December 2011: The Big Squeeze

 

Well, there you are: another year nearly done and dusted...whether we like it or not. And don't they all get fraught towards the end?

Medically, I had a bad year with (since July) a cracked rib, two doses of bronchial pneumonia and lastly, a hip so sore, I could no longer climb stairs.

That's a bit debilitating since we live in a double storey home. I considered moving my bedroom downstairs, but that wouldn't help; the loo and bathroom are upstairs! I eventually saw the GP, supposing that a hip operation could be the next step, but it seems that this is all a back problem of old and the nerves leaving my lumbar vertebrae are being squeezed.

But that's not all being squeezed!

This is the time of year when I invariably take issue with my medical aid. How Discovery can go into a new year, each year, printing a self-payment gap on its statement, concerns me. It expects me to fall short and feels justified in saying so. That means, to me, that it plans upfront, not to cover me completely.

Is that bad planning or Discovery's idea of good marketing? It pips me off no end!

That self-payment gap becomes the bane of my every year-end. And this year, after a few days in hospital, it's been rinse and repeat as usual.

What really raised my ire was receiving an e-mail from Discovery asking me to complete a survey about the hospital I was admitted to.

The San, St Augustine's (or 'Saint Or-gus-teen's as many Durban residents call it) must be the best hospital in Durban, where several other private facilities are also excellent. Every staff member was an utter pleasure.

Diabetic for the last five years (as was my dad and a cousin and is my sister), I no longer check my sugar levels regularly, which can be considered dangerous. This is because I find the regular pricking of my fingertips, which are excessively sensitive, unbearable.

My fingers scream with pain and so I decided to stop.

So once admitted, I thought I should do some fairly intensive checks while I didn't have to spend hours banging away on a keyboard each day. Those 'San' nurses checked my sugar levels up to eight times daily without a single grumble. I had only to ask and they were there.

I learnt a lot. For those who understand such stuff: my sugar levels were between 4.8 and 7.1 the entire time and the highest figures were recorded on morning waking. This suggests that my sugar drops during the night and my liver, the organ which stores glycogen in the body, pumps out more, essentially to stop me becoming comatose.

Once glycogen streams into my blood of course, my blood cells obviously reject it.

For me it was good to learn that eating larger meals than I usually do, and getting no exercise, hardly affected my sugar levels at all. Especially since a public service strike this winter severely hampered my usual daily swimming routine alongside being repeatedly ill.

Forgive me, Discovery, but that's my evaluation of the San. Brilliant! You, far from!

I didn't fill in the survey because the monkey on Google was totally comatose that day! The link wouldn't work.

However, here's a thought: how about giving me the chance to fill in a survey about Discovery and its service? You wouldn't be happy with what I'd say. I kept getting messages while in hospital, telling me you were refusing to pay for this, that, or something else.

It's such a pity my blood pressure refused point blank to rise to the occasions!

Discovery's call centre is as bad as Telkom's and each year you squeeze your members just a little more. You watch the trends and then refuse to honour those responsibilities.

For my money, I believe you are ripping your members off. And I'll remember that when you next brag about your profits. Your shareholders may think you've got the goods, but if a move on my part wouldn't load the fee (and it would) I'd choose another medical aid today and be off like a shot.
If I had to rate Discovery, it would fall about as low as Eskom on my radar. And that's really underfoot!

And isn't Eskom just another big squeeze? Or perhaps I should blame the municipality. A fifteen-hour power outage in our area last week, just as the COP17 folk hit town. Do you think that those do-gooders behave as well in hotels as they claim to at home, where they have to pay their own bills?

I have my doubts...

And then there is SARS, everybody's biggest squeeze at this time of the year. It took exactly nine days for SARS to demand a full audit, putting the squeeze on me for the second year running. I doubt anyone even read the submission before the demand raced back to me.

Audits are not foreign territory for me. In the 90s I was audited practically every year, but the brains then at SARS would do it far more cleverly. Each year, a different claim was investigated. Since I couldn't know which in advance, I was kept honest (if I needed to be) for all claims.

Submitting 12 pages by hand was a matter of an hour's work including, in those days, the trip there and back. My how things have changed.

Luckily, my e-filing only went in while I was in hospital this month and I still remembered most of what I did and where to find the detail. After the chaos of trying to put it all together last year, I have changed my strategy. Before next year, I will change it more.

And submit all the detail right from the start!

So that all I need to do is scan in the documentation when SARS calls. Right now, I've already sent the audit off with an extremely sexy-looking spreadsheet and about 45 scans; after three days fluffing up the original return for a bunch of half-wits who probably don't know a debit from a credit.

My point, of course, is that no-one is paying me for all the extra work or allowing me to earn enough to pay an accountant to do it all for me. I dread seeing the way my careful, neat filing is reduced to various indiscriminate, tacked-together pages (in order to reduce the scans from 90 to 45).

And then, I suppose, I'm expected to separate and re-file again. But if last year is any indication of the time it takes SARS to check my audit (one year); it seems that moving on is not the best move I could make!

The thing about SARS, I've decided, is that it goes into a fat, childish sulk if an audit doesn't present it with a nice new pile of cash for various state departments to squander. And with bad grace, SARS admitted that last year I could have claimed more first time around...

