Would the last democrat leaving South Africa please turn out the lights…

 

 

So here we have it, at last. It has been a while coming, but come it has.

 

Not that it has been unexpected. It was bound to happen eventually, in one way or another.

 

Many very astute and able writers have been trying - for some considerable time - to show how South Africa has been slowly descending into the abyss. More recently Spearpoint has (with far less ability and effectiveness) added his own voice to the warnings that have been increasingly thronging the various media available to us in this country.

 

I fear that it will all be to no avail.

 

The pessimism, even despair, which has silently pervaded South African society over the last decade or so, is now gaining increasing momentum even amongst those who celebrated the most after the release of Nelson Mandela.

 

Now we begin to see the true colours of our Rainbow Nation; colours that were once purposefully and skillfully hidden behind shimmering nebulae of rhetoric and political razzle-dazzle are now being glimpsed more often as the perceived need for global political respectability is, more and more, discarded as the ANC and its puppet masters gain in confidence and arrogance.

 

Today, the legislation to disband the elite crime-fighting unit known as the Scorpions has been tabled in Parliament.

 

Modeled broadly on the FBI, the Scorpions have proven to be a formidable and largely untouchable crime-fighting force that has shown little or no favour and has appeared to be indefatigable in the pursuit of those who would place themselves above the law. They have been a very necessary foil to the poorly performing South African Police Service.

 

Why the ANC has bothered to involve Parliament escapes me. South Africa is a dictatorship of the elected majority party (the ANC), with absolutely no prospect of any realistic challenge to the current status quo being mounted through the ballot box anytime in the next couple of generations.

 

The ANC might as well come clean and rule by decree. It would save them and the rest of the world time, effort and embarrassment over the increasingly amateurish attempts to legitimise their fumbling realisations of their ambitions.

 

The signs have around for a long time.

 

• The selection of a party leader – soon to be the country’s President - who is awaiting trial on corruption and related charges investigated and brought by the Scorpions.
• The blatant and public protection by the current President of the country – with the tacit approval of the ANC - of the national Police Commissioner who faces serious charges investigated and brought by the Scorpions.
• The blatant and unashamed protection of numerous public officials and office holders who have either admitted or have been convicted of innumerable offences ranging from drunk driving through fraud, embezzlement and worse.
• The blasé and indifferent approach to, and acceptance of, crime levels unparalleled outside of war zones such as Iraq. (An example – it is generally accepted that a rape occurs in South Africa every 23 seconds. Do the math – 1.4 million rapes per annum in a population estimated at around 45-50 million people).
• The awesome drift from reality embodied in the continuing and, until very recently, unquestioning support of rogue and repressive states such as Zimbabwe and Burma – behaviour which has led to the ridicule and scorn of the rest of the world, to say nothing of the loss of life and liberty of those poor unfortunates living in those countries.

 

And these are but a very few of the straws that have been blowing in the wind in recent years.

 

The Scorpions are but a single example of the lengths to which the ANC, COSATU and the South African Communist Party (all members of the tri-partite alliance which rules South Africa but of which only the ANC presents itself for election before the people of the country) are prepared to go in order to exclude themselves from scrutiny by both the courts and the electorate.

 

When will the people of South Africa – as well as the rest of the world – awaken to the fact of the immense confidence trick being played upon them at their expense?

 

Do we have to wait for the raids on the newspapers and televisions stations to become more frequent? (It has already happened). Will we only realise our plight when the Internet and blogs are monitored, controlled and restricted? Will we have to wait for the situation in Zimbabwe to become a reality for South Africa (and so memorably and eloquently expressed by the unknown Zimbabwean who voiced it by saying “We have freedom of expression; we just don’t have freedom after expression”)? Will we wait until the cadres of the ANC and SACP are joined on their nightly dissent-suppression street patrols by armed MK war veterans? Will we wait for the type of bloodbath that surely lurks, Kenya-like, in Zimbabwe’s near future?

 

The writing is on the wall. We ignore it at our peril. We run the risk of a bovine-like acceptance of the denial and corruption of the hopes and aspirations of an entire country already brutalised in the not-too-distant past. Or, simultaneously, we run the risk of opening the door to hotheads and armed reactionaries eager to turn back the clock.

 

And as much as Spearpoint harbours hopes for this country and its people, it is very much my profound fear that already it is too late and that the time is nigh for the call to go out, “Would the last democrat leaving South Africa please turn out the lights”.

 

 

Spearpoint

13^th May 2008

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

More on Food and Fuel Prices…

 

 

 

 

 

 

A thought occurs…

 

Eskom, as we are all probably aware by now, seems to be hell-bent on hiking their tariffs to the ordinary South African electricity consumer by 53% this year and by a similar amount next year.

 

I now wonder if, just maybe, we poor and long-suffering victims of the South African corporate and political robber barons might reasonably expect a small glimmer of light at the end of this seemingly endless tunnel of despair in which we find ourselves.

 

In the vein of any good communist or socialist government, it was recently announced by our inefficacious Minister of Health that certain (unspecified) interventionist steps were being considered on the present crisis over rocketing food prices.

