Former president Thabo Mbeki is creeping back into the intellectual spotlight. His pronouncement on the issue of knowledge production at the University of Stellenbosch Business School’s Knowledge Management Conference recently has generated much heat and light.
His utterances have, rightly, put a critical spotlight on the role of academia and business in not only generating knowledge but using it to manipulate society for their own agendas. There has always been suspicion of the real purpose of education or knowledge production, and development and its incestuous relationship with the moneyed class, if you like.
The eminent Mbeki has, of course, raised pertinent questions about this relationship but he does not take us very far in understanding the nature of the problem. There are more straightforward and objective truths and facts that Mbeki could have said but chose not to say. Instead, he asked a lot of intelligent and penetrating questions to which he has answers.
What he did not spell out, for instance, is the incestuous relationship that exists between capitalism and the professional class or intelligentsia. That knowledge production and control of what people ‘know’ is linked to protecting and preserving the economic status quo is so real that it cannot be denied. And Mbeki knows that!
Perhaps there has never been a time when knowledge and power have been like Siamese twins. In today’s information age those who control knowledge production hold the power, thus the saying “knowledge is power”. But what, exactly, is the relationship between the intelligentsia and capitalist power? The inextricable link between capitalist oppression, economic injustice and failure to satisfy the aspirations of the African majority is something that everyone with eyes has seen over the last 18 years. Knowledge producers know that even when they are asleep.
Those who produce knowledge are neither trained nor permitted to critically engage with the capitalist superpower structure for fear that they may pose a threat. Their role is to uphold the system. But in their hearts of hearts they know that South Africa, in its current political and economic setup, is a failed human experiment. It promotes and perpetuates racial inequality and economic injustice in the name of democracy. This constitutional democracy is not only anti-black but anti-human.
But a man like Mbeki and those who produce knowledge cannot say this truth from the rooftops because they are trapped in cocoons of influence, position, prestige and power they wallow in. They have to pretend not to be aware of the contradictions in the economic system.
But there is reason to be hopeful. In fact, there are stirrings of knowledge of these realities within the ruling African National Congress. After all, Mbeki is a senior member. It was only last Friday that Deputy President Kgalema Motlanthe publicly acknowledged at the University of South Africa that the ANC has no control over those who control knowledge or capital. Significantly, he urged society, especially the intelligentsia, to begin to engage the dysfunctional model of democracy and capitalism. You cannot have equality and greed at the same time.
There is something wrong when a state that pushes for equality and justice relies on those who serve capitalist interests for policies and information. This does not, and will not, exactly contribute to genuine transformation.
Thus you find that voices like Mbeki, for instance, are suddenly muted when they know that we need honest and open discourse on this unworkable solution of capitalism and democracy. This is because far many people who know the truth around knowledge production have allowed themselves to be manipulated by the capitalist system to remain silent in the face of this economic contradiction. We have every reason to be afraid when a man of the calibre of Mbeki cannot, as John Milton put it, “speak freely according to conscience”. He has lost everything, now, and has nothing more to lose. He has no business to be preoccupied with self-interest, position, status, power and prestige. He should just speak as his conscience dictates to him.
It is clear as daylight that knowledge producers have an incestuous relationship with power that makes them wary of fulfilling their historical mission which, presumably, is to be the conscience of the nation and thus have no holy cows.
Instead those who know, like Mbeki, now want to mince their words and rarely gravitate towards an open and honest discourse that will sober everyone up about what is wrong about this country. He is skirting around issues because maybe he is too embarrassed or afraid to speak truth to the moneyed classes and what they have to offer.
People who conduct themselves this way, unavoidably, become part of the problem that constrains freedom of thought, expression and knowledge. We have to speak truth according to conscience. Mbeki is the last man who should be pussyfooting around the truth. He does not have to scramble for the crumbs. Yes, he should be pushing the boundaries of unimagined possibilities towards transformation and change to the economic system.
Mbeki must not just tell us that a “small but powerful minority controls knowledge”. He must show how they do that and reveal how this undermines democracy in South Africa.
The perspective Mbeki presented on knowledge production is a tip of the iceberg. As a result, it unwittingly reflects the social and cultural values of those who control the economy and use their power to undermine government initiatives to bring justice and equality to society.