...yet failed to offer me a refund to back up its calculations.

So, just to be pedantic, I've told it to 'Get onto it'.

Of course, that could take another year!

E-filing in its broadest sense is not a sensible course for one-man/-woman businesses/freelancers. It asks too little, needs official documentation to keep it simple and then throws all its toys out of the cot when it doesn't receive any official documentation.

Much about working alone, in fact, is unofficial. Many hours of work are not chargeable. And how sad that I cannot charge SARS for wasting another week of my time! I think it would be best if one of them came to do the damn audit himself; got to grips with my filing system and actually learnt my debits from my credits.

It definitely irks me that those trite little SARS officials get a regular salary for not using their brains; for not using what bookkeeping experience they brought to their positions; for, in short, doing sweet Fanny Adams except pass out imperious instructions.

Whatever is FICA for if not to do the checks the Receiver feels are necessary? SARS does, after all, have direct access to all our bank accounts, so why wouldn't it go with the flow?

Because SARS, like Discovery, is a master of the big squeeze.

Studio M's bottom line: The big squeeze doesn't stop there...we all know how difficult the state makes it for small businesses to survive in this country and we all experience difficulties on various levels, but please do keep your eye on the state's actions in other spheres. The POIB apart, there are changes going on in the judiciary and in local government that could make it really difficult for the small man to function properly. Freelancers also find themselves so ring-fenced that they are damned if they do and damned if they don't. Earn, that is.

Have a good summer; may God be with you.

November 2011: What does really count?

We're into November with the third South African democratic census under our belts.

Or is it?

As one of the homes overlooked during the previous census, I have no doubt that many families in SA are feeling just a little miffed and neglected. If yours is one, I do hope you will make the effort to ring the call centre and notify them. Last time around, no such service existed.

However, because I have a tenant and because I had no intention of inviting a complete stranger into our home, I rang asking that the form be dropped off for me to fill in overnight, so that I could confer with said tenant if necessary.

I still have no idea why the forms were not delivered to post boxes in areas where boxes exist. Many areas have plenty of pamphlets dropped weekly.

I was assured politely that the instruction would be conveyed to Durban's command centre.

Ha! Ha! Clearly that instruction was forever lost in the ether, cyberspace or cloud. It took a further fortnight before two youngsters were beating the gate down and shouting at me from the kerb.

This is a habit I find particularly irritating. If you are denied access by virtue of an electric or locked gate, leave a note (that's what God made post boxes for). I f the gate is unlocked and you want to see me, open the damn thing, close it behind you and come down to the house.

Because if you think I'm about to clamber up those steps for the privilege of a total stranger's company, think again! (My sore hip has been making me grumpy lately...)

We have a second gate which, in effect, could be presumed to be there to protect poor unknown souls from the vicious bites of our slavering guard dogs.

Actually, they are dachshunds and despite the noise they make, they've never yet done anyone any real harm. The lower gate is really intended to keep the dogs safely behind bars. Still, it's always nice to seem to care about the welfare of intruders, isn't it?

I despair about the census questionnaire.

The appliance questions appeared to deal with market research rather than needs, but perhaps some retail organisation subsidised the census. We can all boil water one way or another. What matters is whether we have access to potable water (without needing to trek for an hour to carry it home), firewood, matches and a waterproof, fireproof pan.

If the state doesn't know the answers to those things by now, it never will! Eskom should be able to provide info on who is stealing what electricity, as well!

Before I received my form, a friend who had already done her duty explained the income section to me. She's 64, lives alone, but subsidises the needs of her almost teenage granddaughter, who is confined to a wheelchair.  

I was shocked to hear that she'd checked an income box labelled 'R12 000 – R25 000/month'. Between you and me, there's a vast difference between the two...easily more than one class. The state was not interested in whether she works, half- or full-day, has a pension or investments of any sort.

Although she does work half-day, that clearly that won't go on forever (well, it's probably clear to you and me). Since she's in a scarce-skills field, there may be no one to replace her when she gives up and she also claims that because further regular study becomes compulsory for everyone in her sector next January, many of her peers over 50 plan to kick the working habit rather than be forced to comply.

These are people already watching the horizon with jaded eye for an excuse to retire; the last thing they want to do now is start studying again.

And, in case you feel that cannot be important to the country, the sector is pharmacy, which must surely tie in with the state's ultimate NHI plan, AIDS treatment et al? An opportunity for learning something really important to success has, in my opinion, been missed by a long shot!

Transport is also, in my opinion, one of South Africa's most controversial issues.

In recent months, Gauteng has welcomed the Gautrain, the Rea vaya and Santaco's new airline. Santaco has taken over the management of Rea vaya. When Rea vaya was recently on strike for eight weeks, it is said that no one missed it.

Are you noticing a picture emerge? Should any organisation have so much of a monopoly in any industry?

The census was a perfect vehicle for learning how many people travel between different points twice daily, what mode of transport they use and which they would most like to use if given a choice of public transport mode.

Instead, I'm fast reaching the point where I believe no one cares at all what is wanted or needed in any province by way of public transport. How could Sanral have got its plans for the Gauteng tolling system fees so wrong? It gave not a damn what people can afford.

