12 January 2009

Now we hear that 150 parties are registered for the 2009 elections.  And so we continue the apartheid legacy; our inability to think outside of the clan; our inability to acknowledge that people who are not of our particular persuasion can actually have the interests of all people at heart.  Democracy depends on a certain level of trust.  Apartheid was not democratic because it was based on distrust.

How can we ever be a united people when each tiny group clings to its own particular interests?  How can we ever stop being racists when the people who offer to govern us think along narrow group lines and demand that we follow them into eternal divisiveness?  We do not need an opposition split into 150 powerless groups who can achieve nothing and can only be regarded as opportunists deluding the small groups who support them into believing that they can achieve anything for anyone.  It is clear that they do not want democracy; that they only mouth democratic slogans and their only policy making ability consists in hurling brickbats at the ruling party. We will never have democracy in our country as long as there is no real debate in parliament, as long as policies cannot be really challenged and refined to ensure that all human rights are protected and that there is real development to eradicate poverty, unemployment and crime. Viva apartheid, viva.

As long as the ANC has a two-thirds majority in parliament, we have no opposition and no democracy.