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By Kekeletso Nakeli

Columnist


South Africa is a nation distracted

As Eugene Khoza said, South Africans can be be oblivious to subjects that matter. We are distracted by anything vaguely a fad.


The unfortunate truth about South Africans is our ever-constant allergy to the truth. We are so adamant that our truth needs to be painted with fairy dust.

It has to be aesthetically and verbally pleasing. Thus leaving us in contrast to the reality of our everyday lives, shocked at the real version of existence because we are still living our best lives.

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Eugene Khoza went on Podcast and Chill with words carefully constructed, but accurately summed up. He reminded us that South Africans are oblivious to subjects that matter.

We are distracted by anything vaguely a fad, things that will not matter three years from now take up so much space. Yet the most important things that can help to rebuild the land of our dreams are of no consequence.

He referenced dance crazes as a more debatable topic than the rand manipulation, for example. So much wrong, yet ignored because we are meant to be happy people.

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Now people fight back and, without fail, have so many ways and means to explain away the ignorance of our people.

All the while, nations have survived Covid and, after it, went on rebuilding not just the folly of the day, but continued to rebuild their countries, economies and industries.

People have moved past the pandemic and are not using it as an excuse to be distracted from the order and business of the day.

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People will talk about how political parties do not take them seriously. But have we ever looked and seen that we are gullible to these parties because they know that distraction is easy because the crowd has been figured out?

When they complain, they get food hampers. When they try to complain about the quality of the hampers, we throw in a semi-naked artist and make the people dance… thereafter, all is forgotten.

We have been that gullible… But when someone articulates well enough, to be absorbed, our people see it as an attack on “anything different”. What an incorrect take on such an important topic of discussion.

The truth is that South Africans are allergic to the truth, especially when the truth is simply saying we need to focus on what really matters.

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