 

Just to digress for a moment – why such an announcement should be made by the Minister of Health rather than the Minister for Trade and Industry or the Minister of Finance I find to be confusing. Whilst I am sure that there are public health concerns to be considered if the very poor cannot afford to buy their staple foods, I do feel that any interventions – even in the form of food stamps – would be better managed as part of an overall economic and financial strategy led by the Department of Finance and whose Minister has shown some reasonable degree of competence over the past few years.

 

Anyway, to get back to the point I wish to make…

 

Now, if the South African government is demonstrating a willingness to change its stance and to interfere with normal market forces on food prices then surely, in order to be consistent, it should also consider a similar intervention on fuel and electricity prices.

 

There are several ways in which considerable assistance could be offered to the consumer without necessarily distorting the market and its operations.

 

For example:

1.       VAT could be reduced or removed for all foods, fuels and power supplies;

2.       Eskom could be required to either cease the supply of one third of our total production of electricity for export at the ridiculous price of eleven cents per kilowatt or to export it at prices which would give a far better return, thereby obviating the need to impose punitive tariff hikes on South African domestic consumers;

3.       The fuel industry could be de-regulated so that competition could be allowed on the forecourt and so that supplies of oil could be sourced in a manner that would free South Africans from the artificial and arbitrary pegging of spot prices to the Singapore market;

4.       Introduce new trading rules to control and penalize the exorbitant profiteering in the various commodity (particularly foodstuffs and fuel) markets that results from the unfettered and unnecessary trading, re-trading and re-re-trading of essential goods and commodities.

5.       As previously advocated by Spearpoint, the government could also abolish all direct and indirect taxes (e.g. income, provisional, dividend, corporate, payroll, VAT, fuel levies, compensation, UIF, provincial, municipal, etc. etc. etc. etc….) and replace them with a single, simple “consumer” tax on all goods and services (excepting food, fuel and electricity) in various bands. Thus, incomes would be maximized and protected and the tax burden for individuals and companies would be defined by how much they spent within all sectors of the economy. The tax could be designed and collected on much the same basis as VAT, thereby saving vast amounts in collection costs and public service staffing costs.

 

I am sure that there are other ways in which commerce could be stimulated whilst making the sharing of the tax onus across the entire population far fairer than it is at present. It just requires a little imagination on the part of the government.

 

Most importantly, however, the government, through its own initiative on food prices, has now opened the door to the possibility of constructive intervention in other, critical, sectors of the market economy.

 

Now they must get on with it…

 

 

Spearpoint.

13 May 2008

 

 

 

 

Eskom - Such Great Guys….pfft!

 

 

 

 

Why am I not too terribly surprised that the mismanagers of our electricity utility, Eskom, have done it again?

 

It’s a wonder that these guardians of our national electrical infrastructure don’t have tails wagging from their foreheads and noses on their behinds. Yet again yesterday they demonstrated, to mix the metaphor slightly, that they can’t tell their elbows from their fundaments.

 

After the unprecedented introduction of unnecessary, random and widespread power cuts (‘load shedding’) throughout South Africa late last year, these mismanagers then proceeded inexplicably to relax those early this year – quickly followed by a programme of what they variously called ‘pre-emptive’ or ‘predictive’ scheduled periods of blackouts based on a two-week cycle.

 

So we all begin to think to ourselves “Great! At long last these guys have finally begun to show a little competence and professionalism by getting their act together and allowing us all to be able to plan our lives around a fixed timetable of power cuts”. Still a bad situation, but one now that appeared to be showing signs of being managed.

 

Then, last week Eskom announced that, owing to the fact that South Africa was to chaotically cram three public holidays into a single week (between 28^th April and 2^nd May), load shedding was to be suspended for that week because the bulk of energy-hungry industry would be closed and its personnel enjoying itself either on the coast, in the bush somewhere or cowering at home trying desperately not to spend the money they will be needing in the near future to meet the increasing costs of food, petrol and their mortgages.

 

This time we all think “Great! A bit of relief from having to juggle our lives to Eskom’s tune”.

 

Now, to cap it all, yesterday Eskom announced that, with effect from 4^th May (next Monday) they would suspend all future scheduled load shedding because they were confident that the bulk of what they claimed to be necessary in terms of saving electricity could now be achieved without imposing blackouts on the country.

 

Now I’m not one (normally) to look a gift horse in the mouth – even an equine of such doubtful pedigree and value as this. But the constant about-facing of Eskom over the past few months really takes the biscuit and reinforces my personal belief and assertion that every one of the board and senior managers of Eskom should be removed from their posts and put in a place of safety – ours, not theirs.

 

(Those of you wishing to have a look at my previous posts on this particular matter of the spleen can find them by back-tracking on this site. I’m sorry, but I haven’t yet figured out how to insert those sexy little links into my posts. Maybe I won’t anyway – I want to encourage as many people as possible to actually read the other posts on other subjects that I have, so far, managed to wrench from my keyboard. See – an ulterior motive for ignorance and indolence.)

