Of brickbats and bouquets – we state our case

To paraphrase Johnny Castle in Dirty Dancing, ‘traditionally I have always done the last dance of the summer show’, The Bowman gets to write the last column contribution of 2017 and will take the opportunity to do a bit of Harvey Thomas in dishing out bouquets and brickbats.
When in this kind of position, you are allowed to do this because you have sucked up a lot of dirt during the year and this is the chance, to paraphrase this time Die Rot, to ‘wash one’s mouth out’.
Brickbats go to:
The bunch at the municipality and on the Housing Committee who somehow ended up allocating RDP houses to friends, family and the politically connected instead of to the needy who have been waiting for a new house ever since FW changed the rules in February 1990.
To those people, also in the Kremlin, involved in corruption as per the forensic audit ordered by COGTA – the bunch who monitor municipalities in KZN.
To the police officers who say they need airtime to call other police stations on a landline – really?
To the party-poopers who continue to make a mess and leave a mess after days of weekend partying in Coronation Park.
To the vandals who damage street signs for no apparent reason. Same goes for those bottom feeders who break into places of worship and damage and steal.
To all the rude customers who give people in the hospitality industry a rough ride just because they believe the customer is always right.
Wrong.
To all those people who organised events that never started on time and to the special guests who thought it was just fine to stuff everyone around and arrive one and a half hours late. Wrong. You are not professional, just poor.
To those who think that their egos are too big for this place – you are probably right – feel free to leave.
Bouquets
To that friendly guy at the SAVF Home in Glencoe – Sandile – what a pleasure to see a beaming face so happy to be of help.
To the bowlers, Greg and company, who broke the SA record for playing continuous bowls – what an achievement and what a nice bunch of folk.
To people like Charl, Mr Zulu, Lucky and many others at the municipality who do their bit to help everyone – well done. The town needs you.
To those who generously donated clothing, food and more to the Knysa fire victims – what wonderful hearts our people have.
To Koos and his bikers who are forever willing to go the extra mile to ride and help raise donations for toys for needy children over Christmas and to Assie who never fails to be a Father Christmas who does not need a false beard…
To Shaheer Joosub and his ICE Foundation – forever thinking of others – when it is back to school time (giving out stationery to needy kids, over Eid, Mandela Day and during Christmas).
To Preshu who has done more than most to bring to justice more than a few fleeing criminals over the past year.
So in the New Year lets hope for more bouquets than brickbats, more smiles than frowns, more consideration less egos, more fun less stress.
And if all fails, light up a Camel, this is the promised land.