South Africa is OK!

[Nod]

The previous goverment may have forbid blacks in the local white schools, but they did build schools for blacks in many of the townships. Not much has changed, Opera's school in Johannesburg does not allow whites!!!!

Unfortunately the blacks was more interested in burning their schools than learning. They are responsible for the current uneducated masses, as much as the previous government. The current government is not doing enough to promote education. Setting aside a budget for education, doesn't automatically indicate proper spending of that budget.

I somewhat surprised that English is the medium of choice in most schools, but the ANC went to the streets when Afrikaans was pushed by the previous government. What happened to mother tongue education?

 

[CyraxHB]

Much of what you say is right, but I'd like to comment on a couple of things:
- NHS is free, but judging from what my UK friends say, you can sometimes wait months for an appointment. And it's virtually impossible to get dental work done on NHS.
- I was in the centre of Joburg, and walked several blocks from Simmonds St to the licencing department in Loveday. It was something like 5 blocks before I saw a single item of litter on the road/pavement. (Yeah, I was quite surprised...)

It usually takes about 3 weeks to get an appointment to register with your local GP but once that is done Ive never had to wait more than 3 days for an appointment.

The main attraction is that its free. My brother has epilepsy and has to take medication every day for the rest of his life. When he lived in SA he had to pay for it himself but in the UK its all free. Dentists work the same as GP's, all paid for by your taxes.

 

[PeterCH]

Its not Sympathy. Anyway, a politician does not need a high education. And yes we do have extremely qualified people(black or white) in the country, that it academic wise. You cannot take someone from a position of competence and elevate that person to a position of incompetence.

That's why I do not support, removing a good police officer from the field, who have a good record and unrivaled arrest record, and put that person in an office to manage people, we have taken that person from a position of excellence and we put him in a position of failure.

Politicians will always consult with academics on some matters. But keep academics to their field, and let politicians do their job. Funny thing though, the collective uneducated/unqualified politicians, predominantly black, have lead this nation to the longest sustained economic growth in our nations history, and pre-94 elated Academics could not achieve this, with all their hard cover books.

And some genius talked about the Japanese Prime Minister who resigned, and labeled that "accountability", I believe that's the same guy who filled his cabinet with academics, did it work for him? He screwed up, and a bunch of e=mc^2 could not do anything about that, because they were in an arena that they are not accustomed to...

Oh my word, that is the biggest load of crock I've heard on this forum.

Politicians DON'T need higher education because they have academics to advise them.

So an uneducated politician will be able to judge an academic's advise or even decide who he wants to follow. How will he make decisions if he has no background knowledge? How will he decide which academic to follow.
How will he even know that he should follow academics?

Total nonsense. As with any profession with responsibility over others, one needs to be educated and have relevant experience. The education need not be always directly related to the work but a higher education gives the person a background to be able to make sense of things - something which academic reports do not do or maybe the academics should write in a language style suitable for kindergarteners? Maybe their reports should include cues on how the uneducated politician should think? For example, in paragraph 2 you should consider this action can have effects on result of paragraph 1's decision and you should do this and that to come to
your decision of approving or rejecting proposal xyz. You know people aren't born with the ability to analise things.

Secondly he totally ignored the argument and blew it off on some strawman - academics. Dude the problem is that the Japanese politicians have HONOUR, (many of) ours DO NOT. The Japanese statesman will step down, ours will continue or get a promotion. It has probably also to do with academics because the more educated and worldy the man the more humble he feels,
the more he knows his limits. Everything is simple for an uneducated person who lacks insight and general knowledge. You know politicians in Western democracies resign over scandals and gaffes like this one, all the time. Our saintly politicians attack the media and close down the prosecutor.

Total utter nonsense....I think we can discount anything else news24 says as total, utter garbage. Anyone who suggests that ministers who are responsible for 40+ million people
can be uneducated clods, has an opinion which can't be taken seriously.

 

[Claymore]

The main attraction is that its free. My brother has epilepsy and has to take medication every day for the rest of his life. When he lived in SA he had to pay for it himself but in the UK its all free. Dentists work the same as GP's, all paid for by your taxes.