 

So…what began as a crisis, with recriminations and screams of outrage flying in every direction, then eased, then escalated into punitive scheduled blackouts and now appears to have relaxed so much that one is tempted to assert that there never was a crisis in the first place.

 

Shortly after the ‘crisis’ began it became known that Eskom was exporting one full third of its total production to neighbouring countries. It has now been stated that those exports were sold at prices significantly below the cost of production.

 

In other words, the South African consumer of electricity was subsidising – to a considerable degree – the governments importing South African electricity. (I can’t believe for one moment that the end users in those countries benefited from that subsidisation).

 

Excellent economics, Eskom. What’s the betting you got some nice fat bonuses for that little sleight of hand? And, no doubt, some kudos (or, perhaps, something rather more substantial) for the ANC politicians from their buddies around the continent…

 

Oh, and by the way, we South Africans contributed directly to the repression of the population of Zimbabwe by Robert Mugabe and his henchmen.

 

Gee, thanks. That’s really going to help me get to sleep at night.

 

On top of all that, we now learn that the serious consumers of electricity in South Africa – the mines, heavy industry and business in general – have been paying tariffs some 275% lower than the domestic consumer.

 

Bulk discounts (not normally a feature of the South African business mentality) I can understand. But 275% less is not a discount – it’s an outright gift. Subsidised by the domestic consumer – again.

 

There is no way that the vast majority of the electricity produced in this country (and consumed by industry) is sold at a loss. The stated profits of Eskom cannot possibly come solely from the domestic consumer.

 

So the domestic tariff, less 275%, as charged to industry, is hugely profitable to Eskom.

 

But sauce for the goose should also be sauce for the gander. Why is the domestic consumer not charged tariffs which are very much closer to the industrial rates (or vice versa, if the lies of Eskom were to be made more consistent)?

 

Why is Eskom fighting tooth and nail for a 100% increase in tariffs over the next twelve months? For the domestic user of electricity that is a killer of a hike in rates, but for industry it will be verging on the insignificant.

 

If Eskom needs funds to expand its generating and transmission capabilities (now doubtful, given the revelations about how much electricity is exported across our borders at charity prices), then why do the mismanagers of Eskom seek to extract the cost of their own screw-ups from their captive South African domestic consumers?

 

What is wrong with requiring higher charges for both the foreign customers and local industry? Why, in the name of all that is accepted as good practice in economics and business protocol in general, should we in South Africa subsidise the inefficiencies and malpractices elsewhere on our continent? Why should South Africa beggar itself for the rest of Africa?

 

And why does Eskom have only a one-dimensional approach to the problem – namely raising capital through tariffs?

 

There are other ways, such as, for example, raising a bond issue or creating and selling additional shares in its business. At least then those who can afford to subscribe to the capital expansion of Eskom could do so and those who can ill-afford mercilessly higher tariffs could continue to use electricity without having to sell their mothers-in-law and children into slavery.

 

It is clear that neither Eskom management nor the ANC government has the skill or the imagination to run and operate our precious electrical generation and transmission utility.

 

And because Eskom is a strategic national asset it should not be privatised, either. We neither want nor need the dubious benefits of parity pricing and gross profiteering that would, inevitably, result from such a move. Witness other countries around the world which have trodden that particular route. Power and water are public service utilities designed for public benefit and have no role within the commercial sector; they are too fundamental to the well-being of our nation and its people to be exposed to the rapine of the highest bidding speculator.

 

Rather operate the public utilities much as the State Electricity Commission was run in Victoria, Australia back in the 1960’s and 1970’s. A public utility, set up as a government commission charged with operating as a business - but without profit being the underlying raison d’etre.

 

We are being served by maleficent incompetents who have lied to us, failed in their due diligence and are, generally speaking, a pathetically sorry bunch of unimaginative time servers anxious more for their own benefices that those they are charged to protect and enable.

 

Please go away – all of you. Find something else – preferably in another place - that you can pervert and destroy.

 

Allow us to find those who are operationally able to run Eskom without destroying it, under the guidance of commercially competent managers who can foresee and prevent losses within a non-profit organisation.

 

Spearpoint.

1^st May 2008

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Rampant Food and Fuel Prices.

 

 

 

The hiatus in this blog of the last couple of weeks resulted from me traveling a bit through southern Africa on business.

 

You should understand that, being a white South African male over the age of fifty, affirmative action and all the “-isms” of age, gender and race render me all but unemployable in this Rainbow Nation of critical skills shortages – notwithstanding my degrees and international experience in my field. So when work does periodically present itself I am compelled to grab it and to fiercely focus on the tasks that promise, for the time being, to maintain the temporal connection of body and soul. When money beckons I must then temporarily forego some of my other - more pleasurable and satisfying – pursuits such as blogging. And, much as I enjoy writing, it pays no bills and I have this expensive addiction to breathing which must be periodically slaked with cash – preferably lots of it – whenever possible. Hence my recent absence.

