The #MadlangaCommission was lit this week and there was great interest from a nation baying for justice in a courtroom. Ironic how we wish for justice in the one place made to deliver it.
Warrant Officer Karl Sander took the stand and we learnt about #OneGoodCop. This guy has a forensic lab in the boot of his car, from swabs to nick tests; he’s pedantic, case files are logged with great accuracy and crime scenes are secured like Fort Knox, (well that’s a euphemism, I’m not sure there actually is gold in Fort Knox).
Missing exhibits
Exhibits go missing around Warrant Officer Sander. He said it was commonplace as large quantities of drugs and seized weapons vanish without a visible trace. His coffee machine got nicked among all the theft and thuggery. He called his coffee machine, his “safe space” and can’t we all relate? The coffee machine was stolen and then they polygraphed him for the theft of his own safe space. It was the giddy limit, as my gran would say.
In June 2021 over half a ton of cocaine was seized in Isipingo. By November the whole lot had disappeared. It wasn’t the first time “exhibits disappeared” from this particular spot. In fact, Warrant Officer Karl’s recollection is that this was the eighth time he could remember.
Even though he was on leave at the time when the 500kgs of coke disappeared, poof, he was still accused of theft. He was polygraphed and was never told what the outcome was. He was bullied by a toxic administration of dodgy cops surrounded by white powder.
Sander learnt this week that the polygraph was inconclusive and that he certainly had been exonerated from the list of punked up thieves. He’s eyes filled with tears that pricked his cheeks as his face flushed and he pushed his lips a bit tighter together. This is what vindication looks like for #OneGoodCop.
K9 narcotic dogs
South Africans took to social media. We all agree that your hot drink at work certainly takes the edge off and so began a #BackABuddy campaign to replace Karl’s coffee machine. It was a bit of fun and endearing at first and then the money went from thousands to tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands.
South Africans rallied behind this man, some begging for him to be president. Warrant Office Stander did not disappoint. He thanked South Africa for the coffee machine and told us that he promised the rest of the money would go towards buying K9 drug dogs.
That will fox them. Well done W/O Sanders. It can be done, you can pin down a crime scene, take a polygraph and be bullied for years and then in a minute you become a national hero. That’s karma, isn’t it. #OneGoodMan
His testimony was followed by his boss and his boss’s boss’s testimony, Lt Col Jacobs and Major General Senona. We’re not done with Senona but #Jacobs got his behind handed to him with Madlanga calling him a ‘liar’ as he caught him time and time again.
All rubbish
He changed his statement every couple of minutes, feigned English illiteracy and said: “I didn’t mean that” or “that wasn’t the right word to use”. It was all rubbish obviously and following Sanders, he was always going to be on the back foot. The place is rotten chaps, chuck it out and start again. Use #OneGoodCop
The thing with Madlanga is, this could go on for years, like #ZondoCommission. What will happen? We will note the one good set of judges and no one will get prosecuted or go to jail. Wrong! This commission actually has teeth.
Brown Mogotsi, the political fixer, was denied bail as he did not have a fixed address so they left him behind trallies. Disgraced cop Fannie Nkosi’s bail appeal was denied; he faces charges of theft, defeating the ends of justice, and possession of explosives/ammunition.
Four senior police officials were suspended over the irregular awarding of a multi-million rand police health management contract to Medicare24. Sotheni was denied bail in the murder of whistleblower Marius van der Merwe (Witness D). He faces 16 charges including premeditated murder and was ruled a flight risk. It is slow and selective but justice, albeit cold, is being served to some.
Stalingrad V2
And what of cupcake, I hear you say: His impeachment process is going well as he takes not a leaf but a whole tree out of Zuma’s book playing Stalingrad Stalingrad. The impeachment committee elected Gana to head it up, he’s from Rise Mzansi who is part of the GNU and we all know what a beast the GNU is. Watch this space for #OneBadPresident.
And then this story, which irritated the life out of me: Boomerang Liam Jacobs. You seek him here, you seek him there … three political parties in as many years. This guy took a trip to Israel and came back saying there was no genocide or apartheid.
Of course he took the cash, and then ended up with Gayton. Gayton did a Facebook live with the words “kom op, kom op, kom op” encouraging live viewers on his Facebook page to join as he announced that #BoomerangJacobs had come home because coloureds must stick together mos!
