Thomas Johnson - The Blog

 Pet products company Marltons makes and markets Marltons Tick and Flea Dip for Dogs and Cats. The main chemical is cypermethrin. Last week a pet shop suggested it to as an interim solution between applying flea spot. (I use spot on my cats and it's not highly effective. We're told fleas have a tolerance but I think the products are weaker. Activyl was quite effective but was withdrawn from the market. My vet said it was too effective ie people will buy less of it if it worked too well.) I'd no intention of dipping my cats - vets don't recommend dipping (chemical bathing) dogs and cats - but using the Marltons as a spot or spray for the worst affected areas on their coats. The sales clerk said she uses it on her cat as a spray.  It's a good thing I searched cypermethrin on the Internet. Cypermethrin is a synthetic pyrethroid found in insecticides - insect killers like Raid etc - and even rat poison. It's used for parasite control mainly in agriculture and with s...

 2024's Nobel Prize for Economics recipients Daron Acemoglu, Simon Johnson and James Robinson won it for research showing that countries - societies - with poor institutions and laws that exploit their populations do not generate growth or progress. The research is also based on Acemonglu's and Robinson's book Why Nations Fail (2013). I'd heard they won the Nobel and why and thought little of it. But thanks to a YouTube video that explained their research, I understood it and knew it explained why SA has done so badly, except for the initial five years or so post-1994, and is continuing  to do so: that institutions and the rule of law under the ANC has and is failing and shall continue to do so. SA shall reach near-failed state by 2030 as things are going. Failing ANC-run municipalities, particularly in the Free State, illustrates this well, as have numerous examples over the last 30 years. It's something Greg Mills and others have written about too, eg Mills' ...

At the beginning of the month The Press Council of South Africa ordered Daily Maverick to apologise for its coverage of the Pretoria High School for Girls alleged racism story. For context, the mainstream media always assumes such allegations, even if unfounded, are prima facie true before any investigation is initiated and completed. So DM is no exception. I've not seen DM apologise yet, which was to be published in a prominent place on its website. I emailed a DM editor and asked why the delay. I asked if they intend to or have they appealed the decision. There was no response. DM regularly, stridently trumpets the importance of the Press Council and its and media's adherence to the Code of Ethics and Conduct (Press Code). It was scathing of Independent Media's expulsion, or resignation depending who you believe, from the Council. DM claims that when they make a mistake, they apologise and rectify matters. However, regarding Pretoria Girls, they justify their coverage a...

David Bullard To many it was unthinkable Donald Trump beat Kamala Harris and won a second term. In the run-up, American and other commentators were incredulous that the two would be so close given who Trump is and what he stands for. But here we are again. In his column Tuesday November 4 on Politicsweb, David Bullard wrote that while he's not fond of either Trump or Harris, he'd vote for Trump because he has job experience as president. (He conveniently excludes that Harris is vice-president.) He then attacks Harris for her policy of giving $20,000 to black Americans to start a business, which Bullard describes as a "handout", not help. He also criticises other proposed measures for the LGBTQ+ community in a derogatory way. But these were not Harris's only proposed policies. But it suits him that it was. Harris did not spark the imagination of many people, American liberals and around the world, particularly for siding with the status quo on Palestine. But Trump...

Sugar tax activists had hoped the Medium-term Budget would announce an increase in the tax levy on sugary drinks. They claim the tax leads to and was a "huge success" in promoting healthier lifestyles, (Nzama Mbalati, Daily Maverick op-ed ). They claim the tax on sugary drinks per se leads to lower consumption that leads to healthier lifestyles, particularly lower prevalence of obesity, diabetes and cardiovascular disease. But escalation of these diseases after the sugar tax was introduced in 2018 prove otherwise.  Obesity   Data on the World Obesity Observatory's website for South Africa show over time, including after the tax was introduced in April 2018, obesity is increasing. The website lists the drivers to obesity: insufficient activity; fruit, processed meat and wholegrain intake, and mental disorders. They don't mention sugary drinks.  Diabetes   The International Diabetes Federation doesn't have a useful website like WOO's but gives basic country info...

Earlier this month minerals minister Gwede Mantashe claimed at the African Energy Conference that oil and gas exploration would lead to 5 to 8% GDP growth. He was not the first minister to promise or suggest great things for the economy. Think of all those growth and job strategies over 30 years that never went anywhere and cost millions to produce.  Of course the Marxist-oriented ANC has never understood how market economies work, not even the liberal-left's heroes Ramaphosa, Manuel, Gordhan and Mboweni (I take issue with the mainstream media's hagiographies of Gordhan and Mboweni, but that's another story). ANC aside, I contend few if any SA politicians understand how the economy works and what's needed for growth, centre-right DA included. The DA said numerous times that in the WC they "created" hundreds of thousands - the number varied over time - of "new jobs" since 2009 when they took power. They based this on a faulty understanding of StatsSA...

