Paul Harris should not get a salary – or bonus – for the rest of this year!

If you are white, things tend to work better for you…hell, companies are even prepared to spend R20m to protest your murder. Not only that, the police will work harder and make sure they arrest the people responsible for your demise, and the courts will be as inspired and convict and sentence the guilty party in record time! If only the system worked as well for everyone else. I have read of cases where people spend YEARS in prison, awaiting a trial! And then we have this white dude who gets murdered and his case jumps to the front of the queue – why? Because he is white!

Paul Harris…eish! So they claim to have withdrawn the campaign after ‘consulting broadly’…does this guy not know that it makes him look even more stupid? So, he decided to have this campaign without consulting broadly? And what is with this whole thing about wanting Thabo Mbeki to publicly admit that crime is out of hand? So, assuming he does that…will the bickering stop? And exactly what do they mean by saying that crime is now ‘out of hand’? There are communities that have been ravaged by crime. The Cape Flats is well-known for the crime levels there, but how come Mr Harris has not felt compelled to use R20m of shareholders’ money to put out a campaign to urge the President to make crime a priority? I’ll tell you why? Because the normally rich white folks do not stay there! Now that this crime – which a lot of the population has been living with – has reached the white areas…and it has resulted in the death of a ‘world-renowned’ historian, there is such a huge outcry!

Speaking of outcries! A friend mentioned to me that none of our news papers in SA is owned by a black South African. By owned, he meant that they can influence the agenda - not some toothless BEE deal. The only black owned newspaper is owned by a Zimbabwean. The other one was owned by a Nigerian (interestingly enough, that folded due to lack of funding – and yet we have companies that make no apologies for blowing R20m on an ill-conceived campaign). That should put an end to any ideas you had of SA having an ‘independent media’. On a day after a young black girl had been brutally murdered in Soweto, the focus of the newspapers was on FNB being ‘bullied’ into withdrawing their planned campaign?! Oh, I forget, we focus on the white folks! All eyes on the white folks! R20m could have been used to clear out the veld where this girl was murdered. Rather, Mr Paul Harris, in his infinite wisdom decided to use it to come up with a campaign intended to highlight a matter on which everyone is in agreement!

What am I missing???