Kameraad Mhambi

Koos Kombuis can still write an amusing article while making a good point.

I was reminded of this when I spotted this piece, The unbearable lightness of being Bakkies Botha in the Mail and Guardian where Koos wishes South Africa’s politicians were more like the Springbok workhorse, Bakkies Botha.

A Combatbok video – check them out on Youtube, they rock

God knows, we need more people like Bakkies Botha. In politics, in public life, everywhere. Even if he is suffering from a shoulder injury.

Why? Well, Bakkies Botha is a man of few words. He has never written a book. He never makes speeches. He is the kind of guy who never seeks the limelight, he just donners into the scrum — or the loose maul, or whatever you call the tangle of bodies that periodically piles up on any rugby field — and does his job. Unseen, unheard, he dives into that grizzly pile of swearing and sweat, where he throws his punches, where he scratches and claws and works his silent way towards Springbok victory.

He never towers high in the line-outs like Victor Matfield. He hardly ever joins the back-line to pretend to be a centre like Juan Smith. He never graces the front page of magazines like Percy Montgomery or Francois Steyn. He isn’t pretty, or charming, or suave, or sexy, or cool. He is simply Bakkies Botha. He has absolutely no other baggage to carry in life besides being himself. He has the common touch.

There was a time when I believed Zuma had the common touch, too. I mean, anyone who can survive an evening of braaing with Dan Roodt and Leon Schuster must be remarkably resilient, a real man’s man, superhumanly brave almost to the point of idiocy.

You’ve got beautiful eyes

And, may I remind you, braaing with Dan Roodt and Leon Schuster was the one thing Thabo Mbeki would never have done. Not even if he was allowed to fly there in his private jet and wear his Gucci suit to the occasion. He was far too “sophisticated” to stoop to such mundane levels.

After we’d all gotten so mighty tired of Thabo Mbeki’s long-winded speeches, his quotes from Shakespeare and Charles Dickens, the millions of conferences he organised, trips he went on, all the useless hot air he generated, Jacob Zuma seemed set to become the ordinary folks’ president. To be quite honest, there was a time, until not so long ago, that I believed Zuma’s political style to be the black equivalent of Bakkies Botha’s style of rugby.

He spoke in plain English. In spite of the clouds of suspicion hanging over home — the arms deal, Shaik, the accusations of rape — he was down to earth and accessible. He simply shook off all those bad things like a dog ridding himself of water. The one moment he was the worst villain of South African politics, the next moment he was Mr Squeaky Clean. He installed a corruption hotline right to his office. He seemed eager to get the job done. He promised swift action against lazy cabinet ministers. He spent literally all his time rolling up his sleeves, metaphorically speaking.

Now, the chickens are coming home to roost, and it appears that all that rolling up of sleeves was just trick photography. Nothing had actually been done. Of what use is the hotline to his office if Mr Zuma is never in his office, but always on honeymoon? The fishermen of the West Coast are still looking for Zuma to look into their quota problem. Service delivery is not improving. Even public relations — Zuma’s strong point up till now — is floundering on a sea of contradictions and recriminations.

It appears that Zuma is like Mbeki, but with more wives, less hair and without the quotes from A Tale of Two Cities.

How I wish I had known all this a few weeks ago when I was doing that radio interview for the BBC.

How I wish I had told them about Bakkies Botha.

The people of Britain have the right to know that we still have guys like Bakkies Botha in this country; men and women who are simply doing their job, day after day, without releasing any new Afrikaans CDs, without sitting back and waiting for regstellende aksie, without suing anybody, or raping anybody, or bumping folk over with their cars, or receiving kickbacks for doing nothing, or organising rock festivals with names ending in “-Stok”, or publishing autobiographies (yes, yes, I know), or ignoring red traffic lights in blue-light cavalcades, or changing the names of towns without any rhyme or reason, or ordering Moët champagne at room service with taxpayers’ money, or denying personal culpability, or evading personal responsibility, or appearing in smutty home videos, or throwing cups of tea at nice ladies, or do any of the ghastly things South African politicians and other people figures seem to be spending absolutely all their time on.

This is what I should have told the ladies from the BBC. I have should have told them that we still have people like Bakkies Botha.

Millions of them.

Related deployments:

1. Fatima Meer – a political Bakkies Botha