Huge amounts of money are being spent in good faith and unfortunately, many of us have much faith in the results! In fact, those left to pay the new tolling fees (the middle classes and business) are precisely those people who have less faith in government to begin with.

Lousy PR exercise! How can anyone garner more votes by bankrupting those who feed its system?

Then we come to the interesting rumours about enumerators sitting on street corners erasing census info and inserting new answers, apparently with the authority of the okies in charge. I quote from an e-mail I received from a concerned citizen:

"Attached is [photographic] evidence of a Stats SA employee with eraser in hand, erasing information on people's forms.  He was sitting at the [boom] security hut at Erasmus Road, Edenglen, Edenvale.   When I asked him what he was doing and why he was erasing, he said his supervisor told him to do this."  

Long story short: local residents were shocked, as were police. The supervisor was called and contacted her superior, who refused telephonically to give his name. Picture the discontent, which is utterly wasted on people who don't toyi-toyi (but write e-mails).

Only one question is pertinent: who, in government, doesn't know that official documentation should always (and I stress 'always') be completed in black pen? The moment many of us heard that pencil was required, we clammed up, simply due to that little discrepancy.

It is not how things should be done!

Then, of course, in KZN, enumerators have been arrested for refusing to return questionnaires to their superiors unless they are given an increase on the R5 000 payment offered in their now-signed contracts. Hell, the ink on those contracts is barely dry! How on earth can people have salary issues?

Simply: they supposed the job would be a piece of old takkie and they found out differently. Having done it once myself (also during a low economic period) I know how thankless a task enumerating a census is; it's one long PR exercise from the first to the last questionnaire returned and listening to every last opinion about the state's management performance.

Let's be honest about it: if they sent the enumerators around with tape recorders, the state would learn everything it needs so badly to know about the state of the nation! Instead, it's in the process of dreaming on. Perhaps the census was never meant to be more than a short-term job creation project.

Or perhaps the ANC really doesn't know which direction to take.

As Moeletsi Mbeki put it last month, "The ANC government does not know what South Africa's core national interests are. One day it is looking for foreign direct investment – the next day it is interfering with foreigners investing in the country."

Moeletsi believes that the opening of our trade markets by Trevor Manuel (as the original trade and industry minister) is the cause of our millions of lost jobs. That our infrastructure breakdown, together with capital flight, enabled by the same relaxing of trade controls could see our banks follow those of the US and next, the EU (take a lesson here for SADC). He worries about what will happen to the retirement savings (pensions) of millions. I don't; I'm already panicking!

Studio M's bottom line: I'm reading Great South African Teachers, a heart warming, rather than intellectual exercise. The book was compiled by Professor Jonathon Jansen and two of his students at the University of the Free State. It makes clear that Bantu education could not stifle great teachers.  Thousands of previously disadvantaged individuals took every advantage offered, gained degrees and good jobs by virtue of learning the one thing that really mattered to their futures: that hard work gets us places! More money won't fix the present deficiencies in education; better role models could.

Does Goldman Sachs Rule the World?

If you haven't yet seen the BBC News broadcast of independent trader, Alessio Rastani's interview about the Eurozone rescue plan, now's your chance:

 

I'm not suggesting the man's boy-scout advice – be prepared –  is infallible, but it is about the most forthright few minutes in financial history, I think and such a pleasure when we are all so used to everyone doing soft-shoe shuffles around us.

'Goldman Sachs rules the world,' he claims, with utter confidence. And I suppose that's another thing that attracted me, since I recently read an article that diagrammed the relationship of the companies that are said to do exactly that! And yes, Goldman Sachs was among them.

Rastani even tells viewers how to avoid being led by the nose into certain disaster.

But he's holding his breath in joyful anticipation of a complete Eurozone crash.

It emphasises how often governments, banks and stock markets delude themselves into supposing that 'alles sal regkom'. Do you think they're in denial or do they just not grasp the facts properly?

If Greece is allowed to default, European banks, and particularly French banks, will become vulnerable. But she's not playing ball and has already, in real terms, defaulted. Will her civil servants be paid or not? Just how far will the crisis escalate before it drags us all down?

There are protests in several developed countries. Thank God our strikes are over for a while!

The Eurozone crisis will not affect the average South African directly, but will possibly affect every South African indirectly. As in: referred pain, or fallout.

South Africa and other emerging markets will find it harder to export their products or borrow money and the latter, in the face of our infrastructure plans, could just catch us short. As Engineering News reported, at some stage between now and 2015, by which time South Africa plans to install 1 850MW of wind power capacity, transport infrastructure will feel the pain.

Enter the GreenCape Initiative, which focuses on unlocking 'manufacturing and employment potential' in the Western Cape and includes wind turbine transportation in its interests. It has offered to lease a spot in Suldanha Bay harbour where turbines can be offloaded, which it will later sublet to whoever finally gets the contract to import them.

Each of about 925 turbines would make up seven or eight abnormal loads moving cross-country to their destinations, it claims, which could mean about 6 500 loads clogging Western Cape roadways over two years.

But these factors need to be taken into consideration:

·         We don't have sufficient cranes to load and offload the segments at either end of the journey, or enough sizeable heavy transport vehicles do the job. I wonder whether we even have enough experienced PrDP drivers?

