Today is your day - Dear President Ramaphosa.

Dear President Ramaphosa,

Today is your day – today at 18:00 you either make and save South Africa – or you break us.

We are caught in a world-wide nightmare, and even though South Africans are super-resilient, humorous, innovative and hard-core, we are reeling. We are reeling under an onslaught of information, all bad, about Covid-19. I think we are all realizing the imminent imposition of a total lockdown. We get it, 7,1million (or more) vulnerable people in this country with HIV or TB, are facing infection if we do nothing to stem the infection rate. We understand that the hospitals are going to be over-stretched. We get the social isolation, we get the sanitary precautions, we get the schools closing, we get the restaurants under restrictions, we get it!

As a contributing member to society and the owner of two SME’s, directly employing over 30 staff, and bringing a fair bit of foreign currency a year into this economy based on tourism and another business based on home services, I face a bleak future should there be a total lockdown. While I see that there is an initiative to register on a website somewhere for some relief programme, this is not going to help me.

You might ask why?

We have weathered a period of loadshedding where we lose 4 hours a day of business productivity. We have weathered the imposition of the most expensive mobile data in the world.We have weathered the world-wide economic downtown of the last 5 years – and it was just turning!

And lots more……….

But like I said – we are an innovative lot – and we will keep it up – but you need to support us – this is beyond the scope of the small businessman. We have generators for standby, my work crews take generators with them for jobs, I drive to high spots somewhere to get connectivity to get my emails, I subscribe to businesses that hunt the best mobile-data deals, we develop new products and services and spend money getting them to market. 

For the first time in years I am literally in despair. I don’t see way out of this hole – we were doing well – 2020 started as the best year in the last decade. Since two weeks ago – business has stopped, tourism is dead, the streets are empty, there are fistfights in the shops for a roll of toilet paper!

What we need from you today is a package to keep us in business. I personally don’t want a handout – I want help. I need to keep the doors open because I have 30+ employees looking to me to make a plan, they have nothing else. UIF is a waste of time, they want to come back to work in 30, 60 or 90 days time. They do not want UIF, or nothing, when this is over. They need, and this country needs now more than ever, for small business to survive. 

How am I going to survive?

I do not have the cash to cover 30, 60 or 90 days of no work. It is just not there. As a small business we go month-to-month. Simple. I might make 4 or 5 weeks living on reserves and outstanding invoices, if those clients decide to pay, then I shut my doors.

? First to go will be the vehicles – 9 vehicles will be repossessed – what are the banks going to do with those – because just Westbank finances over 25% of the vehicles on the road - I will be 9 of several million vehicles taken away. Vehicles will have no value. And in 90 days time with no vehicles – I will not be able to start again.

? My factory / office space – I will default on rental – my little spot is one unit of 21 in a complex – and I am pretty sure that the other 20 will follow suite – there is a transport company (nothing to transport), there is a cabinet maker (??), there is a car service guy (no one driving anymore), there is a generator guy (maybe – but who is going to buy a business-sized generator now when there is no business)

? I have become a large buyer from several suppliers – they will feel my shutdown

? Next to go will be cellphones, landlines, SLA with IT company……………………

? And I could carry on, but I think you get the picture – or I hope you do!

What do I think is needed?

? Tell the banks to cancel interest and overdraft charges

? Tell banks and home-loan companies to put a moratorium on bonds and vehicle payments

? Property rental companies need to cancel rentals for a month or two

? Forget the UIF plan – instruct banks to give all registered businesses a 0% (or low) interest overdraft – on top of what they have already – equal to 3x or 4x monthly turnover – we will manage to pay that back. Let the banks deal with it – there are thousands of bank managers able to implement this – your government will not handle the millions of enquiries.

? Drop the fuel price – take away the huge fuel levys – let us move and work, and let us do it at a price we can pay – and while we are there – scrap e-tolls!!!!! Let us rebuild in a way we can afford.

? If we are going to sit at home and self-isolate – put a moratorium on rates & taxes, electricity and water for the period of the shut-down.

? If we are going to sit at home and self-isolate – tell the pay-TV channels to give access for three months for free – let the children have access to educational TV.

I will hold on as long as I can Mr President , and I know thousands of others who will as well. I however already have one or two acquaintances that have failed businesses – mostly in the tourism sector. 

I am scared, no – I am terrified – of what is coming. I am behind you Mr President – I am but one small guy who can help you rebuild. I am 57 years old and am seeing the collapse of everything I have built. I will hang in there as long as I can – somewhere you still have my army number – I will even climb in there if needed and you can have my 30 years’ experience in uniform - even though you have seen fit not to use me for the last 10 years. 

Time to step up Mr President – you have thousands like me – ready, willing and able – but now is your time to help us to help you.

Yours sincerely

Diederik van ‘t Hof