I have to admit that I was a little wary about eating in the Mosaic restaurant, or Restaurant Mosaic as it known, as some friends told me of an evening meal there after which they needed to stop by MacDonald’s on the way home, as they were still hungry.   However, one of our finest wine producers La Motte was hosting a media lunch, so I had little to lose by going along.   As it transpired, not even my appetite.

I used my TomTom navigator to get there, as the restaurant is located in the middle of nowhere, and then on a bit.   It is an attractive building, with a brilliant sommelier, and I was hosted by La Motte CEO Hein Koegelenberg, who was full of fascinating anecdotes and info on the wine business.  When he could get a word in.   One of my fellow guests was clearly under the impression that she was hosting the event, constantly interrupted poor Hein, and did little to enhance my mood.

What of the food?   What is the square root of very small?   Go to Mosaic and you will find out.   The first offering was trundled in – a trolley with four types of bread, accompanied by a selection of butters, which were on the table.   But what small slices!   If a modern-day Christ were seeking the best way to feed several thousand people from a few small loaves, without any flashy miracles, he could learn a lot from this restaurant.

The other courses were not quite as small, although it would have taken the cheese selections from every diner at the table to make up just one mouthful.   The langoustine with bisque and risotto was enjoyable, although I found the bisque a bit bland and the risotto overcooked.

Before that, there was a pile of green stuff surrounded by a moat of different green stuff, which tasted OK.   Two dishes from the La Motte guest chef were less enjoyable.  The first was a few shavings of cured meat, which left an unpleasant taste in the mouth, and then there were a few bundles of poultry wrapped in different coverings, which really did nothing to fill or to please me.

The dessert was two types of chocolate, looked wonderful, but tasted a bit underwhelming.

As the service took so long, I was unable to stay for coffee, as the sun was threatening to fade and I needed to head home, but I am sure it was fine.

The wines were enjoyable, but not startling.   I found the La Motte Sauvignon Blanc rather brash, but the sommelier suggested it might benefit from some cellaring.  Maybe they will do so, and then invite me back for another taste?    There were a couple of reds, one of which had lots of gold stickers on the bottle, and the other of which didn’t.   The first was a the Hanneli R 2011.  I found it rather brash, so my preference would have been for some more time in the cellar.  The second was a multi-award winner – the Pierneef Syrah-Viognier 2013 – which I found it rather harsh and heavy.   I am sure it will be spectacular in a few years time.

Bizarrely, we were also served a few French wines, presumably to prove that La Motte is up to world standards.  For me, this backfired spectacularly, as my favourite red was a 2007 Côte-Rôtie from France.   It might not have been as fine as the La Motte reds, but it was well aged, and was the only wine for which I requested a refill.

The final wine we were offered was a straw wine from La Motte, which was magical.   A real delight. (And we had earlier been greeted with a glass or two of reasonable La Motte bubbly.)

Will I continue to drink and enjoy La Motte wines?  Certainly.

Would I ever pay myself for a few nibbles at the Mosaic?   Unlikely.

Final proof of the pretentiousness of the place came with the printed menu material.   A reference was made to dinner, even though we were there for lunch.  One of the poultry parcels was described as a petite tortellini, rather than tortellino.  And there was a reference to mousse de mer – which means nothing, unless it a mousse made out of sea water. It wasn’t.

John Fraser was a guest of La Motte at Restaurant Mosaic.

 

Tweet of the Day:

Jewish Comedians (@JewishComedians):  The food here is terrible, and the portions are too small. | #Quotes

 

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If there is one thing that businessmen enjoy, even more than long lunches, it is certainty.   Whether it is with their own money, or with funds raised from elsewhere, they are more likely to go ahead with a project if they are sure that its finances are predictable, that any support they are receiving from government will be predictable and will be delivered. 

With this in mind, I attended the media launch of the dti’s latest industrial blueprint, the eighth Industrial Policy Action Plan (IPAP).  

Trade and Industry Minister Rob Davies gave an overview of the strategy, and there were some encouraging elements.   A new auto support programme is being drawn up in good time for 2020, when the existing one is due to expire.    It may be that the voice of the auto component sector is to be more closely heard than it was in previous exercises, and the aim is to provide the industry with continuity and certainty about future support.   Tens of billions of rand of taxpayers’ funds are being invested in auto production, so it is good that proper planning seems to be taking place.

There was also a confirmation by Rob Davies that the focus of government incentive support measures will be shifting from wider support schemes to sector-specific ones, such as those for films, auto, clothing, footwear and textiles and so on.

However, once again there was a slightly opaque response to questions about the main incentive scheme for manufacturing, the MCEP, which ran out of money last year and which would have been reignited around now if there had been fresh funds.

In a series of MCEPtively vague responses, Rob Davies and his DG Lionel October (who had erroneously been introduced as DG September) confirmed the shift from wide-ranging programmes to sector-specific ones, said MCEP has been a success, suggested there would be budget lines for MCEP for the next two years (without saying what funds, if any, are available).  He announced that there would be a smaller successor scheme in future which would again be applied across all industries, alongside the growing sector-specific array of grants.

There is logic in government’s approach.  However, I find it strange and irritating that the changes which are being planned have not been clearly outlined, with details such as funding and timing.  I understand that a number of applications were made before MCEP ground to a halt, but never processed, and the companies concerned must be baffled about what is going on.  

Let us hope that the often excellent communications of the dti can be stepped up to ensure that once important changes are decided, they are then communicated.

Government says frequently how important this country’s industrial base is to our growth, employment and exports, and the more detail on how it plans to support this, the better.

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As anyone who has been watching the excellent TV adaptation of ‘The Night Manager’ will know, the arms business can be dirty and nasty.  Therefore, it is important to keep a close eye on each and every arms deal, especially if is conducted with a government as sleazy and corrupt as Jacob Zuma’s kleptocratic administration.    This is why our interest was aroused by a report in Engineering News about US aerospace giant Lockheed Martin.   It is apparently seeking to sell some more Hercules aircraft to the South African Air Force, with the suggestion that SA manufacturers could be involved in producing the roll-on, roll-off systems for the planes.  Engineering News reports: “Roll-on roll-off modules can be used to configure aircraft for maritime surveillance, intelligence and surveillance, firefighting, medical evacuation and VIP roles, for example.”

Sounds good, doesn’t it?  We buy the aircraft and at the same time the deal brings offsets which give a boost to our manufacturing base. However, those of us with long memories recall the ANC government’s first big arms deal, which was concluded around the turn of the Millennium, and involved an array of industrial offset opportunities.  I am pretty sure that the jobs and investment South Africa was expecting did not materialize at anything like the promised levels, and it is also pretty certain that there were millions of rand which changed hands in murky and corrupt exchanges.   There was not a lot of transparency, either.

Would things be any better today?  I doubt it.  We are now seeing reports that on his latest visit to Saudi Arabia, President Zuma may have opened some joint-venture arms factory, an event which was not publicized at the time.  Why not?  So while I have no reason to believe that Lockheed Martin would act in anything other than an honest and above-board manner, my concern is that some well-connected crooks would benefit from any offset agreements.   So let’s just agree that if the deal goes ahead, instead of offsets, there are some well-audited donations to AIDS charities, rhino conservation and the ZA Confidential wine cellar?  Well, it was worth asking.

 

Tweet of the Day:

Shit Jokes (@ShitJokes):  Two peanuts walking down the road.  One was a salted.

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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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