GARETH VAN ONSELEN: Baleka Mbete’s hypocritical poison
Like so many in the ANC, the speaker confuses position with ability; having a molten core helps her in this regard
"I don’t have time to stand in queues." That was what Baleka Mbete said in October 1996, after her testimony before the Moldenhauer Commission had been found to be so threadbare and contradictory as to border on fantasy. It captures perfectly the arrogance that defines Mbete. She sweats conceit. The commission had been set up to probe the issuing of fake drivers licences in Mpumalanga, a racket from which Mbete had personally benefited. And she had skipped more than just a queue. The Sunday Times reported there was no record of her test; that the licence issued to her had been certified the night before she took the test and been issued in Kabokweni, some 350km away from where she allegedly passed her examination, in Delmas. During her testimony, Mbete said of the test, "It was basically just driving around town, stopping at robots and moving through busy traffic to see if I could control the vehicle." There were, however, no robots in Delmas at the time. If there had been, you get ...
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