Mbeki needs to drop his diplomatic mask and speak for that man who is not in high office. He is lucky that he is still held in high regard but he is an ordinary man, now. As an ordinary man it is his responsibility to make all citizens of this beautiful nation realise that as long as wealth monopoly is concentrated among a handful and charges of land dispossession remain, South Africa will not cease to be a house divided against itself.
Also, as an exponent of Pan-Africanism, Mbeki must remind everyone that as much as this is the era of globalisation, this remains an African country. Yet we need to remind ourselves that Mbeki is a product of Sussex University in the West where he was educated and trained by knowledge producers in the West to become part of the very system. Maybe he cannot overtly be seen to be opposed to a system that made him.
Essentially, what Mbeki did not say is that as long as the knowledge producers are beholden to capitalist sponsors and preoccupied with status, power and prestige, their role becomes not only dysfunctional but anti-poor and anti-African.
The knowledge producers, just like everybody else, cannot be opposed to a history and an economic setup that benefits them. We have to acknowledge that the intelligentsia is now the new opium of the people. They espouse intellectual claptrap and other theories that prick thought processes but will not lead you to an understanding of where power lies or how the world works.
One thing is very clear: there is more to what Mbeki did not say than to what he said. Will the new Thabo Mbeki please speak up?
Very valid points raised! Of course, let’s expect the master denialists, who also happen to be the beneficiaries of this knowledge manipulation, to attack you with guns blazing.
Interesting points raised but what in your view is the alternative. Are we to change the rules of the game or to train the majorty to participate in the very same game. If you cannot beat them why not join them?
Your are right that capitalism is often a very unfair economic system. However the argument around freedom of speech and knowledge is much weaker. Capitalism for all its faults generally allows freedom of speech. Socialism, or communism, which you imply may be better alternatives, are tyrannies by a party elite which allow for nothing of the kind. The history of socialism shows that it always involves ruthless suppression of free speech and free thought – Orwell’s 1984 was a parody of the USSR. One should be careful for what one wishes for. Freedom of speech should never be negotiable, and never subordinated to tyrannical doctrines that pretend to allow an elite to speak on behalf of the citizen. JFK once said – everything is negotiable – except the freedom and dignity of free men.
A rule of thumb – beware of anyone anyone who claims to have an absolute monopoly of truth. Business and academia may express opinions as individuals, but I have yet to see this claim being made, or a claim of ultimate collective wisdom that has to be enforced on all others. Politicians, and political parties, often make this claim – especially those that claim to have discovered the ‘engines of history’. One should be far more worried about them than about anyone else.
I partly agree with the Author. However, we must understand that any nation that is always spoon fed never intensifies in its capacity to mutually grow. What the honourable Mbeki cited is more than enough for all intellectual citizens to understand. It is now up to all considerate citizens to act without being viewed as a political allien of the ‘Mbeki’ group.
This ANC-waffle is a perfect example of what Mbeki calls “false knowledge”. While slamming capitalism and “capitalist interests” this cadre ignores that knowledge is far more restricted and academic freedom (along with freedom of expression) is far more restricted in socialist than in Western countries.
If he slept through the mass enslavement of the Socialist bloc in East Europe, Russia, China and bits of Asia, the Arab Spring and despotsim of Cde Bob on our borders demonstrates this.
Great article.
@What a dumb article and it makes no sense. What Sandile is saying that the creators of knowledge should not be profiting from it like they do in many western countries. In other words Bill Gates and Paul Allen should not have been allowed to profit from creating Window because it creates inequality in a society.
I guess that the fact that you said nothing about the master of the dancing, smiling, singing and compulsively promiscuous brigade (that fellow who is under the illusion he is the head of state, when he is taking breaks from marrying wife after wife) reveals your own (inadvertent) admission that the smiling fellow’s role in – let alone his capacity about – deciphering the role played by knowledge producers in the political game play effectively amounts to nought.
For that glaring admission, Sandile, you deserve a medal.
I have not read such racist idiotic dribble in a very long time…. Well done Mr Memela.
Good article. Frankly, Mbeki’s spiel read like a satirist’s parody of an Mbeki article, but when one realises that he was egg-dancing around reality it becomes easier to understand.
The awful thing is that Mbeki’s spiel was one of the most intelligent things on the subject to have been publicised in the last couple of years. In other words, even when Mbeki’s trying not to say anything liable to get him into trouble, he still makes more sense than most other commentators. That says a lot more about the low quality of the other commentators than it says about Mbeki.
