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
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