Carrot, stick and the lockdown
A friend started a bakeoff challenge on Facebook and tagged me to respond to her initial apple pie bake. I duly liked, replied and tagged a couple of my friends that I know bake a decent loaf or two. No one I tagged took up the challenge. Most likely they went out jogging on the Sea Point promenade on Friday and have not been seen since. Probably feeling sorry for me, another friend jumped in and posted her carrot cake bake. This random act of kindness got me thinking about solidarity, South Africa’s carrot and stick lockdown and a few other things too.
I’m a bit baked-out to be honest, having been baking as a side hustle for the past four years. Not a very serious side-hustle as you can tell from my absence in the business of the year award winners list and my priority ranking on my banks to-call list. I am however very happy to see the endless posts from hundreds of people getting live yeast starters going and producing some really good looking sourdough bakes. More people baking their own bread is good for all of us because it should translate into better bread being available in more stores and bakeries. Better bread equals better health and that’s a good thing for all of us.
Also the lockdown in South Africa is supposed to be a good thing for us and by and large it does seem to have worked in slowing the corona virus spread in the country and buying the medical sector some time to prepare for an onslaught that will put a regular month-end weekend at the Baragwanath Emergency Room to shame.
But the government’s more-stick, less-carrot approach is not universally loved, even if there was a brief algae bloom of love for President Cyril Ramaphosa and the ‘we-are-led’ meme crowd on Twitter and Facebook.
The subsequent announcements by Minister of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs, Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma (aka NDZ to Twitter haters) together with Ebrahim Patel (of ill-fitting suit and questionable tie choices) made it clear that they were the bad cops to the President’s good cop. Their slash and burn pronouncements saw cigarette sales and roast chickens going up in smoke. Plans to grab half-price summer dresses or discounted flip-flops were dashed and hope for celebratory runs to stock up on Devils Peak lager and fynbos gin were tossed on the raging funeral pyre of our civil liberties.
Or at least that’s what it looked like on Twitter.
Minister of Police, Bheki Cele is his own cop and needs no help to paint himself (and the entire state security apparatus)not just into corners, but around them too. At least he seems to expend a little more effort than Patel on getting a half decent suit, so he scores half a point there.
And the lockdown stick beats the drum, but not to a rhythm that would make one dream of Tumi Mogorosi live on the now defunct Orbit jazz club stage but more like an overweight WWE wrestler in armour, having a hypoglycemic seizure on a tin-roof.
The South African cabinet which consists of mostly retirement age veterans has taken to deciding that smoking tobacco is bad for you, drinking alcohol is worse for you and a hot roasted chicken from Woolies is the devil’s doing manifest. None of which makes any sense to millions of people in South Africa who have never had enough moolah to spend R80 on a freshly roasted Woolies chicken anyway. But let’s not get too involved with that last little detail right now. There’s time yet for it to haunt us.
Because this is 2020, we are in the midst of the fourth industrial revolution, the clouds we refer to are not cumulus or cirrus, artificial intelligence and big data are the keys to the bright future of convergence and they all come together in spectacularly beautiful infographics that no one really understands. We nod sagely at the mention of the Internet of Things and wonder if this includes the things (we didn’t need) that we just ordered at half-price off Takealot. The Chief Information Officer is king and data mining is his space-age lightsaber to unlock value and do other magical things we have been hereto far too dumb to do. It was a bright and shimmering age of light, mostly of the Danish designed, Chinese made LED variety which we know messes with the human brain.
Or so it was before the lockdowns started rolling across the world.
Now, those loud voices — to use the words of another friend from Twitter — are “hiding under the bed mainlining chocolate mousse and quietly howling in despair.” She said it in jest, as one does on Twitter, but probably meant it in all seriousness. Or at least I could relate to it in all seriousness.
