Now why would anyone want to think South Africa is in deep crisis? If yesterday’s open letter to Jacob Zuma by Alec Hogg wasn’t enough to convince you, how about a deadly shootout between opposing police forces?

It appears there is now open warfare between the South African Police Service (SAPS) and the Johannesburg Metropolitan Police Department (JMPD). The former is the national police, run by fat-cat gangsters. The latter are a bunch of glorified traffic cops, most related to each other, who spend their days getting fat, extorting bribes, and beating up girls in bars.

Writes the Sowetan’s Mfundekelwa Mkhulisi:

Members of the South African Police Services (SAPS) fired rubber bullets during a stand-off with their Johannesburg Metro Police Department (JMPD) counterparts on the M2 Highway in Johannesburg last night.

“Metro police blocked the flow of traffic on the M2 and when police intervened they fired live ammunition and police returned with rubber bullets,” police spokesman Julia Claassen said.

The entire city centre came to a grinding halt, as bystanders fled for their lives and hid under their cars. The Times reports that a police spokeman couldn’t get to the scene, and couldn’t get a report on the gun-battle because police officers had switched off their cellphones. Its coverage, by Werner Swart and Thabo Mkhize, also says one cop may have died in the stand-off:

Protesting Metro police caused chaos yesterday when they sealed-off the Johannesburg CBD, preventing thousands of motorists from leaving the city centre and sparking a deadly clash with the South African Police Service.

The violence may have resulted in the death of one metro officer, but the SAPS were unable to confirm this last night. Seven metro officers were injured.

The clash came after hundreds of metro policemen, in full uniform, blocked access to highway on-ramps and off-ramps ringing the city last night, in protest over a salary dispute with their employer.

SAPS officers fired rubber bullets to disperse their unruly metro colleagues, said spokesman Supertintendent Eugene Opperman.

He said the metro officers returned fire with live ammunition. The police are now investigating cases of attempted murder against the metro police officers.

Terrified motorists told The Times how officers had threatened motorists and brought traffic to a standstill. At some intersections, officers used concrete bins to block the path of motorists trying to make their way home.

Here’s the Mail & Guardian Online’s take on the story:

Protesting metro police officers fired live ammunition at South African Police Service (SAPS) members in Johannesburg on Wednesday.

SAPS Gauteng police spokesperson Superintendent Eugene Opperman said the police had been forced to fire rubber bullets at metro police members who had blockaded the city, causing traffic gridlock.

Seven metro police officers — three women and four men — were injured during the police action, Opperman said.

The exchange occurred in the Eloff Street/M2 highway area.

The protests were triggered by complaints over salaries and nepotism. Strikers said they would not return to work until their grievances had been addressed.

Major roads and highways were blocked, causing traffic havoc.

Said Opperman: “The SAPS deplores the conflict-seeking type of protest by the Johannesburg metro police.

Come foreigners! Come football fans! Welcome to our fair land, and bring your euros with you! (Dollars can be exchanged for real currency or a flack jacket upon arrival at OR Tambo International Airport. Even Metro cops won’t accept dollars for bribes.)

If I were an honest cop in that department, I would resign in disgust, today, and publicly announce this fact. Anyone who doesn’t, deserves the stigma of being a Johannesburg Metropolitan Pig Thug.

More than that, this appalling behaviour calls for the immediate disbandment of the Metropolitan Police. Arrest anyone who took part in the protest, and lock them up. Make sure they never work in a position of responsibility again, lest innocent companies (such as private security firms) accidentally hire disgruntled homicidal maniacs.

The concept of a Metro police force is a good one. A national force isn’t very good at local policing, traffic management and by-law enforcement. After all, they have police commissioners to catch. But when local police start shooting at national police, something appears to be somewhat wrong. I don’t mean to whinge, you understand, or sound pessimistic, but perhaps someone over at SA Rocks can explain how else one should feel about this sort of thing, or exactly what we should do about it. Other than grin, bear it, and send Nelson Mandela birthday wishes.

I’ve sent him a wish. It read, “Sorry, Madiba, that you had to live to see this.”

You’ve got to be there, you know it. It’s one of the most prestigious tournaments on the golfing calendar. The Golf Tournament. It’s nice, because it’s not hosted. It’s not in aid of anything. It’s still sponsored by Coca-Cola, I think, but I suspect that it soon won’t be. So it’ll be like you and your mates down at your local club: totally unremarkable, except that you’ll be playing with Gary Player, Mark McNulty, John Bland and Vincent Tshabalala, and the proceeds go to buying drinks afterwards.

This is the farce that is (or rather, was) the annual Nelson Mandela Invitational, traditionally hosted by Gary Player. First, Desmond Tutu echoes a call by George Monidiot to boycott Gary Player because one of the many golf course he designed happens to be in Burma, and Monidiot supports a boycott of anyone who does business with Burma because he doesn’t like the Burmese junta. Granted, who does like that backward, murderous regime?