Free is good - especially for chronic medication.

As for dentists - I believe the majority are in private practice, so those that are on NHS have massive queues. A friend of mine was told she could have her teeth sorted at an appointment in 18 months, so she got the money together and paid for it to be done privately.

 

[Albereth]

Total utter nonsense....I think we can discount anything else news24 says as total, utter garbage. Anyone who suggests that ministers who are responsible for 40+ million people
can be uneducated clods, has an opinion which can't be taken seriously.

Perhaps he is running in next year's election and was just demonstrating his credentials.

 

[Syndyre]

SA stats, based on what? Have you ever been to Hilllbrow?(and I'm not talking pre-1994)

Public Transport, we have a good public transport, I myself use it most of the time.

There is a saying "There is no place like Home", even though your in NZ, your still hooked on SA, myBB for example, and the Stats your quoting(What's up with that? Are you checking to see if crime levels have dropped so that you can come back home?)

Have you ever travelled outside SA to e.g. Europe or the US? I'm guessing not judging by that statement.

How do you suppose them to have finished school, if the Apartheid government never made it easier for them to learn? You can mention how dilapidated state institutions are, but don't question their education level, knowing well that at those times(pre-Democracy) it was not easy for the to get a decent education.

Some certainly managed to become educated. Either way uneducated people should not be appointed to senior positions, period.

Its not Sympathy. Anyway, a politician does not need a high education. And yes we do have extremely qualified people(black or white) in the country, that it academic wise. You cannot take someone from a position of competence and elevate that person to a position of incompetence.

Suddenly everything you say makes sense.

Perhaps he is running in next year's election and was just demonstrating his credentials.

He'd fit right in!

 

[marine1]

SA stats, based on what? Have you ever been to Hilllbrow?(and I'm not talking pre-1994)

You mean Nigeria extensions?

Public Transport, we have a good public transport, I myself use it most of the time.

BWAHAHAHAHAHAH Good one

 

[Slootvreter]

That whole article is bullsh1t.

 

[amaedict]

The problem with south africa is the same it has allways been for the last 100 years.... Racism.

Back in apartheid days the whites dominated the country, the black and colored people suffered.

Now the black people run the country and the white and black people suffer.

Black people suffered enslavement and physical torture as well as lack of education ( ill come back to the education part in a moment ).

White people are suffering mental abuse in every way imaginable. BEE is causing unemployment for white people, we are being laid off in all departments across the board to make space for another race to take our place, and often he does not have the experience or qualification for the position.


The problem if you have not spotted it yet is simple, it can be summoned up in one single word : EDUCATION.


We white people are the cause of our own demise, if our kids cannot get work it is because of our fore father's doing, well partly ....


Black people lacked education in apartheid days, and because of this they ( the criminals ) do not know right from wrong, because they werent educated and could not find work they turn to crime, rob and kill for money and food etc ...

A black government is not neccasery a bad thing, but and uneducated government is a very bad thing, when you fire or forcefully remove people out of high positions that have half a lifetimes experience because of their skin colour and replace them with people with very little exprience or qualifications you get what we currently have, a corrupt government that has no clue on how to run a country.

When you phone 1023 and the operator asks you to spell everything you know there is a problem, that should have been the first sign that something was wrong.

BEE is what is wrong with this country, there is no equality in it. South africa is not a democratic country, it never was. There never was equality here and there never will be.

Eqaulity means every man is equal, we all have the same opertunities, the same rights.

BEE = Black economic empowerment, Not South African economic empowerment, there is nothing equal about it, Rasicm is a cancer eating away at the heart of our country, and this time around it is black people who are the rasicts and are abusing their domination in this country.

Things might get better, but not in our lifetimes. The problem was that black people never had the education to run a government, so after 1994 they put MANY people into high positions that really had no clue what they were doing. The next generation will ofcourse be more educated and that is when things will get better, when black people who can work with numbers, do reports, make intellegent descisions enter government.