In my judgement, Mbeki’s always been too clever for his own good — as in the Zuma episode where he tried to protect the ANC by protecting Zuma from prosecution, and ended up wrecking the ANC and installing Zuma as President. I’m not sure that he’s a man likely to challenge authority when he is in a weak position. But, bloody hell, who else is there?
Regrettably, Sandile; your second last paragraph – “They espouse intellectual claptrap and other theories that prick thought processes but will not lead you to an understanding of where power lies or how the world works.” succinctly captures the essence of your article. I could describe your muddled thoughts on this matter any better than you have done!
But hey, at least you are sharing a view and therefore contributing to the debate, which is more than I can account for! Congratulations then.
All thumbs up to Mbeki…we don’t need prescriptive methods of thinking or doing things. we live in a complex & dynamic environment…
This was enough to challenge and engage intellectual such as urself Mr Memela…
Peace!!!
Sterling Ferguson, your analysis leaves much to be desired. Did you do English Comprehension is school? Please read the article again. You don’t have to agree with it, you just have to understand it, then disagree if you want. You totally missed it buddy. Read it again, if that will help. Or rather go to news24 if the stuff on thoughleader is way above your head. That’s my advice as a helpful fellow citizen.
“Mbeki is a product of Sussex University in the West where he was educated and trained by knowledge producers in the West to become part of the very system. Maybe he cannot overtly be seen to be opposed to a system that made him.”
Where were you educated dear Sir?? Let the man be………….
There is no point shooting the messenger (not that there ever could be), when you have your own message. In any event the question posed by Mbeki was what constitute knowledge, by whom and how this knowledge is propagated; and given that the conference was to confront this question, it would have been presumptuous and even unduly prescriptive for Mbeki to predicate to the delegates what constitute knowledge. So accusing him of wallowing “in cocoons of influence”, is a bit harsh, unwarranted and does very little to advance the quality of your argument; but most bizarrely, you point to the ANC as the source of hope for stirring the knowledge debate, because the Deputy-President acknowledged that the ANC does not have “control over those who control knowledge or capital”? An uninterested observer may surmise that you may be referring to Info Bill. I would however agree with your thesis to the extent it seem to refer to information being manipulated or produced by certain power blocs is society, presented and promoted as universal truth and thus knowledge.
“Will the new Thabo Mbeki please speak up?”
By your own admission, he did just that and said the usual nothing.
To throw “knowledge” in the same melting pot as “capital” and “power” as in “the rich vs the poor” and in a politically socialist or communist light makes your article a little biased.
The origin of knowledge has two main sources: (1) the observed (proven or perceived) facts in our daily lives (“street knowledge”) and (2) the analytical results of stated theories (see most PhD’s) often based on these facts. The latter requires an education which provides the (intellectual) tools to make these analyses. Society needs the money to perform such analyses. A recent report (reference lost) suggested that many academic studies are often biased towards the funders of the studies which in itself undermine the trustworthiness of such studies.
The ANC in SA has managed to undermine the intellectual capacity of the current school going population with the lowering of standards and required pass rates. Universities complain that the cohort of University entrants is often not sufficiently equipped to read, write and formulate arguments or follow and produce solutions to simple numerical and mathematical tasks. (Google: “Jonathan Janssen”). The chaos in many schools can clearly be put on the doorstep of the various education authorities guilty of non delivery of materials and poor management of staff. The popular protests are significant pointers that the…
The Bible teaches us the laws of sowing and reaping. If you sow much you will reap much, If you sow nothing you will reap nothing and this applies to leaning, working and living.
The trouble is that Capitalism encourages this law but others want to reap the benefits of the sowing of others and that cannot succeed. So the non sowers criticize the active sowers and call foul because the hard workers reap what they sow whereas the non sowers say that they are ‘entitled’.
No one is ‘entitled’ other than to reap the benefits of what they sow and, by the way, this applies to corruption as well. Sow corruption and it will be reaped in good measure. Sow racial hatred and guess what you will get in return?
By the way. Thabo Mbeki with his archaic ideas and friendship and support for dictators has caused irreparable damage to South Africa. His hands are dripping with the blood of hundreds of thousands of aids victims, their families and children and, his love for Mugabe has flooded us with desperate immigrants where we have a huge unemployment problem, without taking the problems of Mugabe and bringing them here. Mbeki might have the odd good thing to say but based on the mess that he presided over as President we should not be listening.
