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Archive for the ‘South Africa’ Category

Public Servants Strike South Africa – Cosatu are murderers and hooligans !!

25 Aug

The public servants strike currently affecting South Africa like a black plague is now really getting out of control. Cosatu has stooped to new lows in inciting their members to strike, disrupt, intimidate, damage, destroy and essentially to murder too. Murder you say? Yes I DO !!!

As a result of the public servants strike, hospital workers have allowed sick people and babies to die, that my friend is what we call MURDER because it has been done intentionally. Cosatu therefore are directly responsible and have blood on their hands. The leadership of Cosatu should be arrested, locked up and left to die. Oh I’m being harsh ??? Really ??? Is what they’ve done excusable? Is it acceptable ? Is murder okay when you’re trying to make a point? No No NO it’s not frikkin okay and it never will be either !!!!

Everyone thought when we had black leadership in this country that things would change, well nothing’s changed. The same scenes you are seeing on TV today are the same things we saw on TV 20 years ago. Then it was under white leadership, now it’s under black leadership but the picture is still the same. In fact I lie, the picture today is even worse because the ex-government would not have tolerated this kind of despicable behaviour yet the ANC are too timid to show they have any balls. 20 years ago we saw white policeman firing rubber bullets at hoards of hooligans, today we see black policeman doing the same thing, what has changed? Nothing !!!

Of course the ANC will always find a way to keep blaming this kind of behaviour on Apartheid but really that excuse is growing weak now, they’ve had control of the country for 16 years and not even they can control the holligans. They can take another 100 years and it will still be the same, and they’ll still be blaming Apartheid. The ANC will never own up to their own faults but they may eventually realise that there is just no controlling these barbaric masses that tick the vote boxes for them.

The fact that the military has been called in to assist hospitals etc, should be enough reason for the govt to declare war against the strikers, but as I said earlier, there’s a big lack of testicles.

What amazes me is that the Cosatu fat cats still earn their whopping salaries while the people they brainwash go unpaid, and they’re too thick to realise they are the puppets of a few greedy men. The effect this action will have on the economy and inflation will far outweigh any benefits the strikers are seeking, so even if they get their demands the knock on effect will see them worse off than before and of course, it’s the taxpayers that will fit the bill for all of this.

This country has no hope of a future as long as this barbarianism is allowed to thrive, we will end up like every other African nation. The “little” bit of good that came of the World Cup has been undone in less than a month …. WELL DONE COSATU ….. WELL DONE !!!

 
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Posted in Life, South Africa

 

South African Idol – Just how Fair is a voting system that does not work?

23 Aug

It seems that year after year we keep seeing just how poor our cell phone network operators are at handling mass volume SMS systems like the South African Idol’s voting system. Since last night’s Idol’s show sending votes through has been a tiresome task, every try results in a nasty “Network Out Of Order” message and this requires you the voter to keep retrying. Not only is the Idol’s voting system unable to accept the plethora of votes coming in but it has also dragged down the regular SMS system.

Last night the first vote I tried to send went through after 7 tries, the second vote went through after 15 tries and my third vote I only managed to send this morning as I just gave up last night. This morning however I again had to send the vote about 3 times to get it through and a regular SMS to my friend over the Vodacom network took me 5 retries. This just once again proves how our cellular operators charge us an arm and a leg for a service and are unable to spend the money increasing the size of their network to actually handle the load, a simple show like Idol’s drags a cellular network to it’s knees year after year and I doubt we’ll see much change when Idols 2011 comes along either. Why? Because the network operators quite simply will remain profteering without putting enough of that cash back to good use. I hope ICASA is listening.

Now the question? Just how fair is such a poorly managed voting system to the contestants? The voting lines are open until 10pm tonight to allow for people to vote (with all the network errors) BUT the onus is on you the voter to remember to vote. Most people now get busy on Monday morning and can easily get carried away with their regular work week and forget to vote but if they had had the chance to get their votes through last night while it was fresh in their minds they would be able to carry on with their week knowing it’s already done. So how many contestants lose valuable votes as a result of this and see themselves out next week just because their friends could not vote?

I think until South African mobile operators can offer world class service to such shows, the producers should look at alternative solutions for such shows. When we get our next SA Idol, think to yourself just how accurate of a reflection that is from the voting public. Boo to shoddy cellular network services.

 
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Posted in South Africa, Television and Movies

 

I have renewed faith in the South African Justice System – aka. Jackie Selebi gets 15 years !!

03 Aug

Just heard on the news that Jackie Selebi was sentenced to 15 years in prison for his crimes. I had personally given up all hope of any justice system left in South Africa but today my faith has been renewed. It is good to see justice being served and it gives me hope for the future of this country.

