Caught fibbing again, eh Ms Minister?
I noted in a recent post that Buyelwa Sonjica, the minister of minerals and energy, backtracked from her reported parliamentary suggestion that South Africans should go to sleep early so they can “grow cleverer”. In last week’s press conference to announce the department’s energy efficiency campaign, she said the comment was taken out of context and aimed only at former leader of the opposition, Tony Leon.
Turns out that Hansard, the parliamentary transcript, begs to differ, as Darren notes over at commentary.co.za. Note the presence in the record of interjections and laughter elsewhere, and their conspicuous absence at the point at which Tony Leon supposedly asked a question that prompted her response.
And these are the people we look to for principled leadership? These are the people that don’t deserve to be dismissed, because they said sorry? These are the people who will solve the electricity crisis they say we caused by growing our economy faster than they expected (albeit slower than government’s targets)?
When your leaders get snappy at the media, and feel absolutely nothing about lying to you, isn’t it time to get angry? Isn’t it time to turf them out?
Yes, and yes.
So I’m already angry. Now how do I go about turfing them out?
Dunno. Join the communist party and lead a revolution?
No, seriously, just convince enough people not to re-elect the incompetent liars. I don’t really care who they do vote for, and I don’t expect miracles, but if this debacle doesn’t cost the ANC a large slice (say, 15%) of its electoral support in the 2009 election, I’ll be very disappointed in my fellow South Africans.