Here is the reality of the situation :

1. Unemployment is through the roof and off the scale.
2. Crime is far out of control, it is beyond that, it is beyond the point where we can even construct a plan to try and control it.
3. Eskom is buggered, our electricity infrastructure was ignored for 14 years and is running on a very fine thread costing us billions of rands every day lost because of production stats not being met.....
4. Communications dominance by telkom has crippled this country economic growth
5. Government is a joke, our prisons are holiday camps for the bad guys, they have more rights and privilages in prison than you and i on the street, and they dont even pay for it.
6. We refuse to look after our engineers in the municipality and so most of them have left the country leaving our roads disastorous.

Here is the funny part, the white people are not the only ones suffering in this country, the ANC has screwed things up so badly that even black people are seriously suffering from very bad choices on the anc's part and a very badly managed country via the anc government. This is the reason the ANC is splitting, because people inside their own government is realising what a mess they have made.

I dont blame anyone for leaving this country and seeking a better life somewhere else. If i could i would do the same, and who knows, maybe i will.

It is clear that we south africans cannot stand together, and even if we did what would it achieve ?

For to have equality you have to have a government of all races as a governing body. you have to have an equal amount of people representing each race, so you can truely have a democratic vote on any issue. This will never happen and thus we will keep going in circles .....

Just my 2 cents, but life is more important to me than a bunch of semi annoying laws about walking on grass and getting fined for it ...

here is the reality of our country today :
1. http://www.theherald.co.za/herald/2008/11/24/news/n01_24112008.htm
2. http://www.theherald.co.za/herald/news/n05_26112008.htm

Read those two articles and then make a topic called south africa is ok ...

 

[Slootvreter]

We white people are the cause of our own demise, if our kids cannot get work it is because of our fore father's doing, well partly ....


Black people lacked education in apartheid days, and because of this they ( the criminals ) do not know right from wrong, because they werent educated and could not find work they turn to crime, rob and kill for money and food etc ...

Utter bull$hit. And it doesn't take education to know right from wrong, it takes common sense. Anyone knows you are not allowed to steal or murder or rape. If you don't, you don't belong.

 

[amaedict]

Utter bull$hit. And it doesn't take education to know right from wrong, it takes common sense. Anyone knows you are not allowed to steal or murder or rape. If you don't, you don't belong.

Partly true yes.

But black culture is different to ours. Alot of our beliefs and laws clash head to head with theirs. their women are basicly slaves to the men, they have to cook, clean house etc. they also believe that they have to hit their women if they disobey etc, so ironicly a nation that fought against slavery are practising it daily in their own homes, when women are objects to you, rape is just but another way of keeping them in their place.... They punish their own kind without regard to the law, they stone a thief or rapist to death in the township ..., they dont believe in waisting semen and thus dont use condoms, so aids spreads faster in the rural areas, they believe the more children they have the more blessed they are, they do not worry about the costs of raising each child and thus children end up lacking education.... we are talking about a nation that has lived lawless for hundreds of years living by their basic rules based on thousands of years of culture beliefs. you did not have a black police station in rural areas, you had white police stations etc ... So really you are talking about a society with no laws ( other than the white man's law) , no education etc ... Kids have to learn to fend for themselves at a young age, do whatever it takes to stay alive, in their culture there is no talking a situation out, you either are a man and sort it out like a man and stand your ground or you are a coward and people remember you that way. So criminal behaviour is encouraged in a sense. I mean if you have to fend for yourself in a knife fight at the age of 15 or 16 what kind of man does that turn you into one day ? Combine that with a hate for the white man that has enforced his ways onto your people for the last 100 years and you can clearly see why we ended up where we did today.

All is not lost tho, but getting rid of slavery and giving equal rights to black people has really made alot of changes in their culture, for example : the new generation of kids are learning that you have laws and if you dont abide by them you get punished, they are getting descent education etc ... So in reality it is a very slow process of educating a nation that has had no education for hundreds of years in just one lifetime.

The sad reality is that south africa is slowly turning into a second zimbabwe, i dont expect it will ever get as bad, but it really does not need too get as bad to be as bad.....

But getting back on topic, when your family is starving and you have 2 kids dying of hunger, you about to lose your house and your wife and everything else, you cant get work and suffering from deep depression, you are up to your ears in bills and your government is not doing anything to help you, what do you do ??

those circumstances will turn even the best of people to criminal life. I'm not saying everyone will become a criminal, but alot of the people that do resort to that kind of behaviour were good descent people before, that just did not see any other way out.

