'Mbeki's chief crime denialist'

2007-02-08 19:08

Cape Town - Democratic Alliance leader Tony Leon suggested on Thursday that some leaders of big business in South Africa were as cowardly and mean spirited as their apartheid-era predecessors.

This was in the light of the pressure brought to bear by Business Leadership SA on First National Bank not to go ahead with a planned anti-crime campaign, which included 2.8 million pamphlets with attached envelopes addressed to President Thabo Mbeki.

In his weekly newsletter, published on the DA's SA Today website, Leon said it was strange that during a crime crisis that saw 51 South Africans murdered every day, some would deny such a crisis existed.

"Curiously, the organisation of big business which was behind the pressure on FNB to pull its message to the president gives itself the title 'Business Leadership SA'.

"Whether they actually practise bold leadership, or rather some curious form of government-approved 'followship', is perhaps the big question.

"What is indisputable is that the bulk of big business leadership in the old South Africa was perhaps as craven as business leadership appears to be in the new SA," he said.

Mbeki's 'denialism' about SA crime

Leon also criticised Mbeki for what he called his "denialism" about crime being out of control in South Africa.

"As we saw on TV the other night, the president stated that most South Africans did not share the perception 'that crime was out of control'.

"And when the denialist-in-chief is also the chief-of-state, then, as the movie says, 'Houston, we have a problem'," he said.

- SAPA