So, into 2007...

Well, it is either ignorance or optimism…whatever it is, South Africans continue to demand and accept credit…chills my heart when I think of what could happen if interest rates are raised higher this year…I shall be hoping that at the very worst, they are kept at the current level…

Anyway...I read - with great amusement – about the call by the youth league of Solidarity to be spared from affirmative action. They were talking about a comprehensive campaign in 2007 to demand that young people be exempt from affirmative action. They even had research results to back their demands. A survey by Markinor revealed that 53% of 100 youths surveyed were not in favour of affirmative action for young people (would love to see the sample breakdown of those 100 participants by race and area!...at any rate, a result of 53% does indicate ample reason not to change the current government policy).

The whole thrust of this campaign will be that those who started and completed their education during the period after 1994 (post-apartheid era) should not be ‘punished’ for something they played no part in. Almost sounds reasonable, doesn’t it? However, I think what the young Afrikaners are missing is that the issue is now not so much about having played a part during apartheid, but rather, the issue is about having benefited from apartheid. This is the imbalance that affirmative action is intended to redress.

Just to illustrate how far we still have to go…the typical white child will go to an expensive day-care facility (unless he/she has a great, but underpaid, black nanny to look after him/her)…then on to an expensive nursery school…then on to a private school all the way to high school…then on passing matric, he/she will get a car as a present…and will be given a wide choice of universities to go to…along with the option to take a year off to travel the world…of course, throughout his/her life he/she goes on holidays all over the world and pretty much lives thee life…and upon turning 21 he/she is informed of a huge trust fund that was set up for him/her at birth...

This is where the majority of black people need to get to before we can speak of apartheid being safely in the past…but let’s face it, 2014 is really not that far away…black people, we need to get our sh*t together!!!

As for Ernst Roets (the Solidarity youth chairperson), let me save you the suspense…it ain’t gonna happen!…2014 is really not that far off…but then again, you are just a politician in the making…you go boy!