Knowledge is power indeed. I couldn’t possible win trivia evening if I gave the answers to everyone else in the pub, could I?
I also couldn’t hold a job as a technician if I kept telling potential customers how to fix their computers just as plumbers would go out of business if they told everyone how to fix their taps.
Eskom couldn’t stay in business if everyone knew how to independently power their homes and stayed off the grid.
I figure the only way to get around this would be to do away with money and live in a completely utopian society. Then again, this is reality and not Star Trek. *shrug*
On the other hand: If you’re talking about things like knowledge of what the government is doing with our tax money or how a particular corporation is screwing its clients, then yes… we should all have that knowledge.
The objective reality is that the politically empowered have utilised this power for self enrichment and perpetuation of this into the future. They clamour to become part of the capitalist elite which they publicly claim to despise.
To sustain their power, the poor will be given freebies with no commensurate levels of responsibility expected from them in return. This ensures a poor class dependent on the current political elite rather than their own resourcefulness (essentially self empowerment)
I am of the opinion that the current political elite has the capacity and blind resolve to cause more harm and misery to South Africans of all classes than our history of colonialism, apartheid, capitalism, etc. have been able to cause us to date.
Maybe
Ntate Memela should stop hiding his bias and propoganda as innocent, balanced and objective commentary. Who funds you Ntate?
continued….
The chaos in many schools can clearly be put on the doorstep of the various education authorities guilty of non delivery of materials and poor management of staff. The popular protests are significant pointers that the “street” knowledge is starting to step up in wielding its power.
The “old” Thabo Mbeki was very much party to this destruction. I do not believe that the “new” Thabo can deny his past without loosing face.
Where this is going to leave SA in the emerging “knowledge based society”?? Future will tell.
‘…he is an ordinary man, now.’… And like all ordinary men he’s entitled to say WTF he likes, as long as it’s not a regurgitation of hate speech. Intelligent people will check all he says publicly and decide for themselves.
Mr. Memela, it appears to me, is pushing some conspiracy theory here, claiming that black Africans are excluded from the secret knowledge needed to crack the money making system of capitalist countries.
I agree that many young South Africans are not equipped with sufficient knowledge, but it is the current ANC lead government who should take the blame for that. During the past 18 years or so, our standard of education has not improved in SA. During the same period the same government had chosen to reduce personal tax of the middle class and above by more than 30% in real terms.
Now we all know the middle class and above can contribute to better schooling for their own kids. If the ANC government had wanted to enlighten the black population, it had the time, opportunity and potentially the money to do so, but it did not, was it because well informed people might not continue to vote for them? Remember, contrary to the conspiracy theory, the knowledge is there for the taking, but government (who controls the schooling system) has to implement the curriculum before the population can benefit.
So, Mr Memela, who is to blame? Business (trying to make money) or government (not implementing a proper knowledge approach in our schools)? I think you have to agree that, if it was possible for Mr. Mbeki to access the “knowledge”, anybody with at least normal brains attending a good learning institution can do so too.
Now to build those schools and staff them with good teachers…
Slavery does not require a specific pigment or sun tan. Subservience to the Sun (or Son) is capital enough. We are at best High Priests and at worst the blood & mortar of the stone embracing this pyramid ‘Humanity’. Empathy might in deed occasionally soften the blow of the task master’s whip but I suspect that until we unlearn homage to the Sun propagated knowledge will only serve to blind & screen rather then guide us.
Indeed, Mr Sandile Memela; you got the bull by the horns.A real matador, by any standards, especially ours.You got the bull by the balls.Knowledge is power indeed.So said the pündits of knowledge.Mind you there is a real & apparent disaster that the ignorant might want to toy or toi-toi with power to their own peril.How?Power, is not the domain for the uneducated, no matter how popülar they are-practically they fathom that power can be shown by flexing one’s biceps et al.Hence, in that scenario there is, what i would call, political-espionage and political-counter-espionage.The manifestation, of such dictums is visible in processes whereby there is firing and counter-firing of members withoüt due regard of the ensuing repercussions.Indeed, in this dilema people would want to win by elimination and subsequent substitution.Unfortunately, thats the hallmark of the ignorant.Furthermore, they also would want to shift the goal posts in the game so to speak.As if that is not enough, they also would want to change the gradient of the playing field to suit their selfish ego at the peril of the bigger picture….ie ANCYL SUSPENSIONS.Mr Memela, at this juncture, let me reiterate what the Hournerable Vice President Kgalema Motlanthe once said that “the ANCYL is there to adopt radical, millitant positions that the ANC can only contemplate…” In an intellectual disposition, you look at the bigger picture in relation to where you stand, plüs the future and then apply your mind….
