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Pie in the sky

IT IS hardly a week since the ruling ANC launched its 2014 election manifesto and I am already jaded.

And I am sure that I'm not the only one who is bored already because the political discussion has begun to devolve into blandness.

Listening to President Jacob Zuma’s launch of the 2014 election manifesto, one would have thought that South Africa had reached a cusp in politics where disgust becomes pleasure.

It was really outrageous that Zuma promised to create at least six million jobs in the next five years, without giving a single line explaining how his party will go about doing this.

His speechwriters should stop writing stuff that raises more questions than answers. (Of course, I am assuming he was reading from a prepared speech when he made these comments, as is his habit.)

Two decades after it first did so, the ANC still believes in making unrealistic promises to voters.

Can the ANC create 1.2 million jobs a year in the next five years? They must come up with an amazing plan if they are to do so - and I do not think they have it.

Besides, South Africa’s biggest trading partner, the eurozone, is still not out of the doldrums. No one knows how long it will take the eurozone nations to reorganise their economies.

South Africa is dealing with an intellectually static party which fails to come up with innovative ideas to win votes.

There are many things they could do to win votes during this century - apart from unrealistic promises.

If they fail to innovate, then Zuma should follow the lead of presidents in other parts of the world and try to emulate them.

We know that South African conditions are not the same as those in other countries, but he can select things that can work at home and discard what he thinks may not work.

His French counterpart President Francois Hollande – also a great lover of women, and currently embroiled in a sex scandal - has promised to lower taxes for companies that hire more workers in that country.

Hollande’s plan, I believe, can seriously address unemployment in the European country.

The government and the ANC have unveiled so many job creation plans in the past, none of which has managed to address the soaring unemployment rates in this country.

That Zuma thinks his new job creation initiatives will make a difference baffles me indeed.

The ANC’s job creation programmes benefit only members of the ANC and do not involve big corporates which can do the hiring.

Zuma also vowed that the ANC will rule South Africa "forever", as Africa’s economic powerhouse prepares for elections.

"We will continue to run this government forever and ever, whether they (detractors) like it or not," Zuma was quoted as telling ANC supporters.

Zuma must tell us what prompted him to say this. Does he feel in the pit of his stomach that this could be the last time the ANC wins the general elections?

With trade federation Cosatu divided right through the middle, Zuma may be sick with worry that it is during his presidency that the ANC will go to the polls as a weakened party for the first time.

 - Fin24

*Mzwandile Jacks is a freelance journalist. Opinions expressed are his own.

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