Stop ignoring truths and facts in run-up to election

Never let the truth spoil a good story, is a silly newsroom jest. But during this election campaign the determination to ignore truths is serious.

The contradictory findings of the latest Institute of Race Relations (IRR) survey provide examples, which will be considered below. First it is necessary to deal with the lie that a vote for Cyril Ramaphosa will strengthen his hand against the bad guys in the ANC.

There is no such thing as a vote for Ramaphosa in the May 8 elections. You cannot vote for him. It’s physically impossible. The system does not allow you to do so. His name will not appear on the ballot paper, even if his face does. You will be voting for a party. This truth has been repeated ad nauseam. Yet supposedly intelligent people reaffirm their determination to “vote for Cyril”.

They won’t let the truth ruin their fabrications. They twist facts to put a favourable spin on this infatuation.

Fact: instead of voting for Ramaphosa they will be endorsing a candidate list stacked with Zuptas and corrupt incompetents. Bathabile Dlamini, Nomvula Mokonyane, Malusi Gigaba and Mosebenzi Zwane are unfit. Their legal and ethical troubles don’t have to be retold. You know enough.

Deputy President David Mabuza is dangerously poised at number two, while former president Jacob Zuma’s proxy, Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma is in the top 10.

How can there be a new dawn when the ANC is represented in parliament by flawed Zuma loyalists such as Faith Muthambi, David Mahlobo, Tina Joemat-Pettersson, and former North West premier Supra Mahumapelo?

Each has a case to answer. All this is glossed over by those who won’t let anything interfere with their Ramaphosa delusions. There are none so blind as those who will not see. Or, as Simon and Garfunkel sang in The Boxer, “A man hears what he wants to hear and disregards the rest”.

Don’t let the facts interfere with your opinion. Fact: Ramaphosa is complicit in all South Africa’s major travails in recent times, including the rolling blackouts euphemistically called load shedding.

Ramaphosa chaired the ANC’s national deployment committee from 2013 to 2017, before handing over that role to dodgy Mabuza. To this day, Ramaphosa champions cadre deployment, even though it was at the core of state capture. Indeed, rolling blackouts exemplify the toxic confluence of cadre deployment and state capture.

As Sara Gon wrote last year: “There are hundreds of examples that reflect failed cadre deployment, including Marikana; the Scorpions; Eskom; SAA; SABC; the 93% of municipalities which have qualified audits; our rotting water infrastructure; the fact that only one of 394 state hospitals function properly; neglect of duties, sexual harassment and incompetence in schools; the commissions of inquiry into Sars, state capture and now the PIC”.

If you vote for Ramaphosa, believing he is a change agent, you are in denial. Much like ANC supporters – 70% of whom, despite dissatisfaction with the party’s performance in promoting growth, generating jobs, fighting crime and corruption, think their party is “good at governing”, according to the latest IRR survey.

But don’t let the facts interfere …

Martin Williams, DA councillor.

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