June thirty was a ‘damp squid’. I always thought the phrase was a damp squid, but that’s because I wasn’t listening properly. A squid is a sea creature we get calamari from, and a squib is a firework. A squid is always damp unless it’s on your plate but a squib you would want it to be as dry as a bone. All these idioms for idiots like me that greet you at a ridiculous hour.
It’s 4am it’s dark, it’s cold and I can hear a grumpy sea outside. The wind has picked up and we’ve been promised another cold front. Not the day to light a squib or swim with a squid. We might as well scratch the surface and hang this Friday on the hook. Sealed so that I can go on leave to one of the most beautiful places in the world: The Transkei during nature’s greatest show on earth: the sardine run.
Talking about putting on a show: Well done South Africa, you showed them! I thought we might be witnessing another July Insurrection on Tuesday but no, South Africa will not be played anymore. We also witnessed a mass exodus of foreigners, specifically from Malawi and Zimbabwe.
Disgusting to watch
The number of people was enough to make headlines on international television coupled with dramatic images. Wonderful for Brand South Africa. Women gave birth on the pavement; no water and basic toilet facilities, humans being herded like animals from one pen to another, it was disgusting to watch.
Jacinta Ngobese Nog ‘n Zuma was caught off guard as social media dropped the bomb that her fellow comrades Ngizwe Mchunu and Phakel’umthakathi were found to have had a very pleasant meeting with cupcake himself on the night before the country was due to burn. Jacinta was left in the cold.
She did show us she has leadership and even some integrity in rudderless politics filled with dodgy characters. She thought she was doing South Africa a favour when actually she was just being played and the rest of the “fighters” were being paid. South Africa is a movie and I haven’t even begun to unpack this week of media mayhem.
Headlines broke, Feroz Khan was shot in an assassination attempt and fighting for his life in hospital. He was shot at around 11pm on Sunday. The time is very important. News media reports came out at about 11.10pm, he was driving a Baleno; that’s the bit that got us. I’m a major Suzuki fan but I think Khan thinks less about economical, affordable and practical reasons to purchase a car and more about the swag of the motor.
Keeping secrets
At 11.04pm that same night, Khan’s lawyers submitted an urgent application to the Commission requesting that he be allowed to testify in-camera (privately). A protective application followed immediately by a shooting? Khan’s lawyers were implying the Commission was responsible for a leak; in fact his lawyers suggested that the Commission could not keep secrets.
They didn’t stop there, they went on to say the commission was putting lives in danger and mentioned the death of Witness D, Marius van der Merwe. They just stopped short of accusing the commission of murder or manslaughter.
Madlanga’s response was a brutal thing: He called this insinuation “nebulous” and baseless. He asked: “How can you say something so vague for the whole of South Africa to hear?” He viewed the suggestion as a direct attack on the Commission’s integrity. He roasted Khan’s lawyers and they both looked like reprimanded school children after the headmaster had dished out corporal punishment.
This commission has teeth, I’ve said it before, and I think Madlanga has gone rogue. Hold that thought because I’m not done with Madlanga’s wrath. The lawyers also claimed the Commission tried to force its way into the hospital to see Khan. Madlanga denied this entirely, stating neither he nor the Commission ever authorised such a visit.
Madlanga let rip
He was frothing. Enraged, he bit back that the application for in-camera testimony no longer stood and once that was removed, Madlanga let rip. Khan and others have been trying to play the three musketeers of this commission with clever tricks in politics but Madlanga, like South Africa, saw through the ruse.
It gets better. Later in the week we learnt that apart from being free of bullet holes, Khan’s lucky Baleno held a mysterious handwritten note. The note referred to senior crime intelligence officials and stated that they should be taken to the NPA. Think that’s wild? Well, get this. The note detailed a hidden laptop in the boot of the lucky Baleno (without bullet holes).
The laptop was under the boot’s secret compartment. If you’re a Suzuki driver you know. And now dololo, the laptop is gone. I mean, seriously? Gavin Watson vibes or what? Social media went crazy, rumours that Khan was putting his feet up and eating jelly in Millpark started to circulate. Even though Khan’s lawyers invited the commission to visit him in hospital, the damage was done.
Nku and the black rimmed glasses
The commission also saw Paul O Sullivan back in the hot seat with 11 hours of testimony. He just banged on and on and on. He told us how Mkhwanazi received Louis Vutton bags. This is Nhlanhla not Julius Mkhwanazi, to be clear. Maybe his blathering made sense to others, but I can’t with that accent and all the twists and turns when he talks.
He wants us to believe that his word is enough to chuck people behind bars and that he is a national hero. The ego of this man is the undoing of him. You could mean something, Paulie, but instead you waste our airtime.
And then Nku. Side bar: what is it with the hexagonal thick black rimmed glasses, chaps? Gosh to say it’s on trend is an understatement everyone is wearing egg boxes with holes painted black. Anyway, fashion aside, Nku, the hacker – remember him from last week? – he started out so confidently, didn’t he? Almost a little patronising.
