Handle insurrectionists with an iron fist

Thanks to their monitoring of social media and WhatsApp groups, the cops and the military have supposedly deployed units to potential trouble spots in KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng.

This they have now done, but were apparently unable to do in July.

And that gives rise to an interesting, albeit troubling, question about the behaviour of the ministers in our security cluster: Did they do nothing for days because they were incompetent, or because they were sympathetic to the insurrectionists and waiting to see which way the wind would blow?

The wind didn’t blow the way the plotters hoped it would, though, because the thin blue line which replaced the cops at the trouble spots was staffed by volunteers from the communities under threat.

That unity – across race, gender and social class – was clearly something that those behind the uprising (or their political sympathisers within President Cyril Ramaphosa’s own government) did not expect.

It was ordinary South Africans who saved Ramaphosa’s bacon by sending a strong message that they would not allow our hard-won democracy to be hijacked by thugs supporting the evil kleptocracy that brought us state capture and set back development by decades.

Yet, even now, there are stirrings of rebellion down in KZN, where the ANC’s provincial leadership has shown its true colours in supporting jailed former president Jacob Zuma.

That defiance should be dealt with politically by the ANC – in the strongest possible way.

Any threat of unrest – which can cost the country billions, lost lives and lost jobs – should be handled in the same way as any threat of terrorism.

And that is: With an iron fist.