 

I am not so enamoured of driving as once used to be the case; my politically-incorrect car is an ageing brute that punishes its driver for forcing a few thousand extra kilometres out of its creaking carcass. But, in addition to providing a solid upper-body workout, such driving allows time to reflect on Life, the Universe and Everything and thereby provides some of the material which old Spearpoint then tries to convert into the approximations of pearls of wisdom that he seeks to muster in these posts.

 

During this journey I found myself mostly pondering on all the recent shocks of the astronomical price increases in food, fuel and other commodities around the world.

 

We’re all familiar with the price increases. Petrol and diesel prices threatening to push us back to the horse-and-buggy age; staple food escalations promising the prospect of global population decimation; real estate prices destined to shunt us all back into grass huts in a feudal economy; other commodities increasing to the point where the little baubles and the technologies which brighten up and buttress our otherwise drab lives are beyond reach; the threat of drastically higher electricity charges which promise a return not to the age of hurricane lanterns and candles – we won’t be able to afford to buy the oil – but to the age of rush lights and goose grease; the list goes on.

 

Trying to figure out why all of these events have come about in such an apparently short space of time has been an interesting exercise and has led me to some conclusions that are distinctly challenging.

 

We might as well face it: for a considerable period we have had it relatively easy. Ignoring, (for the sake of the point being made), the half or more of the world’s population that has always been too poor to afford to worry about the fibre in its diet (instead being more troubled with the grit, stones, twigs and other detritus in such food as may be available), the world has enjoyed a relatively benign time of late where the basics of life, plus a few luxuries, could be had whilst still having the prospect of putting some money aside for the odd rainy day or two.

 

Then, of course, (being human) we then proceeded to hurry, helter-skelter, to bugger up the nice little zone of comfort within which we found ourselves.

 

Finding the products of our technologies to be pleasant and convenient we then got greedy. We wanted more and, in that wanting, gave space to other greedy people who, for a price, were willing to provide us with more.

 

Let’s look at some of what we wanted in terms of food and fuels since these are the most immediate of our daily needs and desires.

 

• Better quality food – less grit, for a start – with brighter colours and more varied flavourings, artificial or not, which would enable us to differentiate our “lifestyle” from those less well off than ourselves (including our silly kid sister who was dumb enough to marry that throwback who digs ditches for a living).
• Greater quantities of food so that we could gorge ourselves three or four times a day rather than eating small amounts continually through the day as our bodies were designed to do when we were evolving as hunter/gatherers – thereby fostering the growth of global industries in slimming products and remedial medical healthcare.
• Faster food so that the tedious nature of the preparation and processing of cooked foods could be lessened.
• Ever greater supplies of power in the form of electricity because we didn’t want to wear lots of clothes around the house or work and also because the old wood-fired kitchen range was too dirty and too much hard work to clean every day.
• Even greater supplies of fossil fuels because we needed to power the electricity plants and to propel larger, faster vehicles of personal transportation which could give us a shirtsleeve environment in which to wait out the traffic jams on the way to and from work and the supermarket.

 

Lots of wants.

 

My point here is that we have ourselves to blame for many of the reasons behind high prices. Someone has to be paid to produce, package, store and deliver the objects of our desire. Our desires also open us to exploitation by those who would wish to manipulate and escalate those same desires in order to provide more so-called “choices” as a means of generating further sales and revenues by way of marketing and advertising.

 

But there are other ways in which we are subjected to ever increasing pricing which, when all is said and done, we have little control over.

 

Now, before I proceed any further, I need to stress a couple of things.

 

Firstly, I am not too different from the bulk of Western society in that I enjoy the products and services that have been created and made available to everyone who can afford them. I have even managed to be able to buy some of them. I also feel the occasional twinge of lust for the latest mobile phone or big hairy 4×4 – although one of the very few benefits of advancing age is the ability to exert some measure of control over those twinges and to refrain from impulsively either reaching into my hip pocket or signing some usurious agreement to hire the object of desire for a period way beyond the object’s value and practicality.

 

Secondly, within certain limits of taste and capability, I am just as capitalistic as the next man. I like to turn a profit - and the more the better. Admittedly, I am a small-time capitalist, never quite having managed to beat my conscience into the required degree of insensibility to be able to view my fellow humans merely as targets for plunder. I guess I must be a failure – although I do manage to get by. My sleepless nights are caused more by worrying about how I shall survive, sans pension etc., (don’t ask – it’s a long story, as the cricket said to the ant), rather than subconsciously stressing over the deep patina of tarnish building up on my soul.

 

My problem is not so much with the de-skilling of the past couple of hundred years or so - an inevitable consequence of the need to develop an increasingly complex society necessary to cater for the rank stupidity of humankind as it remorselessly breeds itself into global Ebola-like parasitical extinction.

 

My problem with the current situation regarding price increases in the very basic needs of life rests more with the fact that most of these increases are totally artificial and are motivated by the plain outright grasping greed of a relatively small number of individuals wishing to enrich themselves even more than they already are by further impoverishing the already poor and vulnerable.

