Living in South Africa is an extreme sport

We have to be too strong and resilient for our own good sometimes.

Those are not my words but those of a friend and colleague who works in Cape Town. She was talking about how load shedding had impacted her ability to study, but the hard truth is that living in South Africa takes its toll on all of us.

From load shedding to crook politicians and businesses, crime and the threat of kidnappings, hijackings and armed robbery, to people stealing copper cables which hurts the very communities they live in, back to politicians with their endless coalition demands.

Those are just a microdot of the external pressures on us.

The collapsing job market means less people contributing to the economy. So, Jan Tax, with all his mercy, takes a heftier cut from everyone, even those who are unemployed.

Minister of Clowns Fikile Mbalula says population growth is hurting us. He’s not wrong, but, my man, Stats SA has been putting out midyear estimates for decades, you’ve not noticed until this week? Seriously?

How about you concentrate on fixing the galactic mess called e-tolls and please tell us why you allowed our railway system to be stripped bare.

Let’s blame people for doing what comes naturally, without acknowledging government may have screwed up while people were stuffing their faces on the gravy train.

But then we can’t pin the blame on him alone. It’s human nature to blame someone else rather than to accept responsibility for our own actions.

And the pit of money collectively known as parliament never seems to come up with any solutions to better the lives of people in this country.

Sure, there are lots of meetings and statements, but it never really feels like something is actually done.

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We hear things like South Africa is spending R303 billion annually to service debt and it “could” increase to R1 trillion over the next three years.

However, says Deputy Finance Minister David “Do my Nails” Masondo, government remains “pro-poor”.

According to him, this means “60% is made up of consolidated noninterest expenditure over the next three years”.

But from where I’m standing, it feels like government wants everyone to be poor, then there’s no problem.

It’s a simple thing Dave, the more people are working, the more people can pay tax and the less people are living below … (complete the statement, Dave).

Even the auditor-general, who holds everyone else to account, is owed “R1.085 billion … by some national and provincial departments, municipalities and statutory and other debtors”, according to the standing committee on the AG.

Limpopo water projects with no water, trains with no rails, budgets with no money, criminals who make crime pay, airlines with no planes, leaders with no leadership ability, an Eskom without electricity and, this week, a water company without water.

The list goes on ad infinitum, ad nauseam.

South Africa is an extreme sport.