The good ones are waiting in the wings

In an ideal world, Thuli Madonsela would stand as an independent, sweep the boards and become president.

But South Africa is far from flawless and one that Thuli would give a wide berth to lead.

At one stage, Gauteng was labelled gangsters’ paradise. It no longer has that tag as gangsters are now operating throughout the country.

Taxi ranks resemble film sets for spaghetti westerns, except the corpses are real people. Farmers, instead of providing food for a burgeoning population, are being tortured and killed willy-nilly.

Murders are commonplace and no longer enjoy front-page news. Domestic violence, too, is on the increase with even married couples killing each other.

The same goes for abuse against women and children. And what Thuli will have particularly noticed are the political killings taking place almost daily. Here again, these have become commonplace and hardly raise an eyebrow.

Think of the UK for a moment. An MP was killed by a terrorist recently so let’s compare the response to the lone killing with the dozens that take place here.

Almost immediately, a public memorial service was held on the spot where the murder took place.

Both the prime minster and leader of the opposition laid wreaths. A parliamentary session was set aside for MPs, again representing all parties, to pay tribute to the man.

For a magic moment, politics was set aside, replaced by a spirit of caring for the family of the victim.

Here, the guilty enjoy more attention than those left behind. So don’t blame Thuli – and many other individuals around us qualifying for clean and competent leadership – for hesitating to come forward to steer a floundering ship to safety.

But if the nation at large, through the ballot box, shows its disapproval of the rotten bunch, I’m sure they would seriously reconsider coming on board.

The question is, when will we South Africans wake up to the fact our only hope depends on our collective will to survive and the one way open to us is voting the baddies out of office.

We need only to look north to see the result of societal inertia.