·         In some places, roadside infrastructure will need to be modified or removed before such long vehicles can pass and turn. I hope that doesn't include rebuilding bridges...

·         The routes used must be advertised for every journey and each will need route clearance obtained for the dimensions of the pieces. All need dedicated traffic escorts.

Discussion with Transnet (which agrees that road is the cheapest form of moving these gigantic parts) has made it clear that it doesn't have the necessary to do the job. The loads apparently move at a crawl, but taking the numbers into account, this isn't a task for weekends or nights only.

This type of factor is a fairly important aspect of any large infrastructure project and is the point of having good project management to hand when quoting. It would be a shame if Eskom had assumed too little and miscalculated when taking loans.

Logistics experts are doubtless quailing in their boots at the thought.

Global demand just isn't what it used to be and whatever the rand's value it needs willing markets to perform. Even China is suffering contractions and I sometimes wonder whether some countries don't feel they've bitten off, in recent years, more than they can chew.

Quoting the University of Birmingham's Professor Peter Sinclair, Engineering News also reported that the longer that Greek pain is drawn out, the more difficult adjustments will be, affecting risk premiums on loans to South Africa.

Falling exports could easily prove the last straw for production and our gross domestic product (GDP). Sinclair suggested allowing the rand to fall somewhat against the dollar (happy manufacturing sector) in preparation of a possible crisis (not-so-happy manufacturing sector).

Which would leave us exactly where with the oil price and dollar-related local business obligations? Some type of depositor insurance was suggested with regard to South African banks.

Beginning to feel a little queasy yet? Or just pleased you can't afford to save?

However, Sinclair's cherry-on-the-top suggestion was a shift towards more VAT and less direct taxation and the need for us to do long-term planning by learning from the Greek example...

...which involves an ungainly public service with unaffordable salary needs; see any link to us, yet?

Criticism about our public service spend since 1994 is nothing new, starting with comment about moving from four provinces to nine and the replication of jobs that demanded. Then of course there are all the consultants hired to do government work because the wrong people often work within the buddy system.  

Add to that our social welfare payments, the umpteen health and social-welfare projects and the ever-bleeding and begging state-owned companies? No wonder Tokyo Sexwale's getting cold feet about housing! It's all unsustainable in the long term.

Last month, Adcorp claimed that nearly another 500 000 jobs would bite the dust from now to next year and the only one still hiring this year has been the public sector. How that makes it possible for banks to believe (and tell parliament) that consumer spend will prop up economic growth is beyond me...but you never know, perhaps they are referring to new homes and expensive cars for the likes of Julius Malema and other government-subsidised cronies.

I wonder how that inspires consumer confidence?

Because I'm pretty sure their tax situation no longer does. In essence, Grant Thornton research shows that there is a grand total of 5.7 million tax payers paying for a population of around 50 million in South Africa. He maintains that 2.75 million people carry over 60% of the total tax burden.

Taxpayers pay between 18% and 40% of their earnings to tax, depending on their income. In actual fact, the highest payers receive the least in return, which should make Boesak and Tutu happy little chappies!

Taxpayers generally self-fund their security, pension, medical, and educational expenses. Unfortunately, much of that treasury income goes back into social (or current) expenditure, leaving virtually nothing for infrastructure and capital expenditure. The division is unsustainable.
This means that capital expenditure must be covered by a variety of other taxes, levies, duties and tolls, from occasional airport and flight taxes, to VAT.

VAT is kept low to spare the poor. But taxes like estate duties, transfer duties, capital gains taxes and donations' taxes coin a good bit for the authorities. Home owners pay municipal rates, most of which are currently paying off new stadiums built in inconvenient places. Then there's an environmental tax on electricity.

Drivers suffer motor vehicle and ad valorem tax on fancy purchases, licence fees, vehicle registration fees and three different levies on fuel (including the RAF levy), but toll fees are probably the most resisted at this point. An emissions tax comes next.

Sin tax levied on cigarettes, alcohol and ad valorem duties on most imported goods jive with a new dividend tax for shareholders and a gambling tax on winnings. And for your sins you also pay a tax on each of the old light bulbs you buy, a levy on each plastic bag and the dreaded SABC licence, which accounting and collecting systems remain horrendous (ask me).

Collecting all these fees from you probably costs more than you pay, which makes sheer logic of Professor Peter Sinclair's suggestion that we look at more VAT and less direct taxation.

Since this would also enmesh a large number of criminals, drug pushers and sex workers more firmly in the tax net, I'd applaud that and after all, the term 'sin tax' is already taken for lesser demeanours!

Studio M bottom line: I question why Tokyo Sexwale would want to defend Malema. I either have totally misjudged the man or must ask, "What does Malema know about Sexwale that no one else does?" While he's dealing with all that abysmal social housing construction, I hope he isn't tearing his own house down.

September 2011: Pick your struggles

Photo: Graeme Williams MediaClubSouthAfrica.com

http://www.mediaclubsouthafrica.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=670&Itemid=75

After three years of age, I only lived in the same home as my brother during a six-month gap he spent in SA between school and university. I was then in Standard 5 (now called Grade 7).

He worked during his holiday and spent most of his evenings 'out', as young men frequently do. Unsurprisingly, we had little in common.

