Belgian Attacks

I have been working from home a lot.   This basically means drinking a lot of tea and watching a lot of telly.  So I was able to follow the Brussels bombings for several hours yesterday, on Sky, Belgian TV and French TV.

Having worked in some of the buildings near the Metro station which was hit, and seeing them on the TV screen, it brought home to me how these attacks were so close to my old haunts.   And Zaventem airport is a place from which I departed on many memorable trips while I was based in Brussels.

I am not shocked by the reports of dissent and the fostering of terrorists in the immigrant neighbourhoods of Brussels, having lived in such a neighbourhood myself.   And from my own observations, I have noticed that many Belgians are not always benign about their North African neighbours, or their descendants.  Or very welcoming.

However, I was rather disturbed by attitude of the Sky TV vultures who descended on Brussels, as they had done upon Paris after the attacks there.    Maybe I was just being hyper-sensitive, but the tone of some of the coverage suggested that the Belgians had brought this upon themselves.  Belgian and French TV coverage was a lot more objective.,

Now, I may be wrong, but I have always believed that the terrorists and not the targets are the ones we should blame for the atrocities.   Maybe the Belgian security services were a bit lax, but remember that they have just captured the mastermind behind the Paris attacks, so they can’t be all that useless.

Of course, a good response to all of my moaning is that if the Sky TV coverage annoyed me, I should have just turned it off.   And after a while I did.    Bloody Belgians.

Chris Hart

I haven’t seen the very impressive Chris Hart since he left Standard Bank, after much excitement over a tweet which some believed was racist, although it clearly wasn’t.

However, I see that now he has resigned he is out and about again, and we must all welcome the return to the public stage of one of our finest commentators on economics and on the way this country is being (badly) run.

The best news is that now he has escaped the Standard Bank shackles, Chris is now free to speak freely, and anyone with a love of South Africa should take advantage of this.   If he does not soon embark on a crowded schedule of speaking engagements, there will be something very wrong with those responsible for hiring worthwhile speakers.    I know I cannot wait to attend his next presentation, however disturbing his analysis may be.

 

Tweet of the Day:

Shit Jokes (@ShitJokes):  My Mrs reckons she can tell how good a film is by how many tissues she goes through when watching it. Funnily enough, I have a similar system!

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It was notable that as Sasol’s outgoing CEO David Constable wound up his latest results presentation, the last slide referred to succession.

He must be a­­­­­­ hard worker, because his top job is to be taken over not by one man, but by two.  The incoming joint-CEOs Bongani Nqwababa (who is black) and Stephen Cornell (who is not black) were there to bid farewell to the man with two jobs as they prepare for one each.

In a phrase which belongs more in an employment contract than in a media briefing, Constable said his twin successors would be jointly and severally accountable.   Whatever that means.

Now it is about time that Sasol had a black CEO, partly because this is a new South Africa, and partly because it has had a stormy relationship with government – and black CEOs are perceived to be better at oiling the wheels in Pretoria than we pale-faces.

But why does any black CEO need an equal-in-status side-kick/partner-in-crime?   Don’t get me wrong.  There is no suggestion that either new Sasol boss will be first among equals, or that Bongani is not up to the job and needs a bit of hand-holding.

But this is South Africa, where racists lurk behind every bush and perceptions can sometimes be more important than reality.

There is a similar relationship up the Rosebank hill from Sasol HQ – at Standard Bank, where again there is a joint-CEO structure with (black) Sim Tshabalala being in charge alongside (white) Ben Kruger.

Now Sim has undoubted qualities – which help to explain his leading position in the current dialogue between the business community and President Zuma.

But might he not command even more respect if he were doing the CEO job all on his own?

Certainly, any company which has two equal-in-status, of-any-colour, joint-CEOs will be faced with a higher executive wage bill, as neither would wish to be seen to be paid any less than their predecessor or their boardroom equal.   And maybe there is indeed twice the value for twice the money?

However, returning to the issue of perceptions, and without any suggestion that either black joint-CEO is in any way under-qualified, it might have been better if these two giants of the business community, Sasol and Standard, had taken a slightly bolder step and had just appointed a stand-alone black CEO.

It would have saved a few rand, and given the racists less ammunition for their vile theories.

Tweet of the Day:

Mark Twain (@TheMarkTwain):  Under certain circumstances, profanity provides a relief denied even to prayer.   

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