Picture: Flickr.com Picture: Flickr.com
Over the past few weeks, several ministers and deputy ministers have posted pictures on social media of them flying economy class.
This is supposed to be a way of them showing their commitment to government cost-cutting, but the reality is that they would never have done it if the Minister of Finance did not insist that they should make this adjustment to their lifestyles at a time when everyone is tightening their belts.
The fact that they feel they need to share this “inconvenience” on social media so others can see how much they are prepared to sacrifice, shows they have no clue about the struggles poor people go through in South Africa every day.
Ministers, deputy ministers and members of Parliament are, in the main, completely out of touch with the lives of what is sometimes referred to as “ordinary people”.
South Africa’s economy has been in trouble for a while, with Statistics SA announcing this week the country is facing its second technical recession in two years.
A technical recession could have a serious impact on our country’s ability to attract investment - which is one of the mantras of President Cyril Ramaphosa - but, more importantly, it could have a disastrous impact on the employment figures due to be announced by Stats SA soon.
I am at an age where I reminisce a lot. Sometimes it is at the funeral of a comrade, a colleague or a friend; sometimes it is at a special birthday celebration of one of my friends. We sometimes joke about the things we got up to or endured during the Struggle against apartheid.
Often, when we talk about those days, we reflect on why we engaged in the Struggle and we realise while none of us would ever go as far as saying that things were better under apartheid, we have to admit we have failed to deliver the better society we promised our people when we asked them for support during the Struggle.
We were probably a little bit naïve during those days. We believed in a utopian society and we did not anticipate that breaking down the structures of inequality created by apartheid and capitalism would be so difficult.
But, mainly, we believed our political leaders would remain true to their commitment and service to the people. We did not anticipate that so-called leaders would see their ascendancy into political office as a way of financially securing themselves, their families and friends. We did not anticipate that for many assuming political office meant being able to move out of the townships into fancy suburbs and driving fancy cars.
I don’t have a problem with the upward mobility of people after the collapse of apartheid, but one would have assumed those who chose to “serve” our people through public office would have at least tried to find ways of taking others with them.
Like the garish display of opulence at the opening of Parliament, and the Gucci bags and Italian shoes associated with our supposed public servants, showing off pictures of flying in economy class when most people will never fly in their lives, displays so much of what is wrong with our society today. Ministers and others need to think twice about the message they wish to send out to the people who voted for them in the hope of improving their lives. But I suppose they don’t care.
* Ryland Fisher is chief executive of Ikusasa Lethu Media. Follow him on Twitter:
@rylandfisher
** The views expressed here are not necessarily those of Independent Media.
