Pound of flesh

My final prediction for next week’s election in Jozi: we end up with the same model of government as Tshwane. ANC, EFF, MK, PA, ActionSA and others. The ANC will probably hold half the MMC positions, most committees and, crucially, control over board appointments. The patronage networks survive. We’ll get a puppet mayor. Probably someone who speaks well and provides a superficial veneer of “change”. The BOSA lady or the RISE guy would be perfect for that role, and Panyaza knows it. Someone else gets the mayoral chain. The ANC keeps the machinery. I think we’re entering an even more toxic era of governance in South Africa, where the political face of a government has increasingly little to do with who controls it or where it’s heading. They’ll go online, speak beautifully and sell the illusion of progress while nothing fundamentally changes. The ANC continues to plunder the republic, and clever blacks on Twitter get their “gotcha” moment. Apparently, watching a different person explain the same collapse will count as change. I hope I’m wrong. I would be the happiest person in the world to be proven wrong. That being said, Vote Zille ffs.