Zulu president not a solution - Buthelezi
2013-03-21 17:42
Durban - Having a Zulu man run the country does not mean it would be done any better, IFP president Mangosuthu Buthelezi said on Thursday.
"It pained me to see our people blindly believe that government would be better administered under President Zuma simply because he is a Zulu," Buthelezi told residents of Nkandla, KwaZulu-Natal, at a Human Rights Day gathering.
"They were obsessed with the idea that things would improve just because the president is one of our sons and comes from the Zulu community. But it doesn't work that way."
Last year the Inkatha Freedom Party won the Nkandla ward from the African National Congress in a by-election, when its councillor Thembinkosi Francis Nxumalo secured 54.99% of the vote. Zuma's homestead is in Nkandla.
Buthelezi said Zuma, as ANC leader, had to implement policies.
"And why would ANC policies that we couldn't accept before suddenly be more palatable [when] served up by a Zulu?" he asked.
"Can you honestly say there has been a marked improvement in your plight; that things are better under President Zuma than they were under president [Nelson] Mandela or president [Thabo] Mbeki?"
Nation in crisis
Buthelezi said the ruling party had overplayed its hand by refusing to listen to the people.
"The ANC has disrespected your voice and your needs one time too many, and the blinkers are off. No matter how they want to spin it, the ruling party has failed you."
He said SA was a nation in crisis, as millions remained unemployed and suffered from hardships and disease.
"The ANC is a little hard of hearing. They only really listen to the results of the ballot box."
Buthelezi said the 1960 Sharpeville massacre had repeated itself at Marikana, where police shot dead 34 miners in August last year.
Buthelezi said the first voter registration for the 2014 election opened in eight months.
"That gives us time, but just enough time, to grow the IFP's support base to a point where the IFP emerges victorious in 2014. It will mean that we can finally set things right in our country and get back on course toward true moral regeneration and leadership integrity."
- SAPA
