“Nothing is impossible if you put your mind to it.” These are the words from #MusaMotha, the Britain’s Got Talent golden ticket winner who reminded us, as a nation, how tenacious we can be.
This guy danced up a storm on that stage. This despite, no not despite, being on crutches and performing on one leg. If you haven’t seen the video, take a breather, stop reading and watch it now.
I’m Tonya Khoury and this is this week’s Acumen Media Report. I can’t promise you golden tickets but I’ll just scratch the surface of a mixed bag of media and bad acts.
I lost my breath when I read that the legendary talk show host, Eusebius McKaiser, had passed away. I often used to scream at my radio when he was on air. I loved him. I hated loving him. He made me open my mind and recognise that systemic racism was alive and well and … in most instances, he was right.
Well, except for those those times I turned off the radio. I’m gutted, as is the media fraternity. But his legend and the big noise he created will live on, even if his life has been cut short. We will miss you always #EuB.
#Putin dominated headlines as he was granted diplomatic immunity for the #BRICS summit. There are even billboards across Johannesburg urging our President to arrest the warlord. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, if the West wants #Pootin so badly, then they should send Interpol to arrest him. If this meeting is going to cause a war or get us into even more financial trouble, can we please use Zoom?
The story is also weird, BRICS is so popular now that Europe wants to join, so let them… and they can arrest this guy. Seeing that they are the ones that have been sending arms to his enemies. And no, we didn’t send arms, good people, we owe Putin a great deal of dosh so we have no choice but to bow down to him. We can’t take down our rotten leadership let alone someone else’s. Why are we the lucky winners of this not-so-golden ticket?
A great deal of reflection
I have done a great deal of reflecting this week and there’s good news and there’s obviously bad news. Here’s the good news: we don’t have #ACEBestos anymore, we also don’t have #BalekeMbete, #DDMabuza, #NkososanaDlaminiWhenPeopleZolZuma, #LindiweSisulu #NomvulaMokanyane, #DuduMyeni or #ZweliMkhize. That’s pretty good isn’t it?
It would be awesome, like #GoldenTicket awesome, if this was done at lightning speed instead of the snail pace we’ve been watching. Deliberate sloth, that’s our Cupcake, dense and slow moving, but also pretty determined. Look, I agree, he has filled his little black book up to the brim, and made more personal business moves than #MusaMotha can do on a stage and his #BudgetVote was not golden ticket stuff. In fact, the #BudgetVote was boring and uninformative.
He said we should prepare for a cold and difficult winter. As if the seasons are the problem. Perhaps in Siberia, but the problem, my dear country, is pure greed. Cheque book, credit card, more money than a sucker can ever spend. I think the President, and I may be wrong, has teed up #UncleGwede #puzaFace and #Bheki #LeaveYourHatOn #Cele as next in line on the silent assassin’s list.
Just fire them already #Ramatress, we’ve run out of time. Our audience is frothing and you’re on the precipice of failure. You said: “We will overcome”; we are not the people who are involved here, you better overcome, and quickly too, because your snail’s pace has left us with lightning speed destruction. #BadActToFollow.
uBaba’s tax records
#Concourt made a massive judgement in the #Zuma case, ruling that uBaba must release his tax records. That was huge, and I’d be giving them a standing ovation, except, Concourt are the ones who ordered Zuma to prison, so I’ll just give a slow clap.
What else? are you ready? It’s not fun and you’d probably put an X through these stories rather than pushing the #XFactor button. #DrNandi, if you’re still watching this nonsense, hired big gun lawyers to defend herself. The court case was so boring, but the short story is she said she was kidnapped from Tanzania and shouldn’t even be here. Look I get her point, the Guptas never got a jet and a blindfold, and they did far worse.
But here you are, Nandi, a pawn to #Thabo and a pawn to the media. All parties were denied bail apart from #Natasha, who appears to be in the room for nothing at all apart from doing her job. This story, my friends, is utter rubbish, stop watching it because it is nothing more than another distraction from the actual inaction destroying our country.
A true national shutdown
We are surrounded by #cholera; we have no electricity as #Stage7 and 8 are now in our vocabulary; in fact the words #GridCollapse crosses our lips often. Not just ours, but also the SA Reserve Bank as they prepare for a true national shutdown. #Eskom posted a R21-billion loss, imagine? The very same Eskom that paid 934 000 for knee pads and 238 000 for a mop. Why is this allowed? Is this just a plot to unseat #Gwede? If so, my word we have overspent on our budget and we have taken the Michael mouse out of the golden ticket. Is there anything left for a bucket?
#JohnBlock, that name sounds familiar. Well, he’s in jail for 15 years on corruption charges. But that’s not why you remember him, you remember him because #LindiweMedusaSisulu went to visit him not so long ago and that made huge headlines. Today he is facing a further R51-million tender fraud charge. Makes sense now, doesn’t it? #GoldenTicket and a very bad act.
Veteran actor #PatrickNdlovu passed on. He will be missed by #YizoYizo fans. There are many other stories as this week was a bit like a bag of #liquoriceAllsorts. We paid R47-million for 100 water tankers. Only 38 out of 257 municipalities got a clean audit, that’s 15%. That’s appalling and we shouldn’t stand for it, but we just wait for the judges to push their buttons as we watch on, bewildered.
Dineo (another radio personality) is finally in hospital for her mental health. Why don’t we recognise that the brain is just another organ in the body that can also get sick? #BustThatMyth. #Majodina is embroiled in bribery allegations with the #PublicNeglector, but this case is a road to nowhere; the PP will have completed her tenure in October. Just send her home. And leave us alone. We’re here for the golden ticket not a bad act.
Let’s not talk about crime stats
I don’t want to talk about the crime stats this week, they are sickening, and you’ve been through enough bad acts to finally get to your Musa Motha. Here’s another ingenious South African, a school student is selling vetkoek at R8 per serving at #Curro Schools. The average price is two bucks, but hey, this is private school. Hats off to him, he’s making a fortune and the kids are loving it.
Across the pond, Elon wants to plant a device in our brains; Uganda implemented the death penalty for #LBGTI and Erdogan definitely got the golden ticket in Turkey. The sheer volume of people in the images after the election show that this guy, as much as the West hates him, is truly loved by his countrymen. #GoldenTicket.
That’s my wrapping shredded, you’ve tripped the light fantastic, but only on the dance floor and scratched the surface of the news this week. Thank you for doing it with me.
