If you’re looking for an indication of how low our political bar has sunk, there’s no more embarrassing a case than that of Murunwa Makwarela, the erstwhile mayor of Tshwane, who served in that role for all of 10 days.
Makwarela, who comes from the party of ANC rejects that formed COPE, was first ousted from his position because it turned out (after his inauguration) he was an unrehabilitated insolvent. The constitution forbids someone from holding office in that case.
Then, as if by magic, Makwarela produced a “clearance certificate”, purporting to be a court order, declaring he’d been rehabilitated. It didn’t take long for the chief justice’s office to confirm that no order had been granted.
The “court order” was so self-evidently awful, it would have looked more legitimate had it been written in crayon. The rinky-dink order not only referred to a court that didn’t exist (“The North Court of South Africa”), it also bungled the word “hereby”.
There are lessons in this, beyond the rank inability of our political class even to pull off a con properly. It also demonstrates how little respect our political leaders have for those who elected them.
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