of ‘300-million hostile Arabs”. Who wouldn’t be hostile in those circumstances? — Alan Holton, Sedgefield

Berger has apparently appointed himself the South African apologist for Israel’s actions in Palestine. Like him, I have visited Israel on many occasions and have many Israeli friends and associates. A significant number of them question the actions of the Israeli government and defence force in the illegally occupied territories.

The anti-Israeli stand taken by the Gazans and the corralled population of the West Bank is borne purely out of frustration and hopelessness. — John S Wright

A matter of trust

According to Ronnie Kasrils (March 28), the new Protection of Information Bill makes it ‘an offence to classify information as a means of preventing the disclosure of incompetence or corruption”. He claims also that there will also be provision for the ‘declassification of government records …”

Will he please explain how the Bill will ensure that those responsible for declassification are not in cahoots with those responsible for classification? How will it be possible to be sure that classification is not being used to ‘prevent the disclosure of incompetence or corruption” if it cannot get documents declassified?

If he is asking the public simply to trust the government, he needs to be reminded that there are no governments that are entirely trustworthy. This is simply because governments, like all other institutions, are made up of fallible human beings. Does anyone remember how often the old Nationalist Party government asked the public to trust its ministers, and with what consequences?

No government should be allowed to keep secrets from its employers, the tax-paying electorate. — John Brodrick, Kensington

Churches of mammon

Fikile-Ntsikelelo Moyo’s take on prosperity cults founded by entrepreneurial ‘Gospel of greed” characters, who set up churches with names such as ‘The Success Church” (quick results guaranteed!), has immediate Christian overtones (March 20).

Prosperity mosques are springing up in Nigeria imitating this get-rich-quick Christianity (www.theatlantic.com/doc/200803/nigeria/4). The unbeliever might argue that since religion is a big con trick anyway, we are talking only about relatively priced quackery.

However, one does not have to be a Buddhist to appreciate the social and spiritual role of the Dalai Lama. There is something about his simple, sane way of life and consistent non-violence that contrasts sharply with millionaire scientologist Tom Cruise or the monied Moonies.

The question ‘What is religion for?” can admit multiple answers, but when it firstly is to make mega-profits, everyone understands the tail is inappropriately wagging the dog. The mystery is how people who know of such injunctions continue to fall for the con artists for Jesus. Or for those who manipulate other religions for gain, such as the brilliantly named Nomatter Tagarira, the Zimbabwean spirit medium who convinced Cabinet members that she could produce diesel from a holy rock. (Her helper was siphoning the precious liquid through a pipe from a hidden tanker).

People bankrolled because of the desperation of a bankrupt regime. The poor, too, are desperate and most often fleeced. The reason the better-heeled get taken seems to do with the unhealthy relation of dependence between a cult leader and a spiritually lost and psychologically needy flock.

The members of the US Heaven’s Gate sect, having waited in vain for 10 years for the space ship that would take them to the ‘next level”, eventually were persuaded to ‘leave their human vehicles” and commit suicide. The video recordings of leader Marshall Applewhite help us to understand why middle-class Americans followed him — he was softly spoken, but articulate, with a compelling aura of power and charisma. In this case the dictum of GK Chesterton rings true: that when people stop believing in God they don’t believe in nothing; they believe in anything. — Chris Chatteris, Jesuit Institute, Johannesburg

You spoiled a good supplement

In the March Higher Learning supplement you report factually and accurately on developments relating to the University of Cape Town’s new executive team.

How then did you come up with the page one headline ‘Max Price’s staffing headache”? The UCT statement indicates that both the current vice-chancellor and the VC-designate, Max Price, are positive about the arrangements.

It is deliberate policy that no permanent appointments are being made to give the incoming VC a rare and exciting opportunity to recruit his own team as he establishes an executive with complementary skills and experience. The headline is out of sync with your story.

More serious is the article headed ‘More than a Reitz row”, in which you quote ‘Stephen Mulholland’s damning article” on the points system at UCT as revealing ‘something is foul in the state of our most august institution”. Did you investigate Mulholland’s accusations? Did you ask UCT for comment? How can you simply assume Mulholland is balanced, never mind factually correct?

The rules of fair, good journalism were not applied and an otherwise good supplement was spoiled. — Gerda Kruger, executive director for communications, UCT

Your own fault

I wish white people older than 50 would drop their ‘white man in Africa” attitude. They’re always aggressive and never apologetic; they also do not accept apologies. They are not superior in any way — in fact, they are everything but.

Yes, you voted for the wrong party all those years and oh, dear me, you lost the country. And it’s your own fault. Stop blaming the blacks, stop blaming the youth — you are the creators of your own world, so live in it. The youth of this country will rebuild what you’ve destroyed, so please shut up or get out.

Oh, by the way, I’m white. — Steve van Dyk, Faerie Glen, Pretoria

In brief

I worked with Ivan Toms on policy development in the City of Cape Town and his death has robbed me and the nation of a dedicated non-racial activist who made selfless sacrifices in the dark days of apartheid. He was a man of integrity and a struggle stalwart who was not over-ambitious for his personal goals. Passionate about health, he was able to persuade people around him with his soft voice. We shall not cry, but rejoice his good life. — Lindikhaya Bravis Maqhasha, Mandalay, Cape Town

Our government’s hypocritical silence on Tibet is deafening. Since the invasion, the mainland Chinese government’s treatment of the Tibetans has amounted to a form of apartheid; yet the ANC ‘champions of the oppressed” say and do little. Say no to Chinese goods, the Olympic torch procession through Tibet and the Beijing Olympics! — Shawn Comrie

I have to differ with Fikile-Ntsikelelo Moya on run-flat tyres (Motoring, March 28). I fitted them on a Peugeot 407 and know that my wife will reach her destination if she experiences a flat. I have driven for more than 200km with a flat tyre at speeds of 120km/h without any loss of control. — Orebotse

Tony Jackman (March 28) labels nasty vegetarians fascists. Isn’t a society which trucks millions of animals to slaughterhouses, much as Hitler did to people, a Nazi society? — Oliver Price, Cape Town