He had left home for boarding school when I was three and we came to SA when I was nine. We were virtual strangers, but somehow later found an affinity in occasional letters and even rarer meetings over the years.

During one of his irregular holidays here, he commented that it was a pity that our father had not managed to develop his potential as a youthful wartime hero to continue to perform as brilliantly for the rest of his life.

Sometimes, my most seemingly flippant replies actually carry more weight than I realise.

I don't remember aiming to be astute on that occasion; I could have been a little stung by his unintended criticism. After all, in his mid-40s, he had not particularly distinguished himself, I thought.

I said that perhaps our dad was just lucky there had been a war that gave him a chance to shine...

...and received a rather perplexed look in return.

I had watched both my parents bow beneath their own struggles. My mother had Multiple Sclerosis for all of my life and the latter half of hers. She remained incorrectly diagnosed for years.

I understood far better than my brother could, how completely her personal struggle had influenced everything from my father's career choices to his ability to design a comfortable old age for them both. There were times when he came home from work in the evening to do all the housework and cook their meal before helping my mother to bed.

I believe very firmly that the devotion it takes to grit our teeth and see through the family responsibilities that intrude after our frenzied youth is what most merits medals.

Women are more often acknowledged for doing it, but men have also been known to knuckle down to the inevitable. Kudos to those men!

My brother flew out to SA to say 'Goodbye' to us for our final meeting six years ago, by which time our parents had long been dead. He had been diagnosed with terminal cancer after a recurring struggle with the disease. I, my sister and our children knew that we would not see him again. It was an intensely poignant weekend.

I knew it was his sense of family responsibility that made him fly out for a final, personal farewell before dying. He had been a wonderful father to his two daughters and an excellent husband...the sort who does the cooking pretty often.

In all, my brother did substantially more for us than we ever did for him and easily earned my version of his war medal.

So I hope you will excuse the fact that I am somewhat impatient of young South Africans who seem to be on an eternal pilgrimage to identify a struggle worthy of their support.

Any young South African who needs to ponder a cause worthy of his or her effort lacks imagination! There is need and suffering all around us. South Africa's fight should be over but its real struggle has barely begun.

I sigh with despair at the numbers who congregated yesterday to show their support for Julius Malema & Crew. His behaviour is incorrigible! His choice of struggle is a different matter; we disagree only on how young people can attain (and keep) their rightful places in the workplace and economy, not their right to aim for it.

No leader should behave as arrogantly and brazenly as Malema has!

Young people all over the world and in every generation are mainly self-absorbed, selfish and self-important.

Trust me to know this; I've been one.

But it's somewhat sad that so few young South Africans have recognised the worthiness of the struggle to abstain, be faithful and use condoms as they indulge; that they still fall pregnant before appreciating the responsibilities that parenthood brings, or understand  the pressures their parents are under.

Our gardener has seven children. Yeah! Don't say it! I still shake my head in disbelief.

There are two sets of twins, which is meant to make the high number more palatable, but probably only emphasises the urgent need for people with certain genes to learn to multiply by two, more quickly than others.

Nelson is determined that all his children will pass Matric. His own greatest struggle presently revolves around the fact that his eldest: twin daughters, have both already had babies and since matriculated, but caused futile arguments about marriage and lobola.

One left home to live with her boyfriend and his mother. She retreated to her childhood home at intervals between beatings. Each time, after a pleasant sojourn, she insisted on returning to the boyfriend. She now has two young children and all three are HIV.

Last time around, he finally told her: if you go back there, don't return here again.

Her twin sister is now boarding away from home while doing a computer course... which means Nelson's paying for her baby's day-care over the period, as well as for both the course and the boarding. When she phones him he says it's only to ask for airtime.

Luckily, his wife now bakes for hospital patients and visitors. Nelson says she's up half the night cooking and goes off at four every day to sell her wares. He's worried she'll burn out, although that's a phrase he wouldn't know.

Change is particularly dynamic in South Africa at the moment, although not particularly fast.

The vote has been translated into 'freedom' and many assumed this would allow all their fondest dreams to be easily realised without personal effort.

Had I one word of advice for today's youth it would be: your parents are dealing with your freedom; they have not yet attained their own, because in this and other recent generations the struggle is as much between their tradition and your new opportunities.

Children rightly want to take advantage of education, but often leave working parents to deal with their babies. The first generation that quits paying lobola is giving its parents less ability to provide for their other children or to plan for retirement. Those parents assume a responsibility they didn't sign up for.

Nelson is extremely proud of his oldest son, who he says is very clever and doing well in Grade 7. I asked to be reminded of his age: 18.

So there is no doubt in my mind that Nelson, who works fulltime during the week and gardens for various people three weekends every month, has already earned one medal and will doubtless deserve many more that he will never be awarded, before he's through.

I guess there's still time for five of his children to direct their struggle intelligently.

I am reminded of what I used to say to my son: you get one chance in this household...fail and the opportunity is lost!

That may seem harsh, but we both knew he could do it if he really tried.

Parents are living in an unusually strained era. The struggle between the old and the new, the recession and high unemployment have produced the reaction we see in ongoing strikes. I don't agree with the right to strike when an individual or his union has already previously agreed terms.

