Columnists don't have to answer for calumny

One can think of many adjectives to describe political commentators but "consistent" is not one of them. Last August, in the Mail & Guardian, Richard Calland celebrated Women's Month by naming his "dream team" all-women Cabinet for South Africa.

At the top of his list was Mamphela Ramphele, whom Calland nominated for president. His motivation read as follows: "I have no doubt that Ramphele would provide the clarity of vision and leadership that South Africa needs to restore her reputation in the world, while grasping the big nettles in the domestic arena."

Just five months later, when the Democratic Alliance actually nominated Ramphele for the very position Calland thinks she is ideally suited for, he sang a rather different tune.

In "What's the rush, DA? Play the long game" he describes the DA's offer to Ramphele as "bad judgment and bad politics" – even though that is precisely what he had proposed. He also borrowed ANC secretary general Gwede Mantashe's offensive "rent-a-black" phrase to describe her, saying she was "fundamentally ill-suited to the particular demands of party politics" (which would obviously preclude her from ever becoming president).

He castigates me for "bad judgment" in seeking to broaden the DA's black leadership – without alluding to the fact that this was precisely his own stated judgment only five months ago. If it had gone smoothly (as it should have, given the fact that I have managed far more complex mergers before), he would probably have been quick to remind readers that he was the first to propose it!

When politicians make mistakes, we are rightly held to account. What happens to columnists? #JustAsking! – Helen Zille, DA leader

Memories can be short in politics. Have we all forgotten that scarcely a dozen years ago Tony Leon of the DA was jilted by Marthinus van Schalkwyk? The Last Fat Nat (as he was affectionately known to many) had cosied up to the DA to help the NP hang on to the Western Cape, thus ironically advancing the political career of one Helen Zille, who became MEC for education in that administration.

In 2005, Van Schalkwyk rejected the DA's lobola in favour of richer pickings in Thabo Mbeki's Cabinet; he took his New National Party (the party that founded apartheid, Mr Mantashe, remember that?) into the ANC. Nevertheless he did not, apparently, take his party supporters with him.

Although the NNP's few last-gasp seats gave the ANC its first and only opportunity to misrule the Western Cape, the real irony is that, from that very day forward, the ANC started to shrink, nationally, whereas the DA has gone from strength to strength. That divorce was indeed a political game-changer.

We should await the longer-term effects of the DA and Agang's Famous Five-Day Fling with great interest. – Peter Slingsby, Lakeside

Sitting in a coffee shop chatting to a fellow researcher about this DA/Agang matter, we speculated that, given Ramphele's declared R50-million fortune and her passion for launching a political party, why did she not liquidate some of her assets to provide the funding?

She could have developed an Agang youth wing, trained volunteers and canvassers, drafted a coherent electoral policy platform and set up party structures in all the major provinces. The fact that she did not take this step calls into question her commitment to contributing to South Africa's political landscape.

When Zille said it may have been about a smash-and-grab on donated political party funding ("'All donors' behind Agang-DA deal"), it seemed to confirm a long-held suspicion.

Politicians are incorrigible and often unprincipled opportunists, no matter how great their past work in social activism. We need to put our money where our hearts lead, and not where our mouths aimlessly roam. – Justin G Steyn

Mutually assured construction

Old Mutual, the institution at least partially responsible for the Werdmuller Centre debacle ("Love, hate, and the most eccentric edifice in the Mother City"), should rejoin the party.

Their opulent building (not sculpture) in London – which is prestigiously located just below St Paul's Cathedral, within sight, across the Thames, of the Tate Modern art gallery (a recycled power station) – suggests the fusion of corporate largesse and public culture.

If Standard Bank can sponsor the National Arts Festival in Grahamstown, couldn't Old Mutual redeem itself in Cape Town by providing finance and ongoing sponsorship for a modest but potent national art and design centre in Main Street, Claremont, housed in the maverick sculpture it commissioned?

Releasing the sculpture's latent potential could possibly be achieved by first restoring it to its "as built" condition, then changing its failed original purpose so that it becomes an educational facility, along the lines of a mini Tate Modern, accommodating all forms of art and design, local and international, as well as providing research facilities.

It could also offer accommodation for visiting academics and researchers, and retain some of its historical functions as a Holy Grail for architectural students –  for example, lessons in how not to design a user-friendly commercial building.

Enclosing it with a transparent structure, as some have suggested, would solve the problems caused by its much-vaunted "permeability" (architectural jargon for accessibility), offering single-point (revenue-collecting?) access control … and, also, no more weather-stained off-shutter concrete and leaking (permeable?) roofs.

Like it or not, it is a unique, thought-provoking artefact, in need of a magic wand.

With Cape Town currently designated World Design Capital, and the Werdmuller Centre restored, promoted and managed as a particular hot spot for those interested in the arts and design, Claremont would gain a valuable asset, adding further diversity to its current user-tenant mix. It might also help to put an end to the tiresome handbag-swinging "archispeak" halitosis characterising the Werdmuller "debate", driven by detractors and apologists alike, without shape or destination.

It is belatedly reassuring that the designer of the centre, Roelof Uytenbogaardt, was also responsible for the delightful Hout Bay Public Library, a building (not a sculpture) reflecting remarkable humaneness and design maturity.

May he now rest in peace. – "Frank Lloyd Wrong", Cape Town