Smoke, mirrors and teaspoons

On a hot, smoke-filled night in December, a young petrol attendant and I stood in the darkened forecourt of a garage near Simon’s Town and watched the apocalyptic fury of the wildfire racing across the slopes above town.

The young man, who will remain anonymous for fear of reprisals, seethed with frustration.

“We are a rich country,” he said, “but all they can do is bring two choppers with their teaspoons of water.”

In the US, he said, they have a Boeing 747 that can extinguish a fire in one go. He’s not entirely correct — there was indeed a Boeing supertanker that could carry 66,000l of water to a fire, against the 1,000l carried by the Huey helicopter water bombers — but it would not have been much use in this rugged terrain. Still, you get his drift.

“Two teaspoons,” he said. Then: “T’sek. I’m not going to vote.”

Not for him, then, the streets of Mbombela painted black, green and gold. Not the ponderous speeches or sharply dressed party royalty. And probably not the party standard-bearer, flying the ANC flag off the rear fender of his (expensive) 1,800cc cruiser, his German-army-style helmet glinting in the Mpumalanga sun, and as tone-deaf an image as one could imagine. 

Some bikers love those helmets because they reckon they make them look as badass as the chopper-riding, hard-living denizens of a 1960s biker gang. In truth, these helmets are, as Takealot primly notes, “a novelty item”. In short they are only for show (and what a message they send!) but will do nothing to protect your pip in the event of a spill. 

As novelty items go, they’re a bit like the ANC’s plans, as announced by Cyril Ramaphosa, for a “comprehensive Foundation Course as part of the revival of a nationwide political education programme”, along with the “Branch Functionality Audit”, so the branches may connect “dynamically” with the hopes and wishes of their communities. Only, the helmets offer more protection.

Number One’s speech was rich in what “we” must do without going into the necessarily gritty and unpleasant details of how we are going to solve the electricity crisis, reduce murders, bring sanitation to the 30% who don’t have it and otherwise fulfil that most basic of propositions in the Freedom Charter — there shall be houses, security and comfort.

Then again, the big birthday bash wasn’t really about detail. It was about flying the flag, a few hearty guffaws, a chance for the rank-and-file to see those who are ruling them while pretending at the same time that everything is on track when even the criminally deluded can see it is not.

Two teaspoons of water? And so did Rome burn.