 

There are a number of parties to this concerted “conspiracy” (don’t you just hate that word?):

1. Governments seeking to ensure their national interests;
2. Commodity and stock exchanges and their associated traders, speculators and brokers;
3. The large wholesale, retail and distributive chains (increasingly often integrated under single ownership);
4. Consumers – as both participants and victims.

 

Each of the above parties is motivated solely by greed and self-interest at the expense of others. Each is able to operate and gain by virtue of the fact that, whether we like it or not, the world is based upon the capitalistic models and theories developed and honed over the last few hundred years or so. Even former and current communist/socialist governments and ideologies have found themselves forced to modify their pretty theories in order to survive – in the case of mainland China to positively thrive – in the harsh world of capitalistic trade and business. Everybody wants to turn a buck.

 

However, capitalism – as with every other economic theory, I guess – contains within its corpus some fundamental flaws which, long-term, will probably render the entire edifice unworkable without some speedy rectification.

 

The main long-term problems with capitalism are, as I see it, the concepts of firstly, eternal economic growth and, secondly, charging prices based on what the market will bear at any given time.

 

These two fundamental underpinning ideas are, ultimately, unsustainable and will create the conditions under which capitalism will, sooner or later, fail unless modified.

• Untrammelled economic growth can only cause an eventual saturation of the marketplace – even allowing for provisions such as the inbuilt obsolescence of products and services (which, already, is a major feature of modern production and economic methodologies) and the enrichment of the entire population of the planet in order to provide sufficient markets for greater and greater production outputs (and which we are most certainly not seeing at present). There seems to be no inherent concept of reaching for and attaining a sustainable equilibrium.
• The idea of charging the very most that the end user of the products and services produced can afford can only result in the near- and long-term widening of the divide between the rich and the poor. Those at the lower end of the economic scale have little or no opportunity to accumulate anything from their labours since so much, if not all, of their incomes are utilised in acquiring just the basics of life – simple foods, rude shelter and public transport. Thus, the poor remain poor and, as such, are of little benefit to capitalism other than as a pool of cheap labour. Their poverty prevents their empowerment as producers and consumers of products and services and their value to the capitalist model is minimal. Even raising their wages accomplishes nothing due to the impact upon production costs and subsequent price rises.

 

Having said all that, let us now return to the “conspirators” in the current tidal wave of price hikes in fuel and energy.

 

The prime example of a government serving its own self-interests in recent times has been that of the United States creating (much as Nazi Germany did in the 1930’s) the conditions to explain and excuse their invasion of Iraq five years ago. In so doing they began the entire process of market uncertainty and price escalations in which we find ourselves today. Oil prices commenced their upward march towards the top of a hill of which no-one outside of the oil industry knows the height. In starting and maintaining an unwarranted war (“We’re prepared to fight for 100 years!”) the inevitable consequence was to shake the global oil market into pessimism and the resultant supply fears – even though, notwithstanding the predictions of the 1960’s and 70’s, there is, in fact, no shortage of oil in the world. Indeed, hardly a month goes by without some announcement of a major oil discovery somewhere on the planet.

 

The only real beneficiaries of the Iraq war have been the oil companies. Oh, yes – and the current oil industry-dominated US political administration.

 

Gee, what a coincidence.

 

De-stabilising the global oil market then gave others the chance to cash-in on the uncertainty.

 

Commodity exchanges, brokers and traders could then “legitimately” demand ever higher prices for the black gold on the pretext of supply uncertainties and the claimed natural balance between supply and demand based upon the old market maxim of charging whatever the market could bear.

 

This, of course, totally ignored the fact that, despite the best efforts of the OPEC oil cartel, oil supply then and now has never been under anything remotely approaching threat. Nor were oil production costs on the increase.

 

Traders and speculators were, in effect, given license to artificially generate and exacerbate a supposed crisis in oil for the sole purpose of increasing their turnovers, margins and personal commissions under the guise of serving the best interests of their stockholders.

 

Consider this:

• Several days ago a US Navy warship fired a few warning shots across the bows of a couple of (supposedly) Iranian speedboats.
• Immediately upon that news the price of a barrel of oil rocketed by $3!

 

Where was the threat to world oil supplies that merited a 2% increase in the oil price in the space of a couple of hours?

 

There was, of course, no justification – other than the traders and speculators grabbing a chance to further gouge the world for their own personal benefit.

 

We have seen similar situations recently when a refinery closes for a day or two because of bad weather. Or when a Nigerian pipeline gets looted or attacked by those who feel excluded from the national bonanza. As if a single locus of supply or transport is going to impact upon the needs of the entire world. In a time of plentiful supply and growing reserves known to be far greater than current production for the next fifty years.

 

Please. Don’t. Insult. Our. Intelligence.

 

The same applies to the traders of other commodities – particularly food. They have been only too pleased to hitch themselves to the coat tails of the oil traders and to take similar advantage.

