Voters are growing weary of leaders who preach transformation while living far removed from the daily hardships faced by ordinary South Africans.
The real cost of our democracy lies in the price tag put on the political powers who are bought and sold daily, as if they are cattle being readied for a dowry.
Political players may say on the electioneering stages how the rot runs deep, how heads will roll.
They will tell of the disdain they hold for the looters of state coffers, singing from the hymn sheet about stopping the rot by removing the corrupt from the seats of power and taking back the powers they may yield.
I refuse to be led by men and women in beautifully tailored expensive suits who reek of nothing but thievery.
In the midst of this, a political figure that yields seemingly unregulated power, Gwede Mantashe, utters words that are devoid of meaning for the layman.
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Reeking of classist ridicule to the very voters who elevated him to the seat of power, he spews the disdain which he is emboldened enough to say out loud.
I’m not too concerned with the whys, as much I am concerned with the morality of the entire situation.
The ANC screams from the rooftops, together we can do more, let’s do it for the Mandela-Sisulu legacy, while failing to read the elephant in the room.
If it’s not a secretary-general arriving in luxury at the party’s congress, it is now the national chair, basically calling the unemployed lazy.
We are a country under siege by those we have put into power.
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They sold us a dream, we bought the dream and are left with the ruins, in the form of a nightmare of a failing economy, ill-gotten gains and an executive Cabinet that answers to not a single figure of judicial authority.
I cannot attest to the good or bad character of our political leaders, but I can say an inability to identify with your people is not a good look.
While many political leaders across parties have made remarks that leave much to be desired, it never stops shocking the voters who put their faith in them.
Such statements reveal a troubling emptiness of empathy toward the people who hinge their hopes for a better life on our leaders.
Many are now disillusioned, yet some still cling to the hope that change might be delivered by these leaders, who claim to have given them the tools to go fishing, only to point to polluted grey water flowing from a squatter camp.
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For Mantashe, this was unexpected, suggesting that why he can’t meet voters halfway is because he believes he has already done enough for them already.