Except in Sweden, where they are going for the herd-immunity option, though not by design as they are at pains to point out — but by accident. As an unintended outcome of the rest of their strategy; which seen from the perspective of someone who knows as much about medical science as I do about rocket science, seems mostly in order. Just keep in mind, these same people invented the practice of going from a steaming hot sauna straight into a snowbank, usually in their knickers and often in much less. So they’re pretty well equipped to try out other crazy things and it may help us all in the end. More power to the mad Swedes.
If I’ve learnt anything from these last 39 days of lockdown — no, I’ve not been out to join the hordes in Delta Park or Sea Point because I’ve had this crazy notion that the corona virus did not get the memo that “my fellow South Africans” had downgraded it since Friday morning — is that everything we were as a country and people were before the Corona virus hit us; remains utterly intact.
The entitled class (of all races, and whiners to the last one) will complain about anything and everything they can on every platform they have access to.
The corrupt amongst our government officials will remain corrupt and will literally steal the food from the mouths of our starving compatriots.
The Police and state security apparatus will be as heavy handed and insanely violent towards our (and let’s be statistically correct here and say mostly black) compatriots.
The few in any group (this time it was some Wahabi Muslims but could have just as easily have been Midrand residents or Datsun drivers) will always get onto the shortest Shetland pony they can find and use their religion, culture, or some other distinguisher to claim special privileges.
The kanjoos (meaning miser or miserly behaviour — to use a word of Urdu origin) will always find a reason to not pay their fair share to those who need it the most. In this case, largely middle-class South Africans of all races not continuing to pay their (mostly black) household workers wages during the lockdown.
People of all classes and races not bothering with physical distancing, gathering in large groups and crowds; for fun or from desperate need.
In short, all the things about us as a nation, the identity politics, the choices we make about all sorts of things every day remains totally intact in this time of the corona virus and lockdown. It was never going to magically vanish and a visit to Twitter, a listen in to a radio station, a glance at a newspaper, a casual conversation with your neighbour — will confirm that we are as South Africans are, pretty much as we were before. The corona virus outbreak and the COVID-19 pandemic have merely sharpened those idiosyncrasies and contradictions (and the movement of contraband smokes and booze).
But before you slash your wrists or prepare to slash mine for any or all of the observations from lockdown, allow me to share some of the good stuff — because after all — a bird does not fly with one wing, nor does a sensible person even attempt to eat ribs with one hand.
Regular people (of all races but mostly working and middle-class at least in terms of income) will always step up to help those in need. They will do this without being asked. They will self organise through their own networks, their religious affiliations, the non-profits they support, their neighborhoods, even their sports and leisure networks.
They will respond rapidly and pivot with agility, they will work relentlessly, with humour, with good grace with nothing less than love. They will do so with compassion and friendliness and with the genuine spirit of solidarity with their fellow human beings. And probably post too many badly composed pictures of their good deeds on Facebook.
They will do this in small villages you’ve never heard of, in towns you’ve only ever driven past, in the parts of the cities that you drive through very quickly with windows up and mace in your lap.
These people are the office workers, the teachers, ladies who lunch and the bankers who overcharge you on fees, the bloggers, the musicians and policy analysts, the accountants and builders and the farmers and the tavern owners and the bus drivers. By and large, they are doing this work with money out of their own pockets. These people, regardless of where they might live, are our collective kasi sterries.
They are the manifestation of what I’d like to think is what we, collectively as South Africans want to see more of happen in this time of lockdown. And, going into the post lockdown era, whatever that may look like.
So Mr President, enough of the stick, all of these people — the people doing what no government anywhere in the world could possibly hope to achieve — need more carrots.
I know you’ve got a pile of open letters, appeals and even a few court cases filling up your inbox right now, so I won’t presume to tell you what those carrots should be.
Everyone, their lawyer and their cousin (usually the latter two are the same person) seem to know exactly what needs to be done — so you’re covered on the advisory front. But If you need any help getting your live yeast starter going or help with the perfect open crumb — I can hook you up.
I’ll trust that between yourself and our old-age home fronting as a cabinet, you’ll figure it out.
Carrots for all, Mr President. Carrots for all!