Its hard to point fingers since it is not one single person responsible for the way things are. But south africa as a people closing its eyes to a corrupt government is the biggest fuel to the lifestyle we live now.

The point of the post was not to point fingers tho, i was merely trying to point out that living abroad could not possibly be worse than living here. Most south african's have no idea what is going on this country at all. they know what they read in newspappers or see on the TV.... the reality of things are far worse than most can even imagine.

Atleast in most other countries you dont have to fear for your safety or the safety of your children.

The reality is this :

You are not safe anywhere, not even in your own home ! those 2 girls that were raped where staying in a highly secure complex. it was an act of racism, the rapists told them bluntly that they are raping them because of skin colour, it is a clear indication that racism is a reality in this country and that it is not just the white man that has racist issues but all races.

you cannot put a whole bunch of different races together and expect them to get along, things dont work that way. they never did and never will..... each race have different beliefs, different ways of doing things and often it conflicts with another race's beliefs, and this is where racism comes into play, and that will never change.

 

[Slootvreter]

Partly true yes.

But black culture is different to ours. Alot of our beliefs and laws clash head to head with theirs.

This is the reason why they must choose. You want to throw little bones around and pray to your grandfather, and drink muti made from butchered children, and at the same time demand an executive position in a prosperous company? Sounds very wrong to me. I feel they cannot demand to be part of what was never theirs and what they would never have had if whites didn't make the mistake of coming to South Africa.

But getting back on topic, when your family is starving and you have 2 kids dying of hunger, you about to lose your house and your wife and everything else, you cant get work and suffering from deep depression, you are up to your ears in bills and your government is not doing anything to help you, what do you do ??

those circumstances will turn even the best of people to criminal life. I'm not saying everyone will become a criminal, but alot of the people that do resort to that kind of behaviour were good descent people before, that just did not see any other way out.

This I disagree with. Why do you even have two kids dying of hunger when you realized you couldn't even feed the first one? And people cannot lose the shacks they stay in. That would certainly be a some human rights violation. There is no excuse for crime.

 

[shadowfox]

You know ... I had a whole argument thought out based on that post ... but I just can't. You're reaching for straws here ... blame it on culture?!?! WTH?

 

[amaedict]

I know it sounds like it, but im not defending the black people, more like just understanding them. I am no more racists than anyone else.

I know myself i will never set foot inside a township, and i wont walk alone in the streets at night, and i definitely will not trust a black man in my house alone. if they wanna call me racist because of that so be it.

But because i understand their culture, i know what to expect from them, i can understand what is happening in the country, i know what to expect from a all black government etc ... it kind of helps you to make certain choices in life that might have otherwise lead you to an outcome you were not expecting.

This could have been such a great country, we had gold, diamonds, great minds .... we should in reality have been a first world country. its really sad how it all turned out.

 

[KillerX]

This could have been such a great country, we had gold, diamonds, great minds .... we should in reality have been a first world country. its really sad how it all turned out.

Quote of the day my friend. SA should rival the likes of UK, France, Germany.... The resources here are mind boggling.

 

[lion_fish]

Oz more screwed up than this place? ROFLMAO, um ok if you say so.

I know, That comment was brilliant.

I have been laughing non-stop for a good few minutes at that one...

I never thought that there being laws and people enforcing the laws would ever be a bad thing but according to OP it is? Oh well....

 

[boramk]

Quote of the day my friend. SA should rival the likes of UK, France, Germany.... The resources here are mind boggling.

I think we competed with Italy in terms of economy at one stage lol

 

[lion_fish]

I think we competed with Italy in terms of economy at one stage lol

The Rand was equal to the Pound at one stage in early history if i remember correctly...

 

[PeterCH]

"SA IS OK!" the next big African slogan after the old "Charles in Charge!"
http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-67771501.html

LOL

 

[MacNabs]

The Rand was equal to the Pound at one stage in early history if i remember correctly...

And the Zim $ use to be stronger than both the Rand and the british pound