Children starve as government corruption claims lives

It is difficult to get upset about corruption and the looting of government coffers, because this often appears to be a victimless crime and people cannot put a face of suffering to the numbers with endless zeroes at the end.

Today, though, as we hang our heads in shame as a country, we can point to actual human beings – and children no less – who would have been alive had it not been for the fact that so much blatant theft of taxpayer money has taken place, there was not even a pitiful amount left over to feed them.

So, they died. Of hunger.

Let’s just repeat that: this is South Africa in the 21st century, not the Sahel or Horn of Africa where devastating drought regularly claims the lives of millions of people, children included. South African children have died of malnutrition in our land of plenty.

It is no surprise that the deaths of these 116 children occurred in the Eastern Cape, one of the worst-run provinces in the country and where cadre deployment and looting are rife.

ALSO READ: 116 children died of malnutrition in Eastern Cape- SAHRC report

The SA Human Rights Commission reported also that, in the province, 27% of children suffer from growth stunting as a result of malnutrition, with black children the most affected, compared to other races.

Over the years, billions of rands have been stolen by the ANC and its hangers-on… and by their collaborators in the private sector.

While the new tender-fuelled elite pour expensive French champagne over the bodies of their “slay queens”, little children all over our country go to bed at night with empty bellies.

Some of them won’t wake up.

Blaming the crooks, however, does not absolve the rest of us from the duty to do what we can to help the less fortunate. A small monetary donation could save a young, promising, life…

ALSO READ: Half of SA population will be food insecure by 2025