Strong and stable covfefe

2017 in review

Take a look at any look-back at this year's events and it would be easy to conclude that 2017 was a stinker.  But I'd like to throw in some optimism and suggest that maybe it wasn't such a bad year after all.

Okay, okay... there's the Trump thing, not to mention North Korea.  And Brexit is going about as well as can be expected.  Then there was the fall from grace of my one-time hero Aung San Suu-Kyi.  Not forgetting [insert your pet political grumble here].  I get it.  But hear me out.  Mugabe is no longer in power (granted that Mnangagwa may not be much better, but still), Zuma no longer leads the ANC (and hence, hopefully, will soon no-longer loot lead South Africa), UKIP has all but disappeared and Steps went on tour again.  Personally, it was quite a good year too.  I built a staircase and obtained my reindeer drivers' license (seriously).

Oh, and I became a father.

That's right... whatever the doom-peddlers may say, 2017 was a good year as the world welcomed this little bundle:

It gives an opportunity to put things in perspective.  Let me take you back to the early hours a September Friday morning...

I'm just in bed, having been sent away from the hospital as a spare part, when the phone rings.  This is it: the moment.  It was hard to make out the exact instruction through all the screams and profanities, but the gist was something like 'make haste to the labour suite'.

As I arrive and try to accept the reality of the situation, before I have the chance to do anything, the midwife calls me over to the side to warn me that already things are not looking straightforward.  There is a problem with baby's heartbeat, and a range of scenarios could ensue.

She takes me through her scenario-planning: if x happens, then y could happen, so we better do z just in case.  Then again, if a happens, we'd have to do b so I'm going to prepare c just in case.  Then again, d, e and f might all happen, and that would spell real trouble, so I've got g and h standing by.

"Do you play chess?" I ask her, hoping that levity will relieve the gravity of the situation.  "If you don't, you should."

The clock ticks forward, and more and more complicated pieces of monitoring equipment are attached and inserted as a stream of medics visit, look at the graphs and suck in through their teeth like a mechanic who is about to tell you the cylinder head has gone.  The various alarms and people racing from the room suggest there are several emergencies on the go at once.

"I've called in the on-call surgeon, just in-case," says the chess-playing midwife.  "And I've asked the Sick Kids to send out a paediatric emergency team."

It all sounds very serious, yet no-one is worried because this midwife appears to be super-woman.  There is surely no possible scenario she hasn't got a plan for.

In comes a consultant to look at the monitor, and before we know what's going on, everyone is whisked away down a labyrinth of corridors to theatre, and I'm thrown some scrubs to change in to.  It's all very ER.

Thirteen people it took to bring this one little life into the world: nine midwives, surgeons, anaesthetists and others in theatre, and two paediatric emergency doctors stood with me at the side.  In the end, they aren't needed, as the moment he's delivered, he's as healthy a baby as they've seen.  We all share a moment of gratitude that everything is well, thanks to this 13-strong medical team brought together by the chess-playing midwife.

It's hard not to think back to that night.  The harsh reality is that at any earlier time in history, mother and/or baby may not have survived this ordeal.  The harsher reality is that in most other parts of the world, such a team of specialists would be unaffordable, if available at all.

That we still, over 50 years later, have a National Health Service, free at the point of need, that can perform these most miraculous of acts daily is something for which we should be most grateful.  2017's not been so bad after all, has it?

It's time to take an interest (again)

If you are of a certain age, I'd be willing to bet you did your part in the anti-apartheid campaign.  Maybe you boycotted South African apples, moved money out of South African-linked investments or filled the cleverly re-named Nelson Mandela Place in a protest march.  Perhaps you watched the 'Free Mandela' concert from Wembley, bought the song by The Specials or signed a petition to keep South African cricketers out of the UK.  In lots of small ways, the people of the UK came together and condemned this crime against humanity.

