Still reeling from 10 days of an amazing Festival, we were suddenly faced with a visit from the President of South Africa. As the noise of the all-night parties faded away over the weekend, there was to be no rest for the wicked as the military types decided to wake us up before daybreak with the sounds of field drills.
Still reeling from 10 days of an amazing Festival, we were suddenly faced with a visit from the President of South Africa. As the noise of the all-night parties faded away over the weekend, there was to be no rest for the wicked as the military types decided to wake us up before daybreak with the sounds of field drills.
Just in case anyone thought we were relaxing, the authorities decided to bring forward the date of the President’s visit to Wednesday, so we had even less time to reflect on the Festival or think about the Schools' Festival, which is still under way this week.
It would appear that even though the President’s visit had been on the drawing board for several months, when it finally happened, many of us were caught off balance. The traffic department forgot to tell Grahamstown residents that a number of roads in the centre of town would be blocked off and the police left it too late to warn residents about the cannons that would be thundering out over our relaxed little sleepy hollow.
We have also received unconfirmed reports that the regional ANC leadership was desperately looking around earlier this week for a cow that they could give to give to the President. Although cattle farming is far from dead in this area, they could not find anyone willing to sell a cow fit for a president.
While there are some people who thought it was rather extravagant to spend a quarter of a million rand on the presidential visit, many other well-wishers appeared to be very happy to be able to see Jacob Zuma. We look at the positive side of the visit and hope that the President now has a good understanding of some the problems people in Makana face, and perhaps he will be favourably disposed towards Grahamstown when a minister suddenly decides to move the High Court out of town.
He might also remember the poor state of the houses around Miki Yili stadium when it comes time to allocate resources for new infrastructure. Zuma certainly had a busy itinerary when he was here, so it was not surprising that he looked a little sleepy sometimes. We trust he enjoyed his brief visit and hope that we don’t have to wait another 15 years to see a new head of state in Makana. At least the weather worked for us.
