More bang for the buck
WE ENTER a new era in newspapers. We have to fight for our share of the government's advertising budget of R1 billion. Only those who give the government more bang for their buck can expect to benefit. Let us not shrink from the task. Let us get on with telling the story as it really is.
A trawl through the newswires reveals the following:
· Various disadvantaged townships across the country came to a virtual standstill yesterday as jostling crowds blocked the main thoroughfares, joyfully expressing their delight at the recent municipal elections and the imminent delivery of services such as electric light, water and sanitation. Unable to restrain their glee, certain groups lit bonfires made of old tyres and danced about them. Police had to be called to the scene to control the jollifications and good-naturedly fired rubber bullets into the air.
· The Department of Trade and Industry has announced a national Tenderpreneur of the Year award. It will be open to the politically connected at all levels of government – local, provincial and national. Points will be awarded in an inverse ratio to skills, knowledge, experience and actual delivery, while failure – for example, housing projects that have to be demolished and rebuilt – will attract bonus points. A national winner will emerge from a series of elimination contests at the various levels and will be rewarded with a super-contract to convert all police stations into hospital clinics and all hospital clinics into police stations. Announcement of the Tenderpreneur of the Year competition in Pretoria yesterday was unfortunately marred when the ceiling of the newly completed government offices collapsed, burying members of the media and the Government Communication and Information Service in rubble. There were no fatalities and all is well.
· At a local level, forensic investigation of the circumstances leading to the financial collapse of the KwaZulu-Natal provincial capital, Pietermaritzburg, has discovered that it was caused by a long-hidden accounting error during the colonial era. An item: Mayor's allowance - £1 1s 0d (one guinea) - went through as £110. Compounded over the years, and taking into account inflation, it formed a financial black hole down which the capital's finances eventually disappeared entirely. Those in office in recent years are exonerated, and one has been duly recognised by being appointed to another high position.
· Still at a local level, the street-naming process in Durban has been anything but the fiasco portrayed by reactionary elements. In fact it has been a stunning success, and it can now be revealed that it was done in concert with Military Intelligence. As a large seaport, Durban is in the front line of any assault by international forces of reaction and imperialism. As any military strategist knows, an elementary precaution when invasion is imminent is to turn around or take down all the signs so the enemy don't know where they are. The sight of bewildered postmen, taxi drivers and ordinary citizens of Durban wandering about the city totally lost is proof of the efficacy of the measures. If the name changes can disrupt life for those who live here, what will they do for the invading reactionaries and imperialists? (In fact, there is strong suspicion that some of the bewildered postmen are actually American agents trying to infiltrate).
· The fight against crime continues unabated. The latest equipment purchased includes squeeze bottles, embroidered towels, drawstring backpacks, golf caps and golf shirts – all for a modest R3.2 million – while entertainment of the men in blue at a one-day function cost no more than R12 million. That's known as getting bang for your buck.
Memo
From: GCIS
To: Treasury
Kindly reward The Mercury with a 10cm ad in the Classified Section. Adult Entertainment will do.
New Speaker
IAN GIBSON, poet laureate of Hillcrest, pens a few lines on Logie Naidoo, former Deputy Mayor, becoming Speaker of Ethekwini municipality.
We see that Logie's not camera-shy,
He's not a modest kind of guy;
In Metro Beat
He's on every sheet.
Will he ever eat humble pie?
Tailpiece
DID YOU HEAR about the lecherous Scot who lured a girl up to his attic to look at his etchings? He seduced her and afterwards sold her four etchings.
Last word
What we call "Progress" is the exchange of one nuisance for another nuisance.
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