Any knowledge comes with the determination to gain that knowledge…coupled with hard work.
The Praetor
@Sandile:
“The inextricable link between capitalist oppression, economic injustice and failure to satisfy the aspirations of the African majority is something that everyone with eyes has seen over the last 18 years.”
Prove that.
Even the most basic principles of statistics, logic and science (economics, mathematics, psychology et al) clearly highlights the flaws in pseudo-arguments like your “something that everyone with eyes has seen.”
Do you actually understand principles of cause and effect, validity, control groups, abductive thinking, deductive thinking, inductive thinking….?
And to think that possibly regard yourself an intellectual…
@Fraud, there is nothing great about this article and if you think this article is great I pity you. Sandile tries to say many things but most of what he says is full of contraditions what he is suggesting the real Mebeki should be writing about. To give you an example of what I am talking about, he writes that the deputy president Motlanthe has admitted that the ANC led government can’t control capital or knowledge. Since SA is a net importer of capital and produces very little knowledge, how can the government control these things? However, he is trying to say that the ANC is now aware of this and steps will be taken to control knowledge and capital. He claims that there is an incestuous relation wih the people that produce knowledge and the capitalist class and this prevent the producers of knowledge from fulfilling their duties to society. The producers of knowledge have no duties to full fill in any society. He went on to say that Mbeki can only say so much because he has a duty to the capitalist class. Mbeki doesn’t have any duty to anyone and this is all left wing crap. Not one line did Sandile calls for the SA government to invest in research and developing to create knowledge in SA.
Oh please Mr Memela. Let’s not mince our words here. Mbeki set SA on its current course. He presided over the Arms Deal, the Eskom debacle, crony capitalism, tenderpreneurship, the crippling of the education system, cadre deployment and AIDS denialism. These seeds, or should I say weeds, have taken root and are now flourishing. Not to mention his racialisation of every criticsm and then SA life in general. His love for Mugabe and a few other crooked dictators killed thousands and gave SA xenophobia. In short ,Mbeki was a traitor to SA. Knowledge like his we do not need.
@Freddy Kay, that was a very good comment you made about the government in SA. This country spend more money on luxury cars then they do on research and development. The US spent billions on space technology and look what came out it, gps, internet, and a host of many useful things. Instead of bashing Mbeki, Sandile should write an article calling for the government to spend more money on research and development. One has to give the devil his due the NATS government spent money on research and development to create knowledge.
It will be a long time for us in the country when we can’t have an honest debate without prejudices. After Mbeki’s lecture and subsequent interview there was a head-line about Mbeki and his criticism of twitter as a knowledge sharing platform. Judging by the comments that followed that article, it was clear that most commentators had no idea of where the comments emanated from and were just too happy to blast Mbeki for whatever reasons they don’t like the man or what he did as president. Not many had heard or read the transcript for the and not many were even interested.
The author of that piece had deliberately picked out parts of the speech that have in the past generated controversy. The author made no reference to what Mbeki had said about how the the misuse of knowledge had led to the invasion of Iraq. A point I feel was also critical in putting comments about Libya and others in context.
The article had achieved what I feel had set out achieve, which was in my opinion, to gather controversy around Mbeki. The issue of discussion moved to being “Mbeki and his views of twitter”
The same can be said about the lead up to US elections in 2008. Anyone who read about what Rev. Wright had supposedly said would be forgiven for thinking that the man was a racist lunatic until you dig up the entire sermons from where these soundbites were taken from. The knowledge was in that case too manipulated to achieve a certain objective. That in my opinion is the crux of the matter
Oh Sandile is a big joke – this posting does not even deserve my input. Tommy I hear you. There are many Nonqgauses out there ouch!
Disappointing, are you trying to absolve the current ruling elite from the duty to extricate a significant proportion of the masses out of poverty.
