The Curse of the Clan

The late Fiona Coyne, feared host of The Weakest Link, tilted her head slightly forward. While giving me that infamous piercing look over the top of her spectacles, she barked:

“What is your greatest ambition Armandè?”

Even though it had been a childhood dream of mine, I never thought, the first time I would say it out loud, would be on national television:

“I want to be the president of South Africa.”

Her sly grin hovered on the edge of outright laughter. No longer even looking at me, and seemingly addressing the universe, she said with a sense of bravado:

“Tell us again what your surname is?”

Sensing victory, she did not wait for me to respond. Rather, she triumphantly remarked into the camera:

“I do not think so.”

I went on to win that episode of The Weakest Link.

It was the year 2006 and we were a nation still intoxicated with Madiba magic.

My mother had a standard response to anything that ever went wrong in our family:

“It is because you carry the surname Kruger.”

Even though it was mostly said to dismiss the complaining, it did imply that our surname carried with it a curse. I have since cursed my daughter with the same surname. As a result her CV now has this notion to drift to the bottom of the job application pile, every time.

In hindsight, we should have penned in her mother’s maiden name on her registration documents. Chetty might not have meant outright employment, but it definitely would have had the potential to fool the recruitment bots and swing the odds in her favour.

Make no mistake, I have no grudge against empowerment policies such as B-BBEE. Since I have context, I fully comprehend its origin.

I attended a school where the pupils, the teachers, and even the janitor were all lily white.

Some afternoons on my way back from school, I would make a stop at my mother's work. The eleven story building housed thousands of Transvaal Provincial Administration employees. Not a single one of them, was a person of colour.

Not even one.

My very first job as an aspiring attorney, was with The Department of Justice. In the seven months I worked there, I never encountered a single colleague from another race.

Thinking about it now, I am saddened by how normalized it was back then. Unless it was pointed out specifically by those fortunate enough to break through the propaganda darkness, segregation and discrimination went completely unnoticed by those who benefitted from it.

Therefore, when I say that the difference between getting a job or not, is as simple as the difference between your surname being Chetty or Kruger, I am not saying it out of bitterness. I’m saying it because I unequivocally believe the new norm not to be an improvement on the old, broken system.

For South Africa to rise from the ashes, and for this amazing nation to finally put its past behind it, we are not in need of policies which address inequality. We are in need of a mindset that pursues abundance. When employment is no longer a scarcity, the colour of a potential candidate’s skin or the spelling of their surname, becomes completely irrelevant.

Economic empowerment is not about rotating wealth. It is about creating wealth. We have to move away from a scarcity mindset. Without abundance, there will always be an excuse to discriminate; Be that on the basis of race, gender, age or sexual orientation.

My soon to be released book, “I C U” will make you rethink your perceptions about the real challenges in the country at the tip of Africa, we fondly referred to as Mzansi. Even more than that though, it will reveal practical solutions which have the potential to ignite an economic revival in this powerhouse of a continent we call home, which is Africa.

Our children and their children may, after all, become the ones to finally break the curse of the clan.