 

Sure, the world’s population is growing and, yes, the new kids on the middle class block – the Chinese and the Indians – are, not surprisingly, wanting more and better food than they have had for the last couple of thousand years, as well as all the shiny toys that the West has been flaunting in their faces since the 1800’s. But, thanks to the Green Revolution of the past few decades, the world is not, in fact, short of food and we have the land and technology to feed many times the present global population. Properly set up and managed, just Zambia, Zimbabwe and Mozambique could, on their own, provide almost half the world with staple cereals.

 

On the pretence of a supposed food shortage, staples such as wheat and rice are traded and re-traded many times, each trade generating a profit for the traders until we have the crazy situation where, for example, rice has risen in price by at least 70% in the last three months and Thai rice farmers are having to put armed guards on their paddy fields.

 

Then there are the speculators who purchase large stocks of certain commodities (often in Third World countries) when prices are low – usually at harvest times when the market is glutted – and then hoard those stocks away from the marketplace until existing supplies diminish and prices rise in response. The use of foodstuffs and fuels as mechanisms of profiteering against the human right of access to affordable food is cynical and barbaric.

 

Contributing to the lunacy of the current price rises in commodities is the next group of “conspirators”, the large retail chains.

 

Without contributing one whit to the production of the foodstuffs or oil products they peddle, the retail chains can charge the consumer anything from 25% to 500% above cost for the doubtful privilege of distributing the goods to within reach of that consumer. (Real estate chains, for example, can’t do that but have been accused recently of deliberately and artificially inflating the asking prices of properties in order to increase the size of their commissions. The concept of charging whatever the salesman thinks the dumb schmuck in front of him might be stupid enough to commit himself to prevails everywhere). No wonder property prices now prevent first-time buyers from entering the market and forcing people away from their ancestral roots to seek survival in the global urban migration.

 

Perhaps it might not be so grotesque were these chains to pay their workers over the legal minimums; or to employ people on a basis other than casual and temporary; or to stop using their commercial volume purchasing advantages to coerce farmers and independent distributors through restrictive practices into accepting prices which then render those businesses marginal.

 

Matters are worsened when one considers the fact that these chains spend many millions (Rands, Dollars – it doesn’t matter) advertising in the print and electronic media with the constant and perennial claims of being the cheapest and offering the greatest savings to the consumer.

 

Such claims would only be justified if retail prices were not the result of price fixing and collusion between the wholesalers and retailers, as well as between the retailers themselves. Recent investigations in Australia, Britain and South Africa indicate that price fixing is rife and may, in fact, be prevalent – especially through the good old “recommended retail price” mechanism.

 

The final party to the “conspiracy” of artificial prices is the consumers themselves.

 

Consumers are their own worst enemies. Motivated by their own personal greed, stimulated by enticing advertising, too many consumers will willingly pay whatever is asked. Their desire to have whatever it is that they are desirous of feeds the concept of being allowed to charge whatever the market can bear. They have forgotten the old days of the village market where prices were negotiated to the satisfaction of both buyer and seller. If neither party was happy with what was being offered then that party could decline to trade and depart the scene.

 

A high street supermarket, for example, is nothing more than a village marketplace for the local community (many such supermarkets, in fact, claim such a heritage for purposes of brand identification). But because a supermarket has got pretty displays, clean floors, banks of glittering refrigerators and piped Muzak, people have been intimidated into thinking that they are no longer permitted to haggle. The price tag on a shelf is nothing more than an indication by the retailer of what sort of offer he is prepared to consider for that particular item. If the consumer accepts that tag then that is what he is offering and the retailer is only too happy to accept both the offer and the settlement.

 

So, although the consumer is all too often the victim of artificially high prices, he is also stupid not to realize the power at his command were he to challenge the exorbitant prices confronting him and to make an amended offer. If the retailer doesn’t like the offer he can ask you to leave his premises and thereby lose a sale. If sufficient consumers likewise challenge the retailer’s overly high margins that retailer would soon have to re-consider his position or face the prospect of going out of business.

 

The consumer as a group also fails to realize that, if push came to shove, he could forego one or two meals or delay by a few days or weeks the purchase of that washing machine/fridge/lounge suite/car as a way of demonstrating his power to the retailers. Aside from the health and moral benefits to be had, the temporary drop in sales for retail chains could create sweaty brows and an increased consumption of antacid tablets sufficient to bring about a re-consideration of extorting monstrous margins in favour of reasonable returns within a stable price environment.

 

I do not know the answers to solving the present crisis in food and fuel prices. But I do know that we need to do something to curtail and control the excesses of what is an otherwise workable system.

 

Capitalism needs – desperately – to find a path away from the boom and bust short-term maximum gratification of the profit motive. Sustainability and eventual equilibrium needs to be achieved so that the one can profit but not at the expense of the other.

 

Additionally - and equally desperately - the concept of pricing to what the market can (only just) bear needs to be adjusted to one where prices are directly related to fixed and fair margins over the cost of production.

 

Only once such equity is achieved can capitalism then be justifiably linked to democracy.

 

Money could still be made in large enough amounts to continue attracting the interest of the intrepid. But we must also find a way to enable the less intrepid to survive in relative comfort and security.

 

 

Spearpoint.

