Nothing seems to be on the right track. The tail is wagging the dog. I had referred previously to this phrase. It had me a bit bamboozled initially, but after serious thought I worked out the significance and deliberateness of the six words.
We, my fellow South Africans, are being subjected to this scenario on a daily basis and because it has been going for such a long period, it has become the norm.
It has become the way we South Africans live life here… from day to day, without complaint and without any recourse to repairing the bind.
That is, unless the complaint is reinforced with burning tyres and a stone barrier on the road – nothing will change.
To backtrack, to explain the phrase. We, as the consumer, have rights. We have rights due to our Constitution and the fact that we upstanding citizens pay for services – unless you are a delinquent payer.
If you are delinquent it means you are getting services for free, at the expense of the rest of us who are paying. So, here specifically on the South Coast, water supply is an issue and here the tail of the dog is regulating the supply of water to the body of the dog.
So, instead of us paying our way and getting good service and making sure we always have water, because our money pays for maintenance, upgrades and salaries – the situation has been turned back on us. Now the tail takes the money. Spends it unwisely. Does no maintenance or upgrades and therefore restricts how the body of the dog enjoys its life.
I pay more for the tap at the bottom of my garden, which is becoming an ornament, than for the water I use each month. Of course, this is if and when potable water is flowing through the pipes to my taps courtesy of our supplier. What irks people is when their intelligence is being underestimated.
Don’t do that because that is not the way to win friends. For instance, one break in supply will have four different reasons from the control room as to the cause. Come on! One almost wants to laugh at them when control room supplies the reply to a query about non-supply?
Maybe they should be taken on an orientation tour so they actually know how the system is meant to function. However, in closing, anyone who has had multiple dealings with councils, will realise this malaise has infected the whole service delivery network.
The tale has become a tale of service decline, administrative decay and chronic failure to deliver.
Can it get any worse? You can ruminate on that, while waiting for the water to come back. Ho hum!
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