This week Liam took to Facebook live and did his own “kom op” this time with Geordin Hill-Lewis lurking in the background and a “surprise” when Liam returned like the prodigal son to the DA. #OneBadPolitician has made his way from the ANC to the DA to the PA and now back to the DA. Sigh. So many parties, no one to vote for.
Original news hound
There’s much more that happened here at home but it’s all political and my brain can’t handle the media fatigue. Today is two months since my mom passed. I’m not sure how I made it to my desk. She worried if I was strong enough to live my life without her, she was right to worry, it still seems impossible. Here I am though two months, one hour and forty-three minutes later. Still here, reading the news, watching idiots on screen that she would have been so enthusiastic to discuss.
The original news hound. That’s the goose. Always glued to the teevee and outraged by injustice. She’d be watching the World Cup with me this year, even though we both knew it was a farce we would have yelled at the screen. All this is now memory of #OneGoodWoman.
When you’re feeling blue the sea will heal you and I went to see a man about a shark and he did not disappoint me. Twenty large oceanic black tips circling us, each one completely spatially aware of our presence. And then he appeared; you see the remoras first, they are white so easier to spot and then comes the giant himself, the bull shark.
The headline act
Skittish but curious, I followed him down and he turned in front of me over and over again. #OneBigFish. I am still alive. It feels a lot different, but I’m here and I’m showing up. Thank you for bearing with me.
So, I’ll skip the whole #BafanaBafana horror and just tell you that they all finally made it to the country that hates them the most unless they’re white then they love them the most. That’s a good segue to talk about Trump’s car race. It’s ’Merica’s 250th birthday, with farcical failure to put on a concert.
Trump found that all acts bailed on him except for Kid Rock who knows how his bills are paid. Trump decided he’d be the headline act. I’m serious. There’s no end to the narcissism. Shortly after this guffaw he announced the Freedom 250 Grand Prix that would be held in Washington DC and an ad campaign went up saying: “One Nation, One Race.”
Of course, the ad was all in white, with a white driver poised like the Lincoln Memorial statue. Trump has had a doozy of a week, saying a ceasefire is when you don’t use that much fire power as before and it doesn’t actually mean you cease fire.
Talking about the pool
He said this while trying to explain away why Lebanon is looking a lot like Gaza. Why he had a fight with #SatanBigYahoo. All the while Palestinians have been told that they will be forcibly expelled or arrested from Gaza as the ethnic cleansing commences. Iran is standing firm while Trump continues to negotiate with himself and the price of fuel is taller than the pool he is building at the Lincoln Memorial.
I’ve got to talk about this pool. I choose this story and not the story of the American senate coming together for the first time to stop Trump in Iran. Democrats and Republicans actually bandied together; how does it feel to have a common enemy Merica?
Right, back to this pool. It was originally a “reflecting pool” at the Lincoln Memorial. Ah the irony! Trump holds a presser where he pulls out an infographic of the proposed new pool that will be painted blue like the American flag. He didn’t mention that the cost for the refurbishment was scoped (by his mate, obviously in a closed bid) which has started out costing $2 million but is now a whopping $13 million. Not only that, it’s not finished and is way past deadline. Sound familiar.
Anyway in the presser he pulls up this poster of the new pool visually compares the length of the Reflecting Pool (2,030 feet / approx. 620 metres) against the heights of major US skyscrapers like the World Trade Centre, Empire State building and Sears Tower.
Buildings on their side
The infographic uses side-by-side visuals to illustrate that if you “laid the buildings on their side,” it was the tallest pool in America. The tallest. Yes you read that right. He also said that was an understatement because no one had considered the width which was almost 200 feet so it would take two or three Empire States to compare to the “tallest pool”.
He said he was doing it “make it beautiful again”. MIBA? He then posted AI-generated images of himself and Cabinet members (including himself, shirtless) relaxing in the new blue pool. His tag line: Our Pool is Bigger than Skyscrapers. #OneMadMan
There are other stories like the farce that is Ebola. These guys are playing with our lives man. Albanian land is being sold to Trump’s family notice any patterns here? And there was the UK Reform party’s “White Lives Matter”. I got my passport renewed, where on earth would I go?
Thank goodness my ocean is bigger than Trump’s pool. A generous ocean that doesn’t ask for anything back. I’ll be living in it this weekend. Stay safe South Africa, try to be #OneGoodPerson.
I’m Tonya Khoury and thank you for scratching the surface with me and Acumen Media.