27 April 2008

To the Unknown Commentator

 

 

A couple of weeks or so ago some kindly soul sent Spearpoint some nice comments about this blog. The same person also kindly offered to add my blog to his RSS feed.

 

Whoever you are, I thank you.

 

However, I owe you an apology.

 

My antediluvian skills with a computer caused me to (inadvertently) delete your mail which, for some obscure reason, had appeared on my spam list. Your highly flattering comments were flushed away with the dross of auto and other insurance offers.

 

Mea culpa.

 

Please do not think that I am so typically South African as to have ignored your mail or that it was not greatly appreciated. Those who would take the time and trouble to respond to this little blog make the whole exercise worthwhile for me.

 

If you wish to contact me again I shall be only too pleased to properly acknowledge you and your comments.

 

My thanks again.

 

Spearpoint.

 

 

Don’t Kill the Criminals - Save the Criminals!

 

 

I thought so…

 

Reactions to the “Kill the criminals” news story:

 

- Indignation. Shock. Horror.

 

- Everyone jumping on the bleeding-heart political bandwagon.

 

- How could the Deputy Minister of Safety and Security be so callous and uncaring about our poor, defenseless, misunderstood criminals when they are so clearly virtuous and upright members of our society?

 

- How dare she advocate that the police kill them? After all, they are some of the most productive members of our economy – crime is about the only area of growth in South Africa.

 

…………………….

 

Spearpoint tries, in general, to be reasonably polite in his commentaries. But I’m not too sure I can continue that policy this time.

 

To the critics of the Deputy Minister’s remarks I say this to you.

 

What a crowd of ignorant, stupid, self-serving, self-publicists you are.

 

Clearly, you are not educated or intelligent enough to be able to perform the simple act of reading what the lady said. The words she uttered were clear and simple enough that even my five-year old granddaughter could easily understand what was said.

All your degrees, learning and experience in policing, politics and polemics have so obviously failed to qualify any of you to comment sensibly on the fight against crime – nor have they done anything to merit any involvement whatsoever in partaking of the leadership of this country.

The Deputy Minister’s words were “Kill the bastards if…” (did you get that?) If. IF. IF.) “…IF they threaten you or the community.”

 

Her words could not have been clearer.

 

Her words were entirely within existing laws.

 

In no way, under South African law as it stands today, can her words be interpreted or construed as being an incitement for the police to run wild on our streets. The lady did not issue to the police – or anyone else - a blanket licence to kill nor did she advocate abandonment of due process.

 

The politicians who criticized the Deputy Minister’s remarks have plainly demonstrated themselves to be as unsuited to running our country as the ANC has shown itself to be.

 

The Independent Democrats (ID) and the Democratic Alliance (DA), amongst others, have sought only to score cheap political points off the ANC government – who, as it happens, do deserve to be sniped at with unremitting ferocity – instead of listening to what was actually said and commending the courage and clear thinking of the speaker – ANC or not. For the sake of a headline or two and a sound-byte on TV, you have made utter fools of yourselves and, I strongly suspect, alienated much of the crime-ravaged electorate to which you think you will ingratiate yourselves through your unconsidered and downright stupid responses.

 

You all deserve contempt and ridicule for your self-serving prostitution of what you supposedly stand for in your vainglorious and desperate search for political power at any price.

 

The South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC) should be even more ashamed of its unthinking negative reaction. Your biases, hidden agendas and overall inability to deal with reality have blinkered you to the fact that, as a supposedly independent and respected body seeking to improve the access to and delivery of human rights to all and sundry, you have chosen to dismiss and denigrate the human rights of the entire population to peace, safety and prosperity. Instead, you choose to defend and shield from the rule of law those who revile and pervert the rule of law when you are chartered to reinforce and spread the rule of law for everyone. You continue to do nothing for the human rights of the majority of the populace and, in your folly, you undermine and pervert our Constitution together with the hopes and aspirations of every single person (black, white, Asian, Coloured) in our country.

 

Our Constitution and such human rights as we all –allegedly- enjoy are a joke. Even as a banana republic we seem unable to produce banana sundaes - only banana skins.

 

 

 

Spearpoint.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Shooting to Kill the Criminals

 

Maybe it’s a bit premature, but I feel like cheering.

 

At long last someone in the South African government appears to have made a break from the usual line of bull dust regarding the fight against crime.

 

The Deputy Minister of Safety and Security has encouraged the police to be very much tougher on dangerous criminals.

 

During some sort of conference/seminar in which she addressed members of the police force (sorry – ‘service’) (yeah, sure) the Deputy Minister said (referring to the criminals) “Kill the bastards – especially if they are threatening you or the community”. She is reported to have received an enthusiastic response from those police officers present.

 

Spearpoint has had occasion to make comment on the issue of crime in some earlier posts (“Crime and Punishment”; “More About Crime and Rights in South Africa”; “A Little More on Crime in South Africa”).

 

Those of you who have graced my site and read those posts will understand why old Spearpoint is a small step closer to throwing his hat in the air.