I sure hope that the justice system will retain it’s independence and remain free from the ANC’s constant tampering with laws to try and protect themselves. We’re not quite out of the water yet and pieces of legislation like the “Protection of Information Bill” which is a bill designed by the ANC to “protect” anything they the government deem as “secret”, which amounts to just about anything.

So while I have renewed faith in the justice system, a piece of legislation like the Protection of Information Bill can give the ANC the power it needs to further avoid any dealing with the law. Should anything be requisitioned by a court and that document falls under the Protection of Information Act, the court will not be able to access the documents. Isn’t that oh so convenient. The bill also allows the ANC to prosecute anyone (media especially) who print anything that is deemed to fall under this act and of course the ANC can change their minds overnight so if you print something today, they might just decide tonight that what you printed falls under the new act and decide to lock you up the next morning …. hmmmm ….. dangerous bit of legislation this is.

 
3 Comments

Posted in South Africa

 

i-Stuff

02 Aug

Thought this was very funny :)

Got my son an iPhone for his birthday the other week and he was overjoyed

Recently got my daughter an iPod for hers, and was told I’m the best dad in
the world

I was dead chuffed when the family clubbed together and bought me an iPad
for father’s day.

Then we all clubbed together and got my wife an iRon for her birthday and it
was around then that the fight started.

 
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Posted in South Africa

 

Some delayed in egg in the face of the World Cup – FIFA Chief Financial Officer Shot in Joburg

28 Jul

Was waiting for the day this would happen. Not all peaches and cream as it it made out to be.

From News 24

Police were on Wednesday following leads on the whereabouts of gunmen who shot the chief financial officer for FIFA’s local organising committee outside his home in Sandton, Johannesburg, a spokesperson said.

“I can’t really tell you what happened, but we were called to attend to a shooting at Gallo Manor at about 10 in the morning yesterday [Tuesday],” said Captain Kym Cloete.

Full article

This news does NOT make me happy, but it is indicative of the real South Africa, not the South Africa that was staged to the world for 30 days during June/July 2010. Now it will be interesting to see how quickly (if at all) the police apprehend the person(s) concerned, given that on an average day the police are unable to catch anything but the sniffles. I wonder with some FIFA clout if it will make any difference to catching the shooter??? Hmmm, we’ll see.

 
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Posted in South Africa

 

How many South African Millionaire’s did the 2010 World Cup Produce?

28 Jul

The road leading to the 2010 Soccer World Cup in South Africa had many South African’s thinking they were going to become Millionaire’s in a month. People were renting out their houses at ludicrous rates and then moving in with family for the month or moving into their garages while guests occupied their houses. Hotels, Lodges and Venues bumped their rates to insanely high amounts to capitalise as much as possible on tourists. But from the migration figures quoted by the department of home affairs, figures of visitors to South Africa were rather dismal. Add to this the fact that Match (FIFA’s hospitality wing) dropped huge blocks of bookings a mere 8 weeks before the events started with no remuneration to those concerned. This no doubt left many establishments unable to fill those spots at such short notice.

I know of several establishments in my area who did not go with Match, kept their rates only very slightly elevated above what they would normally charge and as a result were booked up almost the entire period whereas those who stood with empty rooms trying to catch people at R5000 pppn stood empty.

It seems many people were under the illusion that tourists are stupid and don’t know what things cost and really thought they would become rich in a month from World Cup visitors but I think many of them got a nasty surprise indeed.

I really wonder just how many millionaire’s (other than FIFA) the 2010 World Cup Produced.

Know something I don’t or have a great success story please comment about it.

 
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Posted in Life, South Africa

 

What’s up with MIDRAND’s roads?

27 Jul

I used to live in Midrand (Halfway House) up until 8 years ago and lived there for 7 years. Midrand was the up and coming place to be, growth like nowhere else in the Southern Hemisphere and teaming with new business. Midrand was THE destination for a corporate head office and a much sought after place to live.

Midrand has unfortunately had a permanent problem with it’s town council, namely that it’s stifled with inhouse politics and infighting, and the result of this shows in the dismally poor way in which this city is managed and it’s NOT to do with any shortage of taxes because Midrand was and probably still is one of the more expensive places to live when it comes to taxes. This was sure how the town council ran when we lived there and I doubt much has changed.

In particular the road system of Midrand sucks more than an Electrolux. Hardly anything is done to maintain the roads.

- There are potholes all over the place and in the last year hardly any of them have been fixed and they keep growing in number and in size.