If, like me, you're a little too young to be involved in all of that, then perhaps your seminal memories involve watching Nelson Mandela walk through the gates of Victor Verster Prison to freedom, or seeing him sworn in as South Africa's first democratically elected president, or watching him work his magic at the 1995 Rugby World Cup final, or hearing the accounts at the Truth & Reconciliation Commission... I could go on.

The fact is, that for several decades, the UK - and Scotland in particular - was caught up in the fight of black South Africans for their emancipation.  We followed their struggle, did what little we could to help and then rejoiced as the miracle of the "rainbow nation" unfolded.

Here's the thing, though: the time has come for us to get stuck in again.  The miracle has been coming undone.  Through a corrupt and reckless president, the last decade has seen the lives of ordinary South Africans plunged into despair, racial tensions re-stoked and Mandela's legacy trashed.  Desmond Tutu has described it as "worse than the apartheid government" - at least we would have expected it of them, he cries.  And yet, we in the UK are paying no interest.  But we should be...

Most people are shocked and stunned by Donal Trump's disinformation campaigns and use of "fake news" as propaganda to further his narrow cause, but on another continent, one Jacob G. Zuma has been doing the very same since he seized power at the 2007 ANC conference through what courts have now shown to be lies and deceit.  He engineered the removal of Thabo Mbeki as president of the country and established for himself a patronage network that has in the process destroyed parliament, cabinet, the Treasury, the Revenue Service, the police, the prosecutions service and the rule of law.  He has ensured that he and his network get richer, while the poor get poorer.  And the price to maintain this power?  Re-igniting the racial divisions of the past that Mandela's generation worked so hard to overcome.

Why should this matter to us?  Why should we again take up the cause?  The answer is simple: this is all being made possible because of UK companies.

British PR company Bell Pottinger masterminded a campaign blaming South Africa's woes on "white monopoly capital" and gave Zuma the racial narrative he was looking for.  As they profited from sowing division, we in the UK turned a blind eye.  (Since this was uncovered, Bell Pottinger has gone into administration - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-41245719.)

KPMG was then found to have been involved in lending legitimacy to the regime and its associates through what it admits were "deficiencies" in its auditing of accounts associated with Zuma which "fell considerably short" of the required standards.  (More here: https://www.theguardian.com/media/2017/sep/15/bell-pottinger-fallout-deepens-kpmg-chiefs-south-africa.)

The Serious Fraud Office is investigating the use of HSBC and Standard Chartered accounts to launder money.  (See http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-41672793.)  Peter Hain has claimed that HSBC ignored warnings that this was going on (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-41835937).  He also claims that Barclays and Santander need to check whether they have had any accounts used (https://www.fin24.com/Economy/british-peer-calls-for-london-based-bank-accounts-of-soes-to-be-investigated-20171206).

I could go on at some length...

The point is that 10 years before Trump burst on to the scene, JZ was using the same tactics in another hemisphere.  The UK has become bound up in his network of corruption and propaganda, and its time that we, who took such an interest in the anti-apartheid movement - did something about it to safeguard the freedoms secured by the Mandela generation.

But what could we do?  Rock concerts and apple boycotts won't achieve much this time round.  But we could investigate whether the companies we have money in have any links to Zuma or his associates the Guptas, and move it if they do.  We could lobby our foreign office to take a tougher stance against the stoking of racial tensions for personal gain.  But most importantly, we could take an interest.  During the days of apartheid, South Africans drew strength for their struggle from knowing that millions across the world stood in solidarity with them.  They need to know the same now.  So lets inform ourselves (start by watching these episodes of HARDtalk: https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/search?q=hardtalk south africa&search_group_id=urn:bbc:programmes:b006mg2m) and take an interest once again.


P.S. The ANC conference to elect Zuma's successor begins tomorrow.  The two leading candidates are Zuma's ex-wife Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma and Nelson Mandela's favoured choice as his own successor, Cyril Ramaphosa.  It would seem that the best hope to reclaim the principles of democracy would be a Ramaphosa victory.  Watch with interest...