LETTER: We need more powerful street protests

Notwithstanding the anti-electricity-tariff hike initiatives taken by political parties, civil society organisations and others, including court cases and marches, the nation should be  mobilised to take to the streets with a far more powerful agenda and purpose.

The electricity crisis is just one manifestation of the incompetent, corrupt governance South Africans have been subjected to for decades by an ANC government that does not hold itself accountable, exists only for the wellbeing of itself and its cadres, and has systematically destroyed so many of our institutions and enterprises that had the potential to provide the nation with a stable, peaceful and prosperous democracy.

We should be taking to the streets in our millions to insist on the immediate firing of failed, arrogant ministers such as Gwede Mantashe, Pravin Gordhan, Lindiwe Sisulu, Bheki Cele and Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma. We should demand the urgent prosecution of politicians implicated in the Zondo report and other well-publicised corruption scandals, and a credible conclusion to the president’s own Phala Phala crisis.

We should call for the immediate implementation of an electoral system that provides for a balance between proportional and constituency representation to be implemented without delay, which holds politicians accountable to the people, not party bosses. And we should demand an early general election that could recalibrate and refresh our fractured and stale political landscape.

Sadly, our frightened, neglected nation has no political or civil society lodestar powerful enough to initiate, co-ordinate and lead the societal rebellion our country needs, and we are more likely to abandon our optimistic expectations and continue to subject ourselves to our intransigent, careless, failed government and its corrupt cadres for years to come.

David Gant
Kenilworth

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