Dear Mr President, Can you look us in the eye and tell us why?

Some residents of Johannesburg have been without running water for more than two weeks.

This morning I was listening to P!nk’s “Dear Mr. President” when my phone pinged with a WhatsApp message from a family member in Johannesburg. “Our regular morning roll call these days” it read below a screen shot from a neighbourhood WhatsApp group. 

The first message from a neighbor read: “Anybody have water?” Then followed message after message confirming that none of the streets in the area had any water. It was the 20th day of no running water for most of them. 

While I was reading this, P!nk was singing her questions to the then-American president in the background and suddenly I wanted to shout out my own questions to our President.  

I really like Cyril Ramaphosa. I always have since I was privileged to work with him in parliament during the early days of our democracy. I truly believe that he wants this country to succeed, because he dearly loves South Africa and her people. I know that there was no other reason for him to become president, since he was already rich and famous enough. He did not need this enormously demanding job – a job made infinitely more difficult by his predecessor’s mess – not to mention COVID, riots and extreme weather events. 

So, I have always felt (and still do) that he is the best and possibly only person who can lead the country at the moment. 

Yet, somehow this morning that WhatsApp message broke something in me, because I had just read that the President had signed off on the new Ministerial handbook. Amongst other things, it now allows cabinet members up to R700 000 for a new ministerial car. (This is a lot, but I guess they need safe cars to take them all over the country for official engagements). 

But what really got to me was that the new rules now exempt cabinet ministers from paying for water and electricity – both which they get without any interruptions. (The state will pay for generators if their houses are in areas affected by loadshedding). This, all while hospitals have been begging to be exempt from loadshedding since they can no longer afford to run generators any longer.

I could also not help but think of an elderly friend of my mothers who is depended on oxygen. When there is loadshedding, she has to go to the frail care section in the old age home where she lives, as that is the only place where there is a generator. However, since they don’t have a bed for her she has to sit there at night in the dark on a chair until loadshedding is over – so that she can keep on breathing.  

Of course, I know that many people in this country have never had access to running water or electricity, and that the wealthy suburbs of Johannesburg are now experiencing what many in the townships have had to live with all their lives. However, are these not the things that were supposed to have changed after 1994? 

I am also aware that in the greater scheme of things, the money the ministerial electricity and water will cost the state is actually quite insignificant. Compared to the billions lost to corruption, this will be small change. 

However, it is the optics that are beyond bad. It is just so tone deaf to change the rules to make electricity free for ministers at the exact time that ordinary South Africans have to deal with massive increases in electricity costs whilst coping with ongoing black outs. It is also tone deaf to tell ministers that they can now use as much water as they want - for free - when many people in the economic center of the country have had no running water for more than two weeks. 

It seems so uncaring, so callous that one has to wonder what on earth could motivate such a decision.

This made me think that if I was P!nk this is what I would have sung to our President:

Dear Mr. President,
Come and take a walk with me
Let's pretend we're just two people and
You're not better than me
I'd like to ask you some questions if we can speak honestly:

I know that you feel sad when you see all the homeless on the street, 

but why then do you allow your ministers to keep their fancy homes and tables loaded with too much food to eat?

I know that you feel bad when you hear of women being raped while walking home through the park, 

but why then give your ministers free electricity that stays on when the rest of the country goes dark? 

I know that you also cry when children die, 

but why then give your ministers free water when others drink where faeces lie?

And why allow ministers to buy such fancy cars 

when we are still waiting for the crooks to end up behind bars? 

Dear Mr. President,

Can you please look us in the eye
And tell us why?