Fighters hunker down while Corona bites

By LM Louw

Is there anybody else out there that wonder what has happened to South Africa’s politicians?

Where are the Freedom Fighters when the people who voted for them need them the most? Or the MP’s that gets paid millions by the downtrodden taxpayers without anything to eat? Has anybody seen red berets marching down Commissioner Street in Johannesburg handing out bread to the hungry lately? Or spotted MK veteran Carl Niehaus leading his camo clad charges down the N2 from Cape Town to the sewage covered streets of Langa and Khayelitsha to hand out food parcels to the poorest of the poor? Has anybody seen Msholozi Zuma, or his son Duduzani’s tweet that they will share some of their loot with the suffering people of Alexandra? Or see to it that people in townships get proper ablution facilities, or that the men must stop killing their children?   

Why does it matter, you may ask? It matters because these are the trenches, Comrades! This is where the virus comes at you the hardest. It is here where wars are fought and won - in the mud, and the dirt and the grub and the blood. Ask the handful of true veterans who are still alive today, those who fought a visible enemy during the second world war in the deserts of Libya, on the beaches of Normandy, and in the shoulder deep snow of Siberia. Cause this is how you win a war, Comrades! You fight it! You do not put on your designer mask and hunker down four months before the bombs start dropping and hope it all ends soon so that you can visit the Saxonwold Shebeen again. I thought those post-94 medals, and pips and stripes on the camos, police uniforms, step-outs and browns were an acknowledgment of bravery. Are these not the veterans who fought in the trenches, on the beaches and on the shores to give all South Africans their freedom, for God sake?   

The younger fighters can be forgiven. It is cold in Jozi and Juju needs his electric blanket and underfloor heating while hunkering down in his Hyde Park bunker nibbling on Chevin cheese and sipping on his Glenfiddich Whiskey. Not a bad deal when the Rona roams the deserted streets of the northern suburbs. This is what the nobility does anyway, isn’t it? The Kings and Queens of Europe never set foot on the battlefield, did they?

Napoleon did. He led from the front. But then, in hindsight, he probably did have blue blood. In Africa, blue blood Kings fought in the trenches. Shaka Zulu did. He was a true warrior. He walked barefoot through thorns, over the mountains and into the hinterland, leading his people, bare-chested and proud, even if the breeze blew in ice-cold from the ocean and over the mountain tops. Nelson Mandela did it. He led from the front. Royalty in the true sense of the word. He would be out there in the trenches, fighting for his people, even if he had a house in Houghton. 

The leafy northern suburbs of Johannesburg seem the bunker to be as Corona unleashes its fury on the people of this long-suffering land. Just a stone throw from the Juju abode, the bluest blood of them all hunkers down, head buried deep in his warm blankets at the foot end of his Victorian style, King sized bed. If he stands on the corner of the bed and peeks out the window, he can probably see Prince Mazotti and Queen Dhlamini-Zuma sharing a zol and having a chat next to the pool about Juju next door, who hasn’t seen the sun for four months, and started growing dread locks. It is a concern, especially if you are into cigarettes.

Across the road from the King, on the hill, overlooking his kingdom, which has always been bright blue, Tony Leon (considered by some to have the purest blue blood) and his good friend John Henry Steenhuisen, are zooming in to see who’s bookshelves are the biggest. Leon is baking cakes for the proletariat while working on a plan to lure back those staunch Afrikaners who didn’t like the new priest and trekked to the Groenewald lager, which has always been their real home anyway. He’s not too concerned about the Rona - his hospital plan will ensure that he gets a ventilator first. Meanwhile, Groenewald has been declared missing in action, and the priest has been absent without leave for a very long time. They were both never the trench fighting type anyway.      

The King, on the other side of the valley, is not worried about any of them. What they are all concerned about though, is the growing number of faceless masks from Alexandra township, Hillbrow and Yeoville that are migrating to their suburb, and sleep on the sidewalks at night, trying to survive the harsh highveld winter without blankets and food. What Juju, Niehaus, Zuma, Leon, Steenhuisen, Groenewald, the King and the Priest fear most, however, is that they might be called upon to do duty in the trenches.

On a big wall in Hyde Park, close to Juju’s house, someone has written in big red letters:

Bad boys, bad boys whatcha gonna do?

Whatcha gonna do when we come for you?

Not too long ago, before the days of VBS, expensive Whiskey and leather shoes, goat’s cheese and Corona, Juju would have written that message himself. Since then, however, the bourgeoisie of the suburbs have become his neighbours and drinking buddies. He would never walk barefoot for his people again. As Corona launches its most severe offensive yet, this time on the northern front, the South African trenches are empty. Our generals are missing, and the troops are hungry. Will the real South African leaders please stand up?