Cosatu's 'nurse' and the breakdown of bedside manner

How a big mouth with a megaphone spooked the 'glorious movement of our people'

A few weeks ago, in the wake of the Marikana massacre, Cosatu president Sdumo Ndlovu addressed a bunch of young communists and tore into Julius Malema. He accused the former ANC Youth League leader of opportunism and warned of consequences if he persisted in exploiting the plight of the poor.

Malema's troops, who call themselves the Friends of the Youth League, hit back. They called Dlamini a mere nursing "sister" with "questionable struggle credentials" and laughed off his "warning".

"If the warning is a threat of violence, Sister Dlamini should be reminded that he knows nothing about violence and does not possess any monopoly over violence."

They urged "Sister Sdumo" to "focus on healthcare and leave politics and activism to the fearless and courageous".

The Democratic Nurses' Union of South Africa was deeply hurt by this and quickly typed out an angry statement. They said they viewed "this attack not only as an attack on Comrade Sdumo Dlamini, but as an attack on the entire nursing profession".

They added the obligatory comrades' concluding line that "we condemn this attack in the strongest possible terms".

(By the way, what's the difference between a democratic nurse and an undemocratic nurse? Does a democratic nurse consult widely before dispensing medication?)

Then came general health union Nehawu, which said it found it "abominable and laughable that these shifty fantasists and Chaucerian frauds that prey on the gullible have the audacity to take cheap shots at the nursing profession".

Dear reader, please do not ask for a translation from this lowly newspaperman.

Then things moved from the ridiculous to the absurd. Malema, who had been roaming the land with a megaphone almost as large as his watch, announced that he was visiting an army base. Defence Minister Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula unfurled her substantial form and mumbled that there were "all indications that this is counter-revolutionary". She immediately put the 76000-strong military on "high alert", the first such step in post-apartheid South Africa. All of that for Julius Malema, Floyd Shivambu and a couple of other guys with laptops and BlackBerries.

So, if a skorokoro mining union - along with a young man and his friends with airtime - can outsmart our governing party like this, one shudders to think what will happen when we have a real insurrection on our hands.

Then things moved from the absurd to the absolutely banal.

Down in parliament, opposition members on the mineral resources portfolio committee proposed that the oversight committee visit Marikana to see the situation for themselves.

No bloody way, the ANC comrades replied. They said something to the effect that they would not put themselves at the mercy of a "suicidal mob".

Basically, these "loyal and disciplined cadres of the glorious movement of our people" were not going to take chances with some black barbarians. Better for them to observe everything from beneath Table Mountain while sipping wine with German tourist Gunther Ludwig.

And if, at this point, you thought the tomfoolery was over, then clearly you must have been paying far too much attention to the Mars Curiosity mission.

The ANC's national executive committee met last weekend and, for the second time, discussed Marikana, having decided the first time round to boldly call it a tragedy, instead of a massacre.

This time around, ANC secretary-general Gwede Mantashe took out his Gatling gun and aimed it at everyone, including the British media, Friends of the Youth League, rebel unions, opposition parties, unidentified ANC leaders and - believe it or not - sections of the clergy. All of these "forces", said Mantashe, were bent on exploiting the Marikana crisis to damage the ANC. He darkly warned that the likes of Malema's grouping could evolve into a Renamo-like outfit which may try to destabilise the country in the same way as Alfonso Dhlakama's movement did in Mozambique. Sigh!

One had hoped the Cosatu congress would bring a ray of sanity to our state of affairs. Until the workers and their leaders began discussing the "Lula moment". This was a reference to the period when Brazil's former president, the left-leaning Lula da Silva, turned the country into the powerhouse it now is. He had done this by being decisive on policy and ruthless on inefficiency, incompetence and corruption.

Then some in the congress started using this "Lula moment" discussion as a platform for the re-election of South Africa's president, so that this country could have its "Zuma moment". At this point, dear reader, you are permitted to have a huge swig of some hard tack.

Next week, the ANC will open its Mangaung nomination process. Brace yourself for a few months of awesome banality.