I perfectly understand the feeling of disquiet that results from an inability to make ends meet and the temptation to find the means any which way possible.

But I certainly don't agree with the behaviour displayed by the strikers. And when students 'strike' or an ANCYL following turns violent, I despair.

Studio M bottom line: Vast online retail company, Amazon.com, has proudly opened its new customer service HQ in Cape Town, to support mainly its North American, German and UK markets. The choice mainly depended on our glorious weather during the bleak northern hemisphere winters. At the opening, Engineering News reported, Amazon praised the provincial government support it received and the ease with which it found German speakers here in SA, but had also noted that the 'service orientation, warmth and customer centricity' of SA's people had much to do with the original decision. South Africans...what are we missing when we look at our own workers?

Mo

August 2011: Brainstorming land reform and the arms deal

mediaclubsouthafrica.com Graeme Williams

I'd like to think that something's coming together in our country as other things seem to fall apart.

Is that too much to ask? I have myself reached the stage where I've completely lost patience with the interminable debates about who benefitted unfairly pre-1994, who owes what to whom and whether the claims are justified.

I have an urge to yell: 'Get over it!' While I don't believe that anything has come easily to me and mine, it is a fact that we have managed to accrue the odd bit and piece over the years. My bank account may be sparse, but I have a home and that's a good deal more than some.

It's a form of security I value even while I struggle to cover medical aid costs (and the additional over-and-above amounts which I have to fork out annually), sky-high insurance premiums and monthly pension policy payments. I realise I'm a candidate for the dreaded NHI.

This is my fifth home and the first of three freestanding ones I have managed to pay off. It will be my last because I never want to go that route again. The stress of high interest rates took years off my life!

My attitude now is fast becoming: 'I have, they don't. Let's get past it and discuss how retribution can be exacted.' We could spend the rest of our lives on this nonsense and I want a bit of time before I'm through to smell some roses and warm my creaking knees in the winter sun.

I haven't yet bought the roses and my still-dependent student son comes first.

I'm told the state owns 30% of SA's land, some of which, I assume is given over to national parks and other which is probably not ideal real estate. I'd like to know how much of this could support agriculture of some sort.

I'm quite certain that some form of PPP could be worked out for the land with agricultural potential; manufacturers, producers and mentors could train newcomers and furnish markets with the state helping to subsidise the exercise. If the state can ever make up its mind!

I visualise a process modelled loosely on the Israeli kibbutz system, where skills are taught, work experience defines potential and those that rise to the top move into management positions. From there they would later acquire their own freehold land, remaining in touch with mentors for an agreed period.

After which, they would be on their own, sinking or swimming along with the rest of South Africa's farming community. If ever in need, they could sell their land rather than appeal to the state again.

We are, after all discussing a starting point, and this would ensure pre-existing food security.

The balance of government land, I believe, should immediately be given (yes given) to those who are in the queue for RDP housing. Houses would be built on those properties. Naturally, it won't always be in areas of first choice; some may decline the offer. That would be short-sighted.

In the late fifties, my father sold a piece of land he had bought with an inheritance over thirty years before, in order to provide spending money for his 16-year-old son, who was left at boarding school in the UK when the rest of us came to SA, the land of my father's birth.

I realised some years ago that, had he been able to hang on to that land another thirty years, his pension would have been secured. It was in the small, still-bare suburb of Bedfordview, Johannesburg, which later became prime suburban property.

Yet he never complained about this or other lost opportunities. His wry humour merely acknowledged them.

So perhaps a piece of land with a house on it in some distant municipality is not quite your shot of JW Blue, but it has potential: to lease, to sell, to back a credit application or even to pass on to squatters of the future.

And perhaps I should stress that this government did no more to earn its land than the previous one.

The ANC government certainly didn't pay for it. What I am therefore proposing is the unbundling of most of the state's land, which was inherited from the Nationalist government. Are we clear?

Fair's fair!

That government land which already houses RDP homes cannot now be used for anything else and I think it's high time the state handed the title deeds over, free, gratis, lock, stock and big, red ribbon.

I gather the initial idea was not to do so for fear that some would deal unwisely with their acquisition, but isn't that exactly what some of us all do in our lives: deal unwisely with what is ours?

Is that not part of growing up? To learn the hard and only way that lessons usually do sink in?

The point is surely to give people the opportunity of land ownership? What they make of it, is their own business; as it has always been mine. The Biblical parable of the merchant who handed talents to three servants and later returned to see what each had made of his acquisition, reinforces this.

Equality is at stake here and I have no doubt that in any stretch of life, in any race run, there can only be one outright winner. And as the Comrades Marathon reminds us annually, he's not always white. I have only to consider Tokyo Sexwale or Patrice Motsepe to know that whites don't always come out on top.

Okay! Now we've done and dusted Phase 1 of Land Reform Stage 2, let's take a quick glimpse at how the economy is losing money and jobs hand over fist.

Strikers revelled in petrol shortages, but probably didn't expect to be snowed in the following week, limiting their ability to make up a fast overtime buck.

Those caught on Van Reenen's Pass came face to face with hunger, cold and thirst in a way that made it clear that they are unused to being without food and clean toilet facilities overnight. I saved my sympathy for those who live in mud huts on unsheltered hillsides and have no salaries to strike over.