Depending on which side you believe, the Press Council expelled Independent Media (IM) for its refusal to retract and apologise for it piece comparing News24's Karyn Maughan to Nazi propagandist Leni Riefenstahl, or that IM resigned. Either way, there's schadenfreude from other media when Independent Media gets it wrong again. IM deserves the opprobrium, though.  Other media (OM) sententiously write about "ethics", "apologising when we get it wrong" and "self-correcting". Do they, though? They only apologise when forced to, which is not a genuine apology.  Media regularly skirt or break the line. In South Africa this particularly concerns stories about "racism" - untested, unconfirmed and defamatory allegations are assumed to be true. News24 has been identified as particularly egregious - Pretoria High School for Girls, Wilgenhof, Food Lovers boerewors  roll man. With the racist label, reputations are damaged, lives destroyed. The baying ...

 In response to public criticism of proposed changes to the Municipal Planning By-Law, mayoral committee member for spatial planning Eddie Andrews said, "The cost per square metre in areas like Rondebosch and Constantia prevented the private sector from meeting the objectives of delivering affordable housing opportunities". Andrews' statement shows the City's cop-out and contradiction regarding affordable housing, and that the by-law is a transparent ruse to give developers carte blanche under their "red-carpet" policy. It also reveals their inherent dishonesty about these changes despite outwardly having good intentions. It's common cause South African urban centres are spatially sparse. But one cannot change the status quo, as Prof. Ivan Turok who was approached for comment (Incidentally, he lives in a sparse province and city - Free State) and Andrews suggest, with blanket densification without upsetting the extant spatial, social and environmental or...

Cape Town's public land sales and proposed sales for affordable aka social housing in Lansdowne, Ottery, Rondebosch East, Mowbray, Woodstock (and elsewhere) is questionable. The city is discounting the price so developers can make the units affordable.  But neither they, developers nor media that enthusiastically report the city's announcements, define exactly what "affordable" is. And that's the problem.  First, is it legal under PFMA and MFMA for government entities to discount the value of assets to benefit essentially private sector interests? Sounds like something that happens at corrupt-ridden state enterprises. As defined, affordable or social housing is for households earning up to R15,000 a month. Typically, land in Cape Town becomes available in middle class areas where it's relatively expensive. No-one, certainly not city or developers, are saying what the price of even the smallest units would be. A one-bed flat near the Lansdowne site is selling f...

Cape Town's Parks Department performed unnecessary tree cutting at a local park during August. Two contractors performed the job, Stoddard's and Sunshine. It took a morning. I estimate work of this scope costs R100-150,000. From a horticultural aspect, the cutting was excessive and damaged the trees and their landscaping and environmental purpose. Around half were moderately cut, the remainder severely. Pruning was inconsistent - some trees were left with more growth, others inbetween and a third cut so severely that all that remains is a fringe on top.  All this is indicative of inexpert, unprofessional work and no supervision. As is typical of soft city contracts, apparently Parks did not provide a job specification. There was no supervision of the cutters and no supervision by Parks of the contractors. From the nature of the pruning and the manner Stoddard's and Sunshine performed the work, the workers' were largely unskilled.  I contacted Parks manager Jacques Cedra...

The absence of project and contract direction and supervision in the Cape Town's Parks and environmental services departments and the lack of political oversight by ward and mayoral committee councillors of these departments is creating problems for quality of service.  I will illustrate the problem - absence of contract specification and supervision - with Parks Department's tree pruning contracts but I believe it's also city-wide with contracts like invasive species control and soft - non-engineering - contracts. August is the last month to prune greenery and prepare gardens for summer. There's an old saying that when the city prunes public open space trees, it's time for homeowners to do theirs. But from what I've seen, it's best not to follow their modus operandi: over-cutting that damages trees. There's the right way and the wrong way to do it. The city and its contractors follow the principle that cutting more and more is always better even when it...