You say “Mbeki must not just tell us that a “small but powerful minority controls knowledge”. He must show how they do that and reveal how this undermines democracy in South Africa. ”
Democracy is South Africa is not being undermined by anyone except by the weak and foolish leaders that you have been pushing to lead South Africa. For these leaders to have dodgy advisers like yourself does not help matters either.
You further advance contradictory statement such as this:
“But in their hearts of hearts they know that South Africa, in its current political and economic setup, is a failed human experiment. It promotes and perpetuates racial inequality and economic injustice in the name of democracy. This constitutional democracy is not only anti-black but anti-human.”
In future please provide examples of your assertions just like Mbeki did in his lecture instead of incoherently waffling.
@Zozo, very good comment you made, I feel better because other people see what Sandile is saying.
Your 5th paragraph is bullshyte. Why do you not examine the similarities between AIDS denialism and growth denialism?
This is the year 2012. We have a fair idea of which economic models work and which do not. The ANC has grudgingly embraced the model that works, hankered after the one that does not, and looted throughout. Case in point – the leaking of the draft mining charter because the third-tier ANC leadership were afraid their turn would not come to eat the money. The result – South Africa, with mining the backbone of its economy, loses out on a decade-long commodities boom.
The ANC’s ‘Alliance Partners’ – who have never fought an election in their own name – have steadfastly tried to sabotage the ANC’s embrace of the economic model that works. Cosatu, in particular, has tried to act as gatekeeper to access to new jobs to try and drive the unit price of labour up. Cosatu affiliate SADTU has destroyed the future of 2 generations of black kids with the substandard product its members almost produce.
This piece is nothing more than a misguided attack at intellectual capital.
Once again, Sandile, you are looking under the wrong rock in your attempt to excuse an ineffective leadership that fails to distribute substantial resources efficiently and deliver to its people.
The only reason our tertiary education system has weathered the storm (somewhat) is because the ANC has no direct control over the “knowledge producers”. Like Church and State, Academia and State should be mutually exclusive.
Yes indeed, knowledge is power. But the state does not own mine nor anyone else’s knowledge, nor does it control how I choose to apply it. This is the essence of what I understand to be “self determination”; this is the essence of “freedom”.
The key is acquiring the knowledge, then having the guts to apply it.
By what mechanism do you propose to wrest the “control of knowledge” from academia and into the hands of the ruling party? What totalitarian vision is this, Sandile? Let us speak openly here, just as you have asked Mbeki.
So you mistrust the ANC’s current neoliberal economic policies and the respect of property rights (both intellectual and physical).
Fine, but pray tell, what is your alternative? What is this amorphous “pro-African” system to which you allude.
I take it then that you will sticking to your principles, putting your money where your mouth is, and distributing all the royalties from your new book to upliftment of those less fortunate?
The sad thing about the gist of the article is that Memela missed the point of the speech itself, which was about to generate a debate. His lamentations about what Mbeki didn’t say, highlight the “laziness of the educated” in SA, that they go around calling themselves intellectuals yet can’t engage on a issue that they themselves should have raised years ago!
Like everything else created through intelligent, industrious creativity, and ingenuity – wealth, economic assets, social capital, knowledge and opportunity, the ANC regime and its astonishingly credulous followers believe knowledge production can be nationalised and plundered!!
Stalin and Mao tse Tung believed that and also murdered scores of millions of intelligentsia in their social “transformation” processes. Sandile dont you read political history?
Sadly, for the tempting but ignorant endeavour to seize instead of creating factors of wealth and enlightenment, the inevitable outcome is regression, impoverishment and misery.
A model is right on our border – Zimbabwe, and millions of its victims are now working industriously here in South Africa until more misguided “intellectuals” and autocratic political leaders repeat the mistake.
@Chris, you hit the nail on the head keep up the good work by shining the light.
With all due respect, but is it not circular to say that Thabo Mbeki must speak freely when this piece itself seems loathe to do so. I would have thought the point of the piece was to elucidate on what Mr Mbeki could not, however all the piece does is recount that he said nothing because of fear of backlash from unidentified agents in positions of power. “The Intelligentsia”? Who is this? Is it Academia? Is it the CHE? Is it SAQA? Are you not also saying nothing, Sir?
Try getting a tender or play the Lotto comrade Memela,its much dignified than having to come up with such laughable ‘brown-nosing’ columns.Pres’ Mbeki isnt lucky he’s still held in high regard,its you who is lucky you still employed and getting published.