And now, at last, some in the ruling party seem to be taking corruption in government circles seriously.

Now, that's a turn-up for the books!

The arms deal is raising its ugly head for the umpteenth time. Don't hold your breath, but it is interesting that the Hawks (who came into being after the Scorpions were disbanded) operate under the wing of the police. And our head of police, Bheki Cele, now has an axe of his own to grind, after exposure for office rental maladministration.

Who said that the police would always protect the ANC? Well, let us now see...

Oops! There's no political will...screw that. What about the people's will? What about the majority who believe the TRC did not do enough to settle the agonies of the past? And what about those minorities who believe that the present government is no better than the past one?

Many hold that Mandela's name will not be officially tarnished before his death, although I cannot see why that really matters any more. We have long got over the fact that he is as human as all other men and we're unlikely to want, as a nation, to see him behind bars.

The same goes for Mbeki. After his great Polekwane fall, no one can ever put Thabo together again. Africa may have lost faith in the UN, but it's a two-way street and I cannot imagine why we rely on it anyway. Africa is simply not into the Western way of doing things.

Like me, do you take note of whispers that Zuma no longer seems to be the flavour of his term? The Zulu stronghold of KZN does not reflect the opinion of the rest of the country, but is anyway this week too caught up with yet another R400 million down the storm drains after snow fell. It's difficult to tell from Durban...

Personal falls from grace be damned! Why can we not have what we really want: the arms-deal truth?

Retribution, even justice, I could easily forego, just to know the truth! Let's do the TRC Round 2.

Our new Presidency spokesman: Big Mac, was not available for comment, the Sunday Times reported, but together with Chips, he could be burrowing under a large shake of tomato sauce. Can anyone be presumed innocent until proven guilty in this?

Between ANC debt for the Polekwane saga (perhaps the university in question would like a ground floor registration office rent-free in Luthuli House to compensate), news that the unemployment rate has risen by 0.7% in the past three months and only 7 000 jobs were created in the second quarter, while 174 000 were lost, and the usual boring, old Malema circus, the ANC camp is picking up all sorts of criticism.

I applaud Moeletsi Mbeki, as usual, who told the Cape Town Press Club that Zuma has neither the will nor ability to steer South Africa out of its economic and political difficulties and believes that our future does not lie in the ANC (big whoop)...and the Chief Justice, who decided to retire gracefully.

It's been quite a month!

Studio M’s bottom line: Worth reading should you have the time: Loane Sharp of Adcorp on unemployment since 1994 (and before) – http://www.leader.co.za/article.aspx?s=1&f=1&a=2945 and Sim Tshabalala of Standard Bank on the nationalisation of mines and banks – http://www.leader.co.za/article.aspx?s=23&f=1&a=2958.

Mo

July 2011: The business end of politics

Top-up business newsletter from Mo Haarhoff at Studio M

There is little as self-empowering as being a lone swimmer in an Olympic-sized pool.

Whether you charge along using more energy to twist sideways for breath than to make headway, fighting the water as though it is your own personal enemy, or glide through it with seemingly little or no effort (as most slim, lithe lifeguards manage to do), or even if you just enjoy being able, as an elderly, disabled or challenged individual, to move freely and comfortably, every movement makes a noticeable impression on the surface and is yours alone.

Every swell and ripple records your progress. To borrow the title of a BBC series: This is your life.

It clarifies the belief religious people have that God sees everything.

But once others dive in to share the pool, they make their own impression and the tentative ripples of the less strident are less obvious, although they still interact.

Even those who don't make waves influence the lives of those around them, at home, at work and in the world. They can, with the help of others, change the course of history, develop a life-saving product or simply play a small part in keeping a business running efficiently.

Many ordinary South Africans joined R2K, making their gentle ripples part of something bigger.

The media made a lot of noise. Some assumed that was because their jobs were under threat. Cosatu and Nersa voiced their concerns.

Professional media bodies remain involved. But perhaps we need reminding that there has been disagreement within the ANC about the bill. Just because we don't know exactly which politicians upheld our rights on this issue, does not mean we should ignore the part they have played. We owe them some gratitude.

I'd love to know what Albertina Sisulu thought about it. It weighed heavily on Kader Asmal's mind. Does the old guard, a slowly dying breed, consider South Africa's recent efforts to find solutions a continuation of the struggle they supposed had already bought them, at great price, their freedom?
In fact, the Protection of Information Bill (PIB) will sooner or later affect the life of every South African, for good or ill, according to whether it is amended satisfactorily before being submitted into law.

So government's recent about-turn on the PIB is a good start.

The ANCYL definitely appears to want the struggle continued more lustily.

The past and now present president of the ANCYL encouraged waves that make a stormy night at Vetch's Pier seem like mild weather. We could all drown in that lot! His sort of talk can also turn the tide of history, particularly among young minds that are known to make the occasional hasty, hot headed and misguided choices.

The timing is such that our youth have convinced themselves that their kissing games produced revolt to the north of the continent. That's dangerous. It's probable that they have little idea of the severe consequences of going on the rampage in defence of unworkable ideals. (They should view the Tatane video one more time.)

