EDITOR – Being activists in South Africa is not an easy task. Although our activism is very much in the civic arena, as committed and positive South Africans, we cannot keep to a narrow focused agenda. We trawl the depths of corruption and ineptitude and are more prone to being privy to the ills of our society. It is depressing stuff and even working through the daily press hardly leads to a good start to the day. However, The Mercury 18 December gave us hope – two excellent editorials. The first summed up the problems in our country with amazing accuracy. The acknowledgement that race is a critical part of the debate, but not the only part of the debate was followed by highlighting the real issues facing us, being poverty, joblessness and despair. Unless all citizens, regardless of their race, accept that we still have a hard road to travel in bridging the gap of inequality, we are doomed, regardless of how bad, our President, elected officials and civil servants may be.
The second editorial, gives us hope in that you nominate Myanmar, as your country of the year. Like South Africa in 1994 they have moved from dictatorship to democracy in an unlikely change, which could not have been predicted a few years ago. South Africans however, can tell them from our own experience in this country, that they have only won the first round. It is so easy to slip back to a dictatorship.
The financial page saw an upturn in the JSE, mainly due to the US interest hikes, but that double-edged sword saw the rand fall, and the task given to Gordhan to right the ship, after Zuma’s mindless sabotage of the economy, is not an easy one. Then as if to add to a more positive start to the day, guest columnist, Douglas Gibson summed it up with a comment that the death rattle we hear, is that of the Presidency, not that of the country.
The leader page today was also positive despite the bad news of recent times and other stories of education corruption, SAA, Snowy Smith and the influence of the Guptas. The way forward is activism by all of us. Students are on the march, corruption has become enemy number one, and the middle classes are stirring and speaking out. Your challenge to all of us to correct the inequalities in this country is crucial. Unless we do so, and make povertyandunemploymentmustfall our main goal, then the notion of a Rainbow Nation will all have been in vain.
Kevin Dunkley
Cheryl Johnson
SAVE OUR BEREA