Gary Player has been good enough for the organisers for seven years running, so allegations about a business deal in Burma five years ago, or worse, his alleged support for Apartheid in the 1960s, really don’t wash. Now, suddenly, he’s a pariah? Besides, there are no sanctions against Burma, and there is disagreement over whether there should be. The course was built at a time when pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi had been released and things were looking more positive than they do today. South Africa just recently voted against a UN resolution to place pressure on the regime, citing some procedural nonsense for what really was teenage rebellion: “Yay, we’re on the Security Council now, so we’ll throw our new-found weight around by proving that we don’t have to vote for anything the US supports.”

Essentially, current events in Burma provided an opportunity for political grandstanding by a far-left fool who masquerades as a journalist, and a priest, and they jumped at the chance, stomping on Gary Player’s head in the process.

Three weeks ago, the Nelson Mandela Children’s Fund, which owns the event, reportedly withdrew the invitation to Gary Player, despite the flimsy grounds for the boycott call.

Now, with four weeks to go to the tournament, and the player list almost complete, it’s withdrawing. Completely. And taking its name with it. So it can officially sue, someone, whoever now organises it, for hosting this site.

It’s a disgrace. It’s arrogant bullying and grandstanding. It’s politically incompetent. It’s going to cost someone a lot of money. If this disaster turns out to reflect badly on the Nelson Mandela Children’s Fund, it has only its trustees to thank.

The comments on a recent post about Burma became a rather interesting exchange, and I promised a more detailed reply. I wrote a response to a call by George Monbiot and Desmond Tutu for a boycott of Gary Player. The commenter who raised it, Leo Africanus, took it rather personally, though I seem to recall saying his view was “interesting” and “has merit”. I also called it “a disgrace” when Nelson Mandela did decide to dump Player as host of the Nelson Mandela Invitational golf tournament.

The main point here is that Gary Player’s reputation as a defender of Apartheid isn’t relevant. He may well be a racist sod and political opportunist. As I pointed out, I’m not about to take his word for it that he isn’t. I didn’t counter Leo Africanus’s arguments in this regard because I had no intention of defending Player’s history or character.

The sole reason given for the boycott call was that he had designed a golf course in Burma in 2002, and that its use by the junta there constituted sufficient reason for Nelson Mandela to distance himself from Player. That is the point on which I disagree.

If the problem really was his reputation as a racist throwback to Apartheid, he would have (and should have) been censured years ago. Even then, it seems arbitrary to single him out when a lot of other people qualify for the same treatment, and it would be rather contrary to the spirit of reconciliation, instead of revenge, for which Nelson Mandela himself became the icon.

Ostracising Player now, on the flimsy pretext that one of the many golf courses he designed was built in Burma — at a time when the political situation there was more promising than at any other time in recent history — smacks of hypocrisy.

And when Player’s own country, South Africa, couldn’t even be bothered to join a UN vote calling on the Burmese junta to cease its repression, let alone to support sanctions against the regime, idioms about splinters and motes, pots and kettles, come to mind.

This is a disgrace. Nelson Mandela caved to pressure to tell Gary Player to get off his greens, as punishment for building a golf course in Burma five years ago, at a time when Player points out the situation had seemed to be improving, and pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi had been released from house arrest.

If this was so obviously such a bad thing, why hasn’t Player been boycotted earlier? He built the thing five years ago, after all. Plenty time to realise how vile and evil his business was, not so? In fact, why even hold the event in South Africa? After all, it was as recent as February this year that the South African government voted against a UN resolution condemning the Burmese junta’s human rights violations. And if IOL’s report is correct, the SA government itself last year doubled trade with Burma, to R35.6 billion.

I’m not going to take Player’s word for it that he’s a good guy, but picking on him seems awfully selective. If Mandela wants to be consistent, he’d have to boycott South Africa entirely.

Sean Jacobs, a South African blogger living in the US, added an interesting comment to the post about Burma under his equally interesting pen name, Leo Africanus.

In it, he calls for a boycott of Gary Player for doing business in Burma. This call, while it has merit, leaves me uncomfortable for several reasons, however. Let’s first establish the facts of the matter.

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William F. Deedes — Bill to his friends, and Lord Deedes to the rest of us mortals — has died, aged 94, after more than three quarters of a century as a working journalist, columnist and part-time politician. He filed his last copy on 3 August.

He once wrote about Nelson Mandela: “Only revolutionaries… draw reverence from their supporters. As soon as they embark on the endless adventure of governing men, they descend to earth and encounter critics.”

Mere days before his death, on 14 August, the Daily Telegraph published a letter: “Sir - May I put forward W F Deedes for Prime Minister in a Fantasy Government? What he has to say in his weekly column makes more sense than all the politicians put together.”

His own quip upon receiving copy for editing seems sadly apt: “I’m infinitely grateful. Your reward will not be in this world.” The Telegraph as a long obituary for a remarkable life.