The ANC in North-west and Gauteng now both want their mines expropriated, despite the so-far official ANC policy. Cosatu too, it seems, is chopping and changing its mind (which validates the belief some have that the latest R37mn ANCYL conference merely dealt with what the ANC intends to become future ANC policy).

Militant talk may not be the end of it, but only the beginning.

JM has, in fact, hit on three sectors that are struggling to show what they consider consistent, reasonable profit: agriculture, banking and mining.

And now the ANCYL seems determined to rape them all.

The land issue isn't going to go away, no matter how we look at it or how low the maize harvest is going to be. Until something drastic is done to resolve it anyone who owns any form of property is going to wonder occasionally whether they'll be safe in their beds come the revolution.

That's right. I don't think it's happened yet.

The threat that the youth will still erupt seems perfectly logical to me. Whate else is there for them to do with their time?

Am I being alarmist? I'd like to think so. But if we all dismiss the threats out of hand, we'll look pretty stupid if they come to pass.

Think carefully about Generation Now and Generation Next. I'm generalising, of course, but they have become used to immediate gratification with as little effort as possible. They can access as much information as their tiny (or not so tiny) minds want. They want jobs and incomes that satisfy them, without wasting time on gaining experience, working their way up, or doing the basics.

And too many are simply not prepared to waste time looking for any information when an authoritative voice says all they want to hear.

Add that to the fact that their lot in life is not enviable (no jobs) when all most really want is some money in their pockets, and we have a recipe for first-class mayhem.

But we have had a few good decisions recently. These ones give me hope:
  Ø  Scrapping an Olympic bid while we still have so much to put right for the poor;
  Ø  The declaration by the Department of Public Works that there is actually no shortage of skills in the built environment and property management sectors;
  Ø  Trevor Manuel's wish to stay at home with Maria (if they nationalise the banks, she's going to need a shoulder to cry on when she faces Barclays), and
  Ø  Finally prying Aurora out of the hands of people who effectively destroyed the value in both its mines and treated workers abysmally.

All relate directly to business.

So when is business going to come out of its coma and say or do something pragmatic?

Business Unity SA (Busa) has finally made a ripple on the surface, but the mining and banking sectors seem a little afraid of the water temperature. Big business has all the essential tools it needs to make a big splash: PR, relationships with the media, financial analysts, statistics...or is it simply counting the cost of finding new pools to swim in?

Smaller businesses have plenty to say, but no really public forum for expression apart from their local Chambers of Commerce or industry associations. If provinces are already agitating over the mining issue, now is probably the right time for small business to make itself heard.

As long as we have freedom of speech, every business that is finding labour laws too restrictive to help it grow, should be voicing its concerns.

A few of us watched a Standard Bank employee devote most of a working day last week to shouting the odds about the coming revolution on a publisher's news blog. The irony of the situation was palpable. He has a job he doesn't seem to want in a sector under threat and was ranting in what bordered on hate speech. He needs a reality check!

I wonder whether he wears his running shoes to work at month-ends...I also wonder what Standard's Chinese investors would think about him. He earns far more than his average Chinese counterpart.

Aurora has shown us that, for Chinese investors, China comes first. As it should!

It really is time that we South Africans managed some of the processes that the state struggles to get its head around. We cannot sit tight and wait until government is prepared to jump into the water. By then, there'll be a lot of damage done (and we all want some water left in the pool).

If eight arrests can be made within two days of a robbery at the Gauteng police commissioner's home, why doesn't this happen with all crime? (The force's psychology is back-to-front: tell a criminal you are shooting to kill and naturally he's going to aim to get in first; splash pictures of your home all over the papers and  now they all know where he lives.)

If the SABC screws up, why does it need to screw us all over by sulking? All its little fracas with M&G has done is given the newspaper the moral high ground. (Aren't potential lawyers taught to say 'Please', 'Thank you' and 'Sorry', like normal kids?)

And now the 'tripartheid' alliance seems wobbly. Well, isn't that about time? Unions and politics don't mix (especially when unions are failing their members and industry by not training new workers to take over from old).

People are still suffering now there are no apartheid laws. Some need more help to rise above the poverty they endure. The TRC did not resolve the desire for revenge that many harbour and the young emphasise. The state has frittered away much that could have helped more and has also run out of ideas (many of which were not very bright to begin with).

It's now too late to debate the moral issues of whether land owners worked hard to pay vast amounts for their property. They have it, others don't. Let's begin there, because stealing from them sure ain't going to make anyone healthy, wealthy or wise.

I have always felt that the combination of an FDR 5-year plan and a kibbutz-type system could help get the ripples going. Others may not agree.

But please would some involved body come up with a workable plan?

Bobby Godsell has a good reputation, but after his stint at Eskom I'm not sure he is all we need.

The lesson for today:
If every white person left this country today (or was, God forbid, massacred) it wouldn't create more jobs or leave thriving businesses for others to amble into. Those who think it would, have a lot to learn about business.

Studio M’s bottom line: So what are you going to do? Make a ripple, a gentle swell or splash like hell? Do you care to save your job, make jobs for others or save your business? Or don't you really care if even more South Africans end up like the miners from Aurora, who have been promised half of their pensions in six months' time, to compensate for two full years without pay? (That leaves them only half of their pensions for the rest of their lives...)
Mo