1. Studying president Zuma's speech at the ANC's birthday celebrations on January 8 one is struck by all the positive things envisaged for the future. The poor discipline and factionalism which have been tearing the movement apart and which paralized the leaders will be eradicated. Ons should be encouraged by all his noble sentiments , but one remains despondend because these are pipedreams. The factions in the party will continue with their agendas , spending more time on infighting than working for the benefit of the country. The culture of using positiions to enrich oneself has become institutionalised in the party and won't go away either.
2. The National Development Plan ( NDP ) which is being bandied about left and right has also little chance of success judging from the ANC's track record. Their inability to even maintain existing infrastructure does not bode well for building on a massive scale . Many projects have failed or became overly expensive because of bad planning, allocating tenders to friends and family and other corrupt practices.
3. Their plans to transform the education system which is in total disarray have little chance of success with the same as well as tens of thousands of incompetent teachers with low word ethics and protected by SADOU.
4. Fighting rampant crime which is high on their list of priorities is also a problem because it has to be done by a police force which is more than adequate in numbers but lacking in competence , leadership and quality because of its badly selected and poorly trained members .Corruption and criminality have also become serious problems in the force and they have lost the confidence of those they are supposed to serve. Their investigations are so poorly done that even when they catch the criminals redhanded , cases are often thrown out on technicalities or because of lack of evidence costing millions without results.
5. The ANC's plans to boost the economy and creating jobs on a large scale will not come to much either. They will have to relax the draconic labour laws and Cosatu will not allow that.Violent strikes resulting in loss of life and destruction of property like we have seen recently at the mines and all over the Boland farming area , will have to stop because it benefits nobody and lead to job losses and ill will between owners and workers.The farmers also stand to lose markets and investors are frightened off. The goverment shows no will to stop this anarchy.
6. President Zuma's promise that transfer of land to blacks will be a focal point this year and that the process will be speeded up , was received enthusiastically by the audience , but judging from the few successes this far and the billions that have been spent with little to show for it , one should not be blamed for being sceptical. Will the same commissioners who messed up the process thus far be used again and will the 90 percent failed farms be made profitable before new ones are allocated and where will the money come from ? These questions require answers but the president is short on particulars.
Cyril Ramaphosa's election as vice-president is a positive event and will help to turn some of the talk into action but he is only one person and there is much to be done.
FINIS !
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