SONA 2015 aftermath and the parallel universe outside Parliament

On Friday morning South Africa woke up to the realisation that the national project of a new democracy based on defending the Constitution, the Bill of Rights and the rule of law against its enemies is in danger of imploding. If Karl Popper were alive today he would have added a new chapter to his book The Open Society and its Enemies. Following his identification of Plato, Hegel, Marx and their residue as the enemies of freedom, Popper would have found an equally dangerous enemy in Jacob Zuma, our President in name only. Thursday's State of the Nation in Parliament was the clearest evidence yet that Zuma and the network of cronies he's built around him will stop at nothing to cling to power, at the expense of institutions designed to protect us from oppression and rule by cleptocracy.

                  " Bring back the signal!"
The media, fellow MPs and numerous commentators have documented Thursday's outrageous scenes in the House of Assembly so I will not attempt to repeat them here. Suffice to say that from the moment the scrambling device was detected before the sitting began, to the DA's walkout and Speaker Mbete's calling Julius Malema a cockroach at an ANC rally yesterday, the foundations of South Africa's democracy were steadily and relentlessly attacked by forces within the ANC that sacrificed them beneath the defence, at all costs, of Zuma and his corrupt patronage network.

Promoting opportunity, not envy: Opinion piece in The Star

Hot on the heals of my complaint to the Human Rights Commission regarding Minister Lindiwe Zulu's comments on the looting of foreign-run spaza shops in Soweto, my views on the broader issues are published in The Star newspaper this morning (Thursday 5th February). 

Walking through my constituency in Soweto observing the damage done to property, local business and community relations by the recent looting of foreign-run spaza shops, it became clear that the causes were not immediately obvious, and the solutions hardly more so.

SAPA releases statement on my request to the SA Human Rights Commission to investigate Minister Lindiwe Zulu's comments on foreign traders

The SA Human Rights Commission has received a request from the DA to investigate comments made by Small Business Minister Lindiwe Zulu about foreigners, it said on Tuesday.

"We are currently assessing the matter with a view to investigate," commission spokesman Isaac Mangena said.

"The assessment will tell us if we are the correct institution to deal with the matter or not."

Press statement - DA calls on SAHRC to investigate Lindiwe Zulu’s state-sponsored xenophobia

Democratic Alliance press statement by

Toby Chance MP

DA Shadow Minister of Small Business Development 

2 February 2015

Release: immediate

The DA will today lay a complaint with the South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC) regarding the recent xenophobic comments made by the Minister of Small Business Development, Lindiwe Zulu. 

In arguably her most outrageous public comment since becoming a minister eight months ago, Zulu said that foreign business owners should share their business practices with locals if they wanted to live and trade here without fear of disturbance or violence. 

ANC stuck in an ideology that’s crippling growth

This article features on page 15 of Friday's Cape Argus - click here to read it on the IOL website.

Driving back to Joburg from the coast on Saturday, my wife and I tuned in to coverage of the ANC’s 103^rd birthday celebrations in Cape Town. It dominated SAfm programming for most of the day. As our journey progressed I realised my holiday was well and truly over and politics was once again foremost on my mind.

But contrary to our journey forward the narrative from Cape Town, in particular President Zuma’s speech, was firmly stuck in the past.

Press statement - Minister Zulu must follow words on easing regulations on small business with action

Democratic Alliance press statement by

Toby Chance MP

DA Shadow Minister of Small Business Development 

Scrapping the Licensing of Businesses Bill must top Minister Zulu’s New Year ‘to do list’

12 January 2015

Release: immediate

The DA challenges Small Business Development Minister, Lindiwe Zulu, to meet with Minister of Trade and Industry, Rob Davies, to successfully ensure that the job-killing Licensing of Businesses Bill is scrapped and does not proceed to Parliament. 

Contents of the old oak chest revealed - Part 3: the drift to war

I'm now in Plettenberg Bay on the final leg of my holiday, though I've scheduled some meetings which have a bearing on my political responsibilities - more on those in a future blog post. Somehow work seems to follow you around if you keep your eyes and ears open.

But back to the oak chest, and my grandfather Roger Chance's memoirs, Some Men of my Time: From War to War. The final chapter, Moray Firth to Berlin, recounts a short spell in Scotland (which features at greater length in the chapter on Kurt Hahn, the founder of Gordonstoun school which my father attended) and his time as Press Attache at the British Embassy in Berlin.