 

How refreshing it is that, out of the blue – and in stark contrast to the stance and performance of the Minister of Safety and Security – a senior government minister has had the courage and honesty to break from the usual insipid ANC utterances and actions on how best to combat the criminals in our midst.

 

Good on you, Deputy Minister. Crime is against the law. The law is derived from our much-vaunted Constitution. Crime contravenes the Constitution and our Constitutional and human rights. Contravening the Constitution cancels the Constitutional rights of the contravener. He, therefore, has no constitutional rights and the police then have the duty to terminate, with extreme prejudice, those rights. Survivors will be prosecuted.

 

It is likely, however, that the good lady Deputy Minister will be severely chastised by her ANC brethren for daring to be so politically incorrect.

 

If a reprimand or dismissal follows her comments then you will know, without doubt, that the present government and the ANC has absolutely no interest or intention of further tackling crime and its aftermath beyond what they have already determined to be an “acceptable” level.

 

But coming hot on the heels of Jacob Zuma’s recent outspoken statement about the electoral fiasco in Zimbabwe, I am struck by the thought that, maybe, just maybe, we might be seeing some sort of shuffling of feet away from the more usual ANC policy of doing everything on the quiet – “quiet” diplomacy, “quiet” policing and “quiet” ethics.

 

Of course everything has been “quiet” on the part of the government. When you bury your head under the blankets for fear of seeing the bogeyman you’re so afraid of having to confront and take a stand on, then everything does go quiet. So you do not, then, hear your neighbour abusing his family, you do not hear the burglar coming to help himself to what he hasn’t earned and you do not hear your own family members conniving to rob you of what the burglar leaves behind.

 

Jacob Zuma’s comments on Zimbabwe and on re-opening the debate on the death penalty (see my post “The Death Penalty and Electioneering in South Africa”) are understandable. He is trying hard to establish himself as a credible popular politician suitable for the role of the leader of this country and doing it in a way that will distance and distinguish himself from the “business as usual” style of Thabo Mbeki and his allies.

 

Perhaps the Deputy Minister of Safety and Security is, cynically, also positioning herself for the upcoming change of government leadership in 2009. Perhaps she just wants to ensure that she will still have a nice cushy ministerial job come this time next year.

 

I don’t really care.

 

For the first time the necessary words are being spoken. It remains to be seen whether the necessary actions will follow. I, for one, certainly hope so.

 

I just hope that the police are up to the task…

 

Spearpoint.

 

 

 

Thanks, Synaptoman

 

 

 

You made my day with your take on a possible solution to the problems of our northern neighbours.

 

http://synaptoman.wordpress.com/2008/04/09/20-reasons-to-annex-zimbabwe/

 

Spearpoint.

South Africa’s Road Carnage

Despite the fact that South Africa has some of the best roads to be found in Africa, the use and abuse of those roads kills and maims many thousands of lives each year.

The amazing thing about all these accidents is that they continue to occur unabated even though everyone from motorists to the government periodically expresses horror and concern over the statistics.

We have the laws. We have the police. We have the responsible government department(s) to manage the roads and their use. We have the funds necessary to build, maintain and police those roads.

However, and as usual in this country, we lack both the competence to do the job properly and we lack the will to do it. The situation is, truly, shameful.

There are several aspects to the overall situation, some relatively minor, others gravely serious.

1. THE ROADS

As mentioned, South Africa does possess some very good roads. The vast bulk of the road network was inherited by the ANC government from the days prior to 1994 when control and management of the country was taken over from the old apartheid government.

Unfortunately, many of those roads, including major arteries, have had little, if any, maintainence performed on them in the intervening years. There are roads which, in the decade or so that I have lived in this country, have never been re-surfaced or had anything done to them other than some minor patching; these are roads that I, personally, have used on a daily or weekly basis for many years.

Perhaps those roads are a testament to the road-building skills of the old days since they are still servicable despite starting to exhibit the inevitable deterioration stemming from continuous use over long periods of time. They are, however, beginning to crack up and when they do start to fail in a big way the costs and disruptions are going to be massive on an unprecedented scale.

Rather like a penny-pinching car owner who fails regularly to service and maintain his vehicle, eventually something big and complicated will let go in an unpleasantly catastrophic way. The expensive sounds emanating from somewhere under the car indicate to the driver that life is about to become, in the manner of the old Chinese curse, interesting - and significantly more costly.

Such has been the apparent approach of the government to our road network. Correct repair and maintenance of our roads has been relagated to the back burner.

The top patching of small potholes, where it is done at all, is all too often just cosmetic with little or no deep seated repairs of the substrate beneath the tar.

Larger potholes tend to be left alone as just another surface obstacle to be avoided - if you’re lucky. When they are repaired they are often patched with the incorrect tar mix; the first few trucks passing over them - particularly in hot weather - tends to establish and then deepen pronounced grooves in the surface which can act much as tram tracks do on the steering of any vehicle encountering them.

Many a driver has had the disconcerting high-speed experience of finding unexpected potholes which can run you off the road, snap a shock absorber or burst a front tyre. The results can be spectacularly fatal.