Whatever happened to the “Rainbow Nation”? The ’90s was a time of unbridled optimism that the world had finally changed for the better. Communism collapsed, and apartheid in South Africa ended. As Jesus Jones sang, I was alive and I waited for this … watching the world wake up from history. South Africa was going to be at the vanguard of a new, vibrant Africa.
Somehow, though, between the fall of the Berlin Wall and the Balkans War and the Clinton and Dubya presidencies, it all went to shit – and so did South Africa.
South Africa is a country of boundless energy, physical beauty and endless contradictions. Unfortunately, it is no longer a source of inspiring prosperity for the majority of its citizens. In a word, South Africa doesn’t work. The brokenness of things pervades every conversation and every occupation. You cannot talk about South Africa without discussing how broken it is; everyone here does.
South Africa’s promise was supposed to peak a decade after the end of the ’90s, with the World Cup in 2010. And perhaps that really was the nation’s peak: because it’s been a meteoric fall into failure ever since. But, even in 2010, the signs of the nation’s collapse were there to be seen.
Apart from the Vuvuzela trumpeting at football matches, I wanted to see the ‘real’ South Africa and made sure to visit a place the local people I was staying with said I should not go. A township outside Johannesburg called Alexandra. It covered an area of one square mile, housing one million people in shanties, with no sanitation or electricity, and water accessible through an occasionally placed communally [sic] tap […]
Twelve years on from my profoundly disturbing visit nothing has changed, except Alexandra has grown to two million people and ranks as one of the most crime-ridden areas of South Africa. Local taxis in Johannesburg are hailed by hand signs, for example a raised hand with the index finger pointing up is a sign you are hailing a taxi going the Johannesburg CBD. Conversely, the hand sign for catching a taxi to Alexandra is a gun.
Away from the slums where raw sewerage flows in the streets, South Africa invested heavily in tourism, to capitalise on the attention brought by the World Cup. Yet, even the nation’s signature game parks are falling apart.
The government-owned and managed parks are overwhelmed by the number of proliferating animals and the fauna is often left uncontrolled, leaving proliferating pest flora abundant. Fees and charges given to park management are universally claimed to disappear. Everyone at the parks point out the problems and the ubiquitous answer, ‘nothing is ever done’, is repeated over and over at Madikwe and throughout the whole country.
Like so many countries, South Africa is in the grip of an energy crisis – exacerbated by years of governmental failure.
What began as an hour of no electricity once a fortnight has now become a daily torture of hours in a day without electricity. The ramifications spill into every aspect of life and death […]
The electricity crisis is everywhere across this country and the number one topic of conversation; more likely how people are trying to work around it. Why has this problem got out of hand, I persistently asked? [sic]
The answer is the same as the game parks, street crime, township misery and the general economy; the government is paralysed. It isn’t mismanagement so much as no management.
At the electricity generation plants, everything that is not bolted down is stolen, so there is no maintenance and the plants are breaking down. The theft is reported daily in the papers and the government does virtually nothing to stop it. Organised crime gangs loot whatever they can as much as the individuals who shove copper pipes down their pants on their way out of the plant.
They can’t blame the wicked whiteys, either. South Africa has been in the iron grip of the African National Congress for the entire three decades post-apartheid.
It is widely accepted that the ANC has become a corrupted organisation, relying on patronage and privilege to maintain power. The immense abundance of this wonderous land is being fritted away into loyal pockets, and clearly not being directed to solve the real problems of South Africa.
It is a rare historical occurrence for revolutionary movements that succeed in overthrowing the old regime to morph into wise rulers. The ANC, while proudly at the vanguard of overturning apartheid, is not capable of good governance when in power.
Spectator Australia
And, yet, the ANC still commanded more than half the vote at the last general elections, and a comfortable 29-seat majority.
Insanity, to twist an old truism, is repeatedly voting for the same failed, corrupt politicians and expecting different results. And so, South Africa remains condemned to darkness for the foreseeable future.