Former eThekwini Mayor Zandile Gumede. (Photo by Gallo Images/Darren Stewart)
Wednesday.
Day 146 of the Covid-19 lockdown.
Day three — or day two, depending on which way one swings when it comes to the definition of midnight — of life under level two of the country’s disaster regulations. The debate over when the move from level three should have correctly taken place in terms of President Cyril Ramaphosa’s Saturday night announcement is still raging at the Mail & Guardian, splitting households, pitting partner against partner, sister against sister.
The argument, it appears, is far from over, something like the lockdown, and is likely to flare up again when the head of state makes his next announcement of a move to level one — or back to level three — depending on the behaviour of our drinking population, now that alcohol is legal again.
The temptation to watch the president’s announcement at my local with a R55 Heineken quart and a couple of pieces of braaied beef short rib, just for the hell of it, was very real.
Where I live, a lot of people have started to take their cue from our leaders and apply the lockdown regulations selectively, when it suits them, so booze has been pretty freely available despite the rebanning of liquor at the end of June.
It’s been inevitable, given the level of disregard shown for the law by those who draft and enforce it since way before the lockdown started. And the growing realisation that while ordinary people obeyed the lockdown and stayed at home, the lahnees were busy gutting the R500-billion Covid-19 relief fund.
That said, I stayed home and watched Ratherstaypozi’s 8pm in my lounge, like a good, obedient citizen, following the lockdown regulations, doing what those whom we pay to rob us say, rather than what they do.
Back to Wednesday.
The mobile goes.
It’s Oom Gov, from Pieter-maritzburg. Oom Gov is an old-school ANC cat.
That’s the main reason why he’s called Oom Gov.