I wrote about the confusion surrounding "clean audits" in government audits (see here ). The public believe accountants and auditors are above reproach. They aren't. Like lawyers and doctors, they too have questionable and unethical practises. Commentators used the collapse of Steinhoff and its founder and CEO Markus Jooste's disgrace and suicide as a lesson on the dangers of fraud and corruption. He was described as a financial genius who built Steinhoff from nothing but then defrauded investors. He hid the Ponzi scheme - that the enterprise was built on sand - from them and auditors in South Africa and abroad for so long. But how indeed did he evade scrutiny? Jooste was a chartered accountant and knew the tricks of the trade. He did not personally prepare the accounting records and statements so others, especially senior management and auditors, must have known about irregularities but chose to remain quiet or not probe too deeply.  The auditor's motto is to exp...

 There's been the expected fulsome (definition: excessively flattering), even obsequious commentary on former ANC finance and public enterprises minister Pravin Gordhan's death. On CapeTalk former ANC MP and political commentator Melanie Verwoed gushed about his sharp intellect like he was Stephen Hawking.  Most commentary including in Daily Maverick is about him being a supposed corruption fighter nonpareil. Intelligent he may have been but the rest is overblown. Intelligent as a politician and office bearer he wasn't. Gordhan was part of the ANC's system of patronage, corruption and managerial neglect who contributed to SA being where it is. He personally may not have been the recipient of ill-gotten financial gains, but he was part of a system of state-wide corruption, the worst anywhere in the world, who allowed corruption to proceed unstopped. His mild, hesitant and too late resistance to singular acts of corruption in the Zuma government, for which he was then and...

South Africa's economy is in crisis. The problems are going to take more than a few empty words by the left's favourite pres, Ramaphosa. It's structural, partly a tolerated and condoned holdover from apartheid, including social aspects, and partly deliberate decisions by the ANC (ideology) and business that affect the economy.  Declining private expenditure and investment aka fixed capital formation are the end result of the underlying structure or nature of SA society that's proving impossible to change.  Crime, entrenched corruption, poor education, poverty and inequality, which indirectly impacts crime, are almost entirely the fault of the ANC government. They had a window to address the legacy of apartheid but through hubris, incompetence - often plain stupidity that defies reason - and venality they cocked it up.  ANC incompetence - I still don't understand how anyone who's doing the same job for 30 years has still not mastered it and continues to mess up -...

Cape Town Olympics debate already decided Sports minister Gayton McKenzie has suggested South Africa could host the F1 Motor Race. Also, others are calling for him to initiate a feasibility study into hosting the 2040 Olympics in Cape Town. Consultants Our Future Cities say it could be done "cheaply" using the Cape Town Stadium as main venue and other existing facilities. They've named the proposal Cape Town 2040 and CT2040. But can Cape Town bid for the games cheaply even if the " deserted monstrosity " CT Stadium is used as main venue? As mega-projects around the world including SA show, they're always over-budget. The World Cup 2010 was originally budgeted around R40 billion but ended at R60 billion.  Incidentally, about the CT Stadium. In 2016 I calculated, after adding costs like employee costs of R21 million and other eg municipal services and routine maintenance the city declined to disclose saying the information "simply did not exist", tha...

South Africa's unemployment rate is catastrophic, 42%. The official rate is 32%, the remainder being discouraged jobseekers having given up looking for work (because there is none) and, by definition, not unemployed. Unemployment, though, is not discussed for the disaster it is but treated as a meme or political point scoring or as a consequence of growth. There is a direct link between unemployment and poverty but these are discussed as separate things. So when this month Tim Cohen wrote in his Daily Maverick column "Are we ready for a big debate about SA's unemployment rate?", I was encouraged. Instead, I was disappointed. His effort was worse than no discussion at all. His opening sentence "South Africa’s unemployment rate, the highest in the world, … blah, blah blah [is] worrying, irritating, demeaning and, I’m willing to bet, totally wrong [sic]" stated his intention to debunk the facts. Cohen's argument, if one can call it that - not an original on...

It's not only those with nefarious agendas who want to rewrite history. Seemingly sincere people do it too. For 30 years the ANC's story has been prominent: they defeated apartheid, Mandela was the Messiah and great provider, Mbeki the philosopher-king, Zuma the RET deliverer who would overturn WMC so black people could rise from poverty and subjugation. And last, Ramaphosa the reformer and corruption buster. All hail ramaphoria! Each leader had their acolytes and mythology. Zuma, after everyone thought he would retire, with the ANC and government's help formed the MK Party from disaffected members. Ramaphosa, in addition to being a suburb businessman, was the great negotiator and consensus-builder who would provide South Africa with investment, growth and jobs. When that failed to emerge during the first half of his presidency, the story changed to him having to bring like-minded ANC members on board.  Only during the last two years did the narrative unravel to reveal, to ...