I have been watching my fellow South Africans for some time, and I have to ask: when did mediocrity become our goal?
With all the laws designed to give this one, or that one a leg up, based on race (pre 1994 and now) when are we going to stop excluding huge chunks of our population from competing on a level playing ground?
How is eliminating the competition fostering excellence?
How can we ever have anything but mediocrity in our future unless we make excellence the goal? And as far as I understand it, the only way to achieve excellence is to have the person who is the very best in their field (regardless of race, creed or gender) be the benchmark for that field.
As much as we would all have liked BEE and AA to be policies that furthered the previously disadvantaged South African, it seems as though all they have done is lower the bar. To be the best, you no longer have to be the best. You simply have to be the right colour.
Which is fine, as long as you are dealing locally, but when you start to look outside our borders (and we are a part of the global village after all) even our best isn't good enough to scrape the boots of the best internationally - not because we don't possess people with the ability to be their equal, but because we are forcing people who are not capable to try and compete.
When is all the insanity going to stop? When are we going to realise that the only way to breed excellence - anywhere - is to make the best people our role models - in government and everywhere else.
As long as we use any other criteria BUT excellence when we select anybody - in government or private enterprise - we are making mediocrity our goal.
Shame on us.
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