- Kyalami Road which leads through Crowthorne, and is the main entrance to Beaulieu, has remained in the same state for as long as I have been going to Midrand (20+ years), not ONE change or modification has been done to improve that. Daily this road is absolute chaos with tailbacks stretching for several kilometres. The intersection at Crowthorne is littered with stones and loose particles which causes those with fancier cars to slow down so as not to scratch their cars and this causes even further congestion. The road surface is warped, cracked and uneven but in nearly 15 years diddly squat has been done to amend it. To add to the traffic chaos it’s doubtful you’ll ever find a pointsmen on duty there to help traffic flow.

- Van Heerden road which runs past the High school and Primary school is absolutely shocking, I drove there last week and nearly lost a front tyre due to the massive pothole there, luckily the vehicle in front of me swerved out. Had it been at night that would have caused serious damage. It probably has already caused damages to numerous vehicles travelling that road at night. It’s NOT like Van Heerden road does not carry some serious traffic, so why then are repairs not being carried out and timeously?

- Almost all heavily used back roads are in a rather dismal state too, again it’s not like the Midrand town council does not know how much traffic these roads carry it seems more like they just don’t care.

I struggle to believe that maintenance is being held back from a lack of taxes, I think it’s more of a case of a lack of ability or lack of knowledge on spending public funds wisely or the funds are being used for “other purposes”. Either this is the case or the Midrand Town Council is still stifled by the politics and infighting as it was when I lived there.

Midrand ratepayers should really not be just accepting that this is the way it is, it takes a bit of effort to stand up and fight for what’s right but on the surface it appears nobody is actually doing that. I just avoid Midrand like the plague, on occasion I have no choice but to go there but every time it is the most unpleasant experience. I’ve even told my one suppliers to move shop and they actually did not disagree with me.

 
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Posted in Life, South Africa

 

Have the expensive upgrades to the Rigel Avenue Offramp (M9/R50 – Centurion) been as effective as planned?

27 Jul

I regularly travel to Pretoria and have been doing so for years now. The Rigel Avenue off-ramp has always had a backlog of cars often resulting in waiting for 3-4 changes of the traffic lights to make it through. Last year some very expensive upgrades to the Rigel off-ramp and bridge were carried out. The upgrades look all fab and wonderful to the untrained eye and it certainly looks very modern and impressive BUT has it achieved the desired result? Has it improved traffic flow?

From my personal experience using this new off-ramp several times already I say not really. The upgrade to the off-ramp has added an extra lane which thereby can hold more traffic but there is not much difference to the flow of traffic. You can get to Rigel avenue now and still wait 3-4 changes of the traffic light to get through, how is that different?

The real problem is not so much the upgrades, I believe the upgrades were the correct thing to do and were much needed, it’s the timing and operation of the traffic lights that is still causing a problem and it’s probably been left up to some plunket to manage that side of things. When the traffic light changes it allows barely 16-20 vehicles through at a time which keeps a constant backlog of 3-4 changes of the traffic light to make it through. Had these Einstein’s set the light to be green for a mere 30 seconds longer at least 50 vehicles could make it through.

I hope this is just an oversight from the traffic planning department and I do hope to see it amended. Right now as it stands I give them a thumbs down.

 
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Posted in Life, South Africa

 

Excuse my ignorance but what is the meaning of Waka-Waka?

26 Jul

I’ve tried to no avail to find the meaning of Waka-Waka, the official song by Shakira and Freshly Ground for the World Cup 2010 in SA. Having grown up in SA I’ve never ever heard the term Waka-Waka and I wondered if anyone else knew the meaning of this term. Personally it sounds very “Oz” like to me, but I may be very wrong. Love to hear any feedback on this.

 
2 Comments

Posted in South Africa

 

Horrible Hendrik Potgieter (The Road)

25 Jul

Hendrik Potgieter road has got to be one of the most frustrating roads to drive on, I’ve been driving it for 4 years and the frustration and aggravation never ends.

First off Hendrik Potgieter which runs from Hillfox, through Clearwater, Little Falls, Strubens Valley and Ruimsig has got to have some of the thickest drivers in South Africa. Everyone is going somewhere but nobody seems to know where they are going.

The road is the same size it has been for the last 20 years yet authorities somehow granted licenses for massive housing and shopping mall developments without so much as a hint of road upgrade plans and this road today carries probably thousands of cars an hour which results in daily chaos on this road.

The next bad thing about Hendrik Potgieter is that road, from start to finish has a speed limit of 90 km/h yet everybody seems to want to drive 50-60 km/h clearly showing that nobody even reads traffic signs anymore these days nor has any consideration for other drivers.

Some serious road upgrades need to be done to this road but like with everything else in SA, municipalities are either uncapable of spending rates and taxes appropriately or are using the money for “other” things. If nothing is done within the next year, and the housing developments keep growing as they are, this road will be gridlocked for hours on end on a daily basis. The ratepayers of those areas need to take action and FORCE change where change is due.

 
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Posted in Life, South Africa

 
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