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IMF's warning: good news

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I have concluded that when the International Monetary Fund warns this country of its spending patterns it should delight our government, and especially those who would love to see this country destroyed.

I say this with all honesty, because come to think of it, why then do we not learn from what they are warning us about?
Why do you think government keeps insisting on doing the very thing that we are told is dangerous for our economy or country? To me it is simply because the authorities couldn’t be bothered, which is why the arrogance leads to them making the same mistakes over and over again. Someone asked me this week why our government never listens to its people, and I seriously had no answer.

The question was particularly referring to why the government ignores the criticism in the media, why it goes on as if nothing is wrong yet we keep pointing these things out. This to me is the painful reminder that this government is answerable only to itself.

Otherwise how do we explain their defiance to advice thrown at it, including that of the IMF; why government ignores the pleas from the public; why ministers remain defiant in the face of criticism? They do not care. Actually, maybe they do. Perhaps their agenda is to bring this country down, see to it that it collapses-mind you I do not have any clue what is there waiting for them when this country becomes another Zimbabwe.

But they can rest assured, they are doing quite a good job, so yes things are going according to their plan; otherwise how would we explain their policies, their insistence on spending the little we have and yet have no investors or income to sustain their insatiable appetite.

The thing I fail to understand is what they see in the finance minister to retain him, because everything he has done has failed. The report by the IMF is damning and exposes just how arrogant and adamant that we would take no advice from anybody.

The finance minister’s justification for spending on the huge bill is also laughable in the sense that it is illogical to say government’s idea of creating employment is to have a large workforce!
What happened to the voluntary packages-the minister failed. Instead of trimming the wage bill the minister buries his head in the sand and says it is better to keep spending because government failed with the voluntary retrenchments!

So then, how does he see us surviving-he is going to tax us until we bleed. Where is he spending that? he is going to pay back the same people. It is wrong. We need to set the example that times are hard, and then people will take us seriously.

The final moot point here is that MPs are finally toying around with the idea that the minister needs to be fired-for whatever reason. We have been saying this for years.
Anyway, my point is that I am certain there are people who want this country to grind down. I do not know what is in it for them, but the way things are going, I am convinced of this.

These people are also finding their way around the king, and calling the shots from somewhere, making sure this country will end up ungovernable. The result is that we are now on the brink of collapse. I am sure these people, wherever they are, are having a jig. It is all going according to plan.

Has David Simelane been violated?
The visit by the women to the high court to sit through the David Simelane case last week should not be taken lightly, nor the reaction afterwards, at the end of the case. I am not by any chance referring to David Simelane’s outburst when he lashed out at the women who reportedly taunted him as he was leaving court.

That the women grouped themselves together and put on T-shirts with certain messages to go to court and sit through this case at the public gallery is significant enough-and who would blame them. We all share their concerns I am sure; I mean it has been long enough, almost 10 years now and we still do not have the foggiest idea what exactly went on when those women and children disappeared and were reportedly raped and murdered.

The state argues it was David Simelane’s work, but it has to prove its case in court, and therefore Simelane remains just a suspect. But because the case has dragged so long, some of us have kept on wondering why it has, and if there is no outside influence that is causing the delay. By outside forces of course we are referring to the speculation that there is an extra force that must have been involved here, because surely no one man could have managed this alone.

But I am not a legal eagle, and therefore my layman opinion counts for nothing in court.
What I do know is that many of us are desperate to have this case concluded so that if it is not Simelane then we start asking the question of who then must it be, and that if it is him then we have to allow those families affected by this to close this painful chapter.

Because the case has dragged so much can sometimes mean that the DPP’s office could not be bothered. It also raises the question that if such a high profile case can drag for so long, and it is not explained or clear why, then how much more others?
In other countries, such cases are given priority, and I do not exaggerate when I say by now someone should be behind bars.

Anyway, this very reason that David Simelane remains just an accused person leads us to understand why the women may have been fed up enough to want to protest by their presence during the case. It was fitting enough that this day in court for Simelane coincided with the start of the 16 Days of Activism Campaign-no doubt an important event on its own. Obviously, the message here was that the women who marched to the high court were sending a message that this abuse can no longer be ignored, this pain and suffering that the victims’ families have been going through should come to an end.

It was a very loud statement that I am confident made its mark.
However, I find it ironic that while protesting their own abuse as a result of this delayed justice, the women ended up dishing out their own abuse on David. I do not know what they said to him, but I do know that it must have been enough to have him perhaps even snap, to the point of him lashing out.

Here, I feel Simelane’s rights have been violated. He has been abused-and by the very people whose action was to highlight the type of abuse that was being condoned by the case not being wrapped up. How did they end up doing this, one wonders. Surely, we would expect them to know better. After all, Simelane is still an innocent man; he therefore remains innocent.

That he is standing trial does not make him guilty, and therefore not quite the beast that the women probably wanted to make of him.
It also suffices to say that this 16 days of activism is about violence against women and children, but I do know that it also caters for abuse of men. So, why then has no one said anything about this? Why haven’t the NOGs standing for the non-violence of men or women and children cautioned these women? Why the silence-because it’s David Simelane?

I find it very wrong, and am shocked that this incident happened right at the start of the period when we are to sensitise each other about the fact that we need to respect everyone’s rights, we can let this go.
Those women are wrong, but I find the groups that are not saying anything about this even more wrong.

Old men demanding sex
The story of the 65 year old man who has been making sex demands on his 57 year old wife is a classic. This to me is also significant during this period which is the 16 days of activism, because there is something it teaches us. Firstly, this man is sticking to his wife, hence the demands for sex.

He is not cheating on his wife, and then coming back home and being abusive, but he would rather have his wife. You do not find this happening in this country, and the old man-but for beating his wife-should be commended. Of course it is another thing that he is sexually active at that age-and that active (to make such demands that would actually chase the wife away)! No wonder there are many females wishing they would have his number!

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