In the course of my anxious ramblings across the internet for all things ANC-related I stumbled across this article. Shock. Horror. Mbeki's first interview with the Mail and Guardian in his eight years in power. He finally decides to engage- two days before he, in all likelihood, gets politically castrated on Sunday. A little too little too late is the achingly accurate phrase that springs to mind and jumps up and down in jittery panic.
Mbeki was an aloof president. A stubborn president. A president too often in denial and too often lashing out in offence. But he was a competent president in many respects who failed to communicate that competence to a public and nation desperate to hear from him. If a good public relations officer is a politician's best friend, Mbeki was a friendless kid sitting in a corner of the playground reading an encyclopedia whil everyone else played marbles.
Nkosazana Dlamini- Zuma (who I pray will be a last minute compromise candidate to end the madness) said in a recent interview with the Cape Argus that he's just "shy".
"I won't say he is anti-social, but he is more reserved, a bit on the shy side, and sometimes people interpret that as not being friendly." she said, reflecting on Zuma's one strength over Mbeki: his friendly jabbering and ability to say what everyone wants to hear.
There's a part from the movie, The American President, where one of the president's aides (Lewis) powerfully and poignantly points out the awful, awful consequences of a president going quiet in a time of need, and the gap it leaves for those kind of talkers to rise to power.
An excerpt from the script below:
The President doesn't answer to you,
Lewis.
LEWIS
Oh yes, he does, A.J. I'm a citizen,
this is my president, and in this
country it is not only permissible to
question our leaders, it is our
responsibility. But you already know
that, Mr. President, because you have
a deeper love of this country than
any man I've ever known, and I want
to know what it says to you that in
the past seven weeks 59 percent of
Americans have begun to question your
patriotism?
SHEPHERD (president)
Look, if people want to listen to Bob
Rumson--
LEWIS
They don't have a choice! Rob
Rumson's the only one doing the
talking. People want leadership.
And in the absence of genuine
leadership, they will listen to
anyone who steps up to the
microphone. They want leadership,
Mr. President. They're so thirsty
for it, they'll crawl through the
desert toward a mirage, and when
they discover there's no water,
they'll drink the sand.
SHEPHERD
(evenly)
Lewis, we've had Presidents who were
beloved, who couldn't find a coherent
sentence with two hands and a
flashlight. People don't drink the
sand, 'cause they're thirsty, Lewis.
They drink it 'cause they don't know
the difference.
In the end, Edmund Burke was right. All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing... or in this instance to say nothing.
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