Every time someone tells me “things were better under apartheid”, a knot twists in my stomach. As a young black professional with the privilege of education, this feels like a gut punch.
How did we arrive here? Why have we tolerated the erosion of dignity — not just for ourselves but for our children? Do we feel no shame about how history will judge us?
It’s time to wipe the greasepaint from our faces; we must stop being clowns in this global circus.
The ghost of Babylon
Scripture recounts the fall of Babylon, an empire so mighty its hanging gardens were a wonder of the world. Yet when King Belshazzar feasted while Cyrus’s army camped at his gates, divine fingers scrawled his doom on the palace wall: “Mene, Mene, Tekel, Upharsin” — your days are numbered; you have been weighed and found wanting.
Corruption isn’t an anomaly; it’s the rhythm of our decay
That night, Persian forces diverted the Euphrates, infiltrated the city and slaughtered the revellers. Babylon fell not just to invaders, but to its own rotten core of arrogance and decay.
The parallel chills me. Today, our leaders gorge themselves on state resources while hospitals collapse. Elites cling to privilege as schools fail a generation. Citizens scroll through Netflix, numb to the drowning of their nation. And who suffers? The poor, mostly black people like me, are left to fight for scraps from a broken table (hello Operation Dudula).
A nation in freefall
Our public services are tragicomic:
- Hospitals starved of medicine, staffed by clinically indifferent nurses in the worst sense. Nurses who dare sell junk food in the paediatric gastro ward — how cruel.
- Schools where bureaucrats play politics while children stare at crumbling chalkboards. Where the solution to a failing system is to lower the pass mark instead of improving the outcome.
- Municipalities hijacked by thugs who pocket millions as raw sewage floods streets, and we have pothole-riddled roads resembling the moon’s cratered surface. Except the moon’s scars were forged by asteroids, while ours were carved by neglect and corruption.
- Churches built on self-gratification over the self-denying ministry of Christ, whose message is of divorcing themselves from the responsibilities of society.
Do these officials live among us? Do their children choke on the same polluted air?
When my eight-year-old son asked, “Dad, why don’t you fix Eskom?” I wondered: does the Buffalo City roads director’s family wince at every pothole? Does the education DG feel shame when their graduate child can’t wire a plug? What grotesque self-delusion lets them sleep at night?
Corruption isn’t an anomaly; it’s the rhythm of our decay. Officials steal boldly while citizens queue for birth certificates. Failure brings no consequences, only the next act in this farce. Our collective betrayal. But here’s the danger: we are complicit.
The intellectuals’ cowardice
Where are the thinkers, the professionals? Too many sip lattes in Sandton, muttering curses at politicians — yet never organising, mentoring or lifting a finger. Our graduates scroll TikTok while schools burn. We demand change but won’t tutor a child or report a bribe.
A European colleague once told me, “Reporting corruption is my civic duty.” Why does that shock us?
Middle-class hypocrisy
We hashtag #BlackExcellence but step over beggars. We lease German cars and talk about townships through tinted windows.
When did excellence divorce accountability?
An ultimatum
This is a moral reckoning. No saviour comes.
- Hang the corrupt – Stop voting for thieves, even if they share your skin.
- Burn your privilege – Mentor. Hire. Teach. Move the needle.
- Kill apathy – Attend community meetings. Blow whistles. Demand more than survival.
- Tear down comfort – Gated communities are incubators of complacency.
The future won’t be won in parliament. It’s forged in our living rooms, workplaces and streets.
History’s pen hovers with terrible accuracy. What will it write about you?
For opinion and analysis consideration, email opinions@timeslive.co.za
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