Madlanga and his crew again shredded him into tiny little pieces. This week Nku said he could no longer testify as the commission had endangered his life. Madlanga told a story about his Latin teacher who told his class that by trying to translate Latin to English you make a massive story filled with words only to end up with a tiny little mouse. Squeak squeak with your all the corners of your specs mate. Bye bye now you bloody crook. I wanted to right hook the oke. I really loathed four eyes or is it six eyes or eight even. Anyway, go, gallas!
Jumping John
It’s a worry, though, because pratts like Nku will end up shutting this commission down, and that’s why I say Madlanga has gone rogue. The big guys behind this massive ring of malfeasance were expecting the commission to quake with fear as those around them get dramatically shot, killed or threatened. The truth is, that these three brave leaders have courage. Something that cannot be bought.
And then… John. Oh, my word jumping John! Hell, hath no fury like a jumping John scorned. Geordin Hill-Lewis – now pronounced Jordan. You see when you’re posh and have a private education you get to mess with normal names to the extent that we have been calling oke Gordon for about two years. What an embarrassment.
Jordy, sorry Geordy Porgie pudding and pie, made John cry and with that, John vula’d the gate on the whole sordid inside of the DA. The original apartheid Nats are still running the DA, as we learnt in a tell-all on News24, that Tony Leon’s company, Resolve, has very close relations to Starlink… any of this hitting a major bell in your head, dear readers? Tony was being pushed on John and all other DA members in key positions. There you go… Know your DA good people, never Zille and Say No to Phoney Tony.
Bring back Dina
And what of our Prez? Well apart from orchestrating or diffusing an insurrection (you decide), he did a bit of a cabinet reshuffle, I say HE did, I mean Geordin did and Ramaphoria endorsed it. The only real move cupcake made was to bring back Dina Pule. We last handled this tsotsi under Zuma where she wined and dined her lover at our expense and was subsequently sacked.
And why has she returned? Well, this time she will be taking care of DSD. What is DSD eintlik? They are the department that takes care of every single vulnerable person in our country. The unemployed, the elderly, the disabled, the beaten, the raped, the molested, the abandoned, every single one of them belong to DSD’s portfolio. The department of social development, that’s a joke. But I’m sure Dina will do just fine when we measure her against her predecessors Sisisi Tolashe and Bathabile Dlamini.
And then, and this is just weird, you know in South Africa we don’t do islamophobia, we just don’t? We don’t equate Indian people with beards to ISIS terrorists. We just don’t. We’re smarter than that. Something is off, part of this “reshuffle” brought a new deputy minister of higher education, DA’s Yusuf Cassim. Brother Yusuf came under attack as if he invented terrorism and was likely to bomb the next higher education institution rather than uplift it. Guys, we’re not buying that crap either. Tsek man, go get a real job.
I have to wrap up South Africa now but I can’t without telling you that Cat Matlala’s plea bargain was denied! I did not expect that. Is that the last of Cat’s nine lives? Well yes, I think so as his skoemfemfah (side chick) was fired. Rachel Marjeng was formally dismissed after being found guilty of serious misconduct implicating her in a R300 million SAPS tender. She is not in jail, yet. Stay tuned.
Political damp squibs
There were other big political damp squibs, Gayton and Liam’s bromance ended up as a damp squib. KwaZulu-natal Hawks head Lesetja Senona resigned, stating he wouldn’t give those bastards the satisfaction of firing him.
And then this: Jacob Zuma is back with the Guptas. This time he is donning many a rose red garland. He received blessings and prayers in a Hindu temple. Zuma said he will take South Africa back because he now has a new god’s blessing. A blessing or a massive slap in the face to Judge Zondo from a commission not dissimilar to one we are pinning our hopes on today.
uBaba played victim and said that because people didn’t “like the work” they were doing with Zuma, authorities “went after” the Guptas. He said he’s making a return. Great! Just what South Africa needs. Another 80-year-old crook with an ego and a huge family. What is it about their generation that just won’t let go? Go play with your grandkids and great grandkids, you and Zille. Horrible humans!
That’s it, finally I can end of a high note. Bafana Bafana and Germany are on the same level this World Cup: both exited the cup in round of 32 knockouts. Both came home. #BafanaBafana came back to a heroes’ welcome, I’m not so sure about the krauts.
I don’t have space for international news and I can’t even begin to unpack Trump’s new nurse and his threesome with his sons. Or that half a million Lebanese are trying to get back home to a place that is looking like, but isn’t quite, Gaza.
It’s finally time to replace my doom scrolling with the pursuit of big fish and cold water. Pray for my Goose. See you in August fam. Peace out!
I’m Tonya Khoury and thank you for scratching the surface with me and Acumen Media.
