As an aside, during the session on SABC TV, Dlamini stated that ‘the
Constitutional Court Judges are people; they also read newspapers and watch
television, so they gain incorrect understandings of what has happened
regarding the payment of social grants.” That extreme insult to the Judges of
the Constitutional Court, who each have more intelligence than the entire
Cabinet of the President, and more integrity in their fingernails than the
entire leadership of the ANC, was accepted unquestioningly by the sycophantic
Peter Ndoro, who enthusiastically nodded his agreement of every word uttered by
the criminally-convicted and Constitutionally-sanctioned Minister.
To return to the new understanding.
One of the speakers, justifying the policy of wealth
redistribution, explained that poor people don’t have much to spend. By
redistributing the wealth of wealthy people, who would otherwise simply spend
it on the imported goods they favour, the poor people are given the means to
spend on goods they need, so creating economic activity.
That remarkable explanation ignores a number of important
things. The first is that wealthy people use their wealth, at least a
considerable portion of it, to create the economic activity the country needs,
the mines, factories and other businesses, as well as providing the finance
needed for research and development, of goods and ideas, that would otherwise
have to be sourced from abroad. Without that wealth, there would be no jobs,
and so no way for the poor to earn the income to spend on ‘what they need’.
Experience worldwide (yes, my own experience – I have earned a living for many years
by generating new businesses for ex-employees of my management consultancy
clients, who were displaced as a result of making the client’s businesses more
efficient. Every one of those new businesses remained in businesses for at
least three years, and many of them have become management consultancy
clients.) has shown me that the average investment required for the creating of
new jobs is around US$250 000, in addition to the requirement that the
employees in those new jobs need a good education (an important disqualifier
for most South Africans, as a result of the ANC-inspired sausage-factory
education system producing an education standard ranking 183 of 185 countries)
and years of relevant on-the-job experience, under the tutelage of an
experienced manager (also precluded under the BEE system, which views skin
colour as a suitable replacement for experience, resulting in a downgrading of
the capability of South African businesses). This must not be seen as a
criticism of Black South Africans. In my experience, a black South African has
the personal qualities and mental capabilities to be the equal of a White South
African, or of the citizens of any other country. What they lack is a decent
education and suitable experience. This would be assisted by them having
enjoyed exposure to a culture that values reading and understanding,
questioning and critical discussion – as the President has often demonstrated, a
background as a herd boy provides a very poor foundation for understanding how
the world works. That background can be supplemented by reading and discussion,
and by relevant (not political brainwashing) education that opens the world to
the mind, and the mind to the world.
The Minister repeated the same public relations line that is
taken by so many others who do not wish to expose their failings, saying that
there are many accountants and lawyers who cannot find work, without going to
the obvious next step of asking why. They cannot find work because their
qualifications are inferior – a degreed South African of any colour who seeks
work in the UK, the US or Europe is now not really sought after, unless their
work experience demonstrates clearly that their work ethic puts them on a higher
plane of capability, in contrast to those with a pre-ANC education, who could
take virtually any relevant position in those countries without effort. Don’t
forget that the Law Society published a report some years ago that the average
Ll B graduate now is incapable of using language effectively! A client who
employed a newly-graduated M Sc in chemistry (White) found that he had no
knowledge or understanding of some basic chemical reactions! A university
lecturer in engineering resigned because the instruction that he ensured that a
certain proportion of Black students passed his course, in order to fulfill quota
requirements, was not acceptable to him. He commented “Imagine using a bridge
designed by a civil engineer who was required to achieve a 40% pass in
mathematics!”
South Africans are capable and
willing; they need a government that understands some of the basic rules of
economics, and that demands that they perform to the highest standards. They
need teachers who know their subjects and are willing to put in the effort and
the time to ensure that their pupils achieve what they are capable of doing.
And, most of all, they need to understand that by working to a belief that all
people are equal and that they must all be entitled to share in what they don’t
produce is a certain recipe for mediocrity.
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