AS PROTESTS flare up again at South African universities, the issue of free education makes it back into political debate. So far, the responses by the government and university managements have been ad hoc and haphazard. Instead of tackling the issue head-on right after 2015’s protests, the government has been plodding along. So have most university leaders.This lack of preventive governance seems to have become a trademark of our country. We have long known about the likelihood of severe droughts including the serious strain they place on water provision, yet no serious planning has taken place. On the contrary, we keep supporting mining operations, industrial agriculture, coal-fired stations and nuclear plants as if this infrastructure did not require massive amounts of water we don’t possess.We have been heading for food and energy shortages, yet obsolescence and distribution bottlenecks are not addressed. We keep investing in highly inefficient "big is beautiful" projects that ...
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