The F word
Published: May 23, 2026
Is South Africa a First World Country?
That was the question raised on Quora. Victor Mashigo, Engineering Physics Technician. from his post on Quora, updated May 13. responded:
Ok. Don’t be fooled by people’s emotions, stereotypical biases. The fact that this question is asked in the first place indicate that South Africa is a well developed first world country. It’s the most developed country in all of Africa. Im not just talking services and infrastructures. Technology too. World class universities and research institutions. South Africa easily built nuclear weapons during the cold war starting as far back as the 1960s to 80s. Many South African are not aware that South Africa built nuclear weapons. There are European countries that tried to build nuclear weapons but failed.
That is Mr Mashigo’s firt paragraph. His post is five generous paragrpaphs in all, and he does not mince words. He concludes:
South African rulling politians are pretending that South Africa is a third world country that needs funding. They are embezzling the funds. They are so obsessed with funding that they can sell their souls. They hide behind the characterization of a developing country. EU and US don’t understand South Africa. Only their ambassadors to South Africa do. Most people in the West think there are lions roaming around the streets in South Africa. They think one mistake outside the airport a lion might get you to rest in peace. They mistaken South Africa for a large game reserve. They think South Africa is either Kalahari desert or Kruger national park. As soon as they get to South Africa they would say to the guides wow it’s a lot like where they came from. In the West.
Four Letter Word
F. U. N. D.
I have long been sarcastic about ‘funding chasers’. Our liberation movements fell for this trap. They have not yet worked their way out of it. I don’t know how other countries wormed their way away from this word, but Iceland, Greece, Vietnam, Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka come to mind. They were all strapped with financial mayhem, some after being bombed to hell and back by pre-Trumpers. I wonder if they have our unemployment problems? Do they squabble about empowerment? Do their grootkoppe spend a house deposit on a handbag?
Bee Found
In a casual conversation with a prominent liberation figure, before he became president, I floated the idea of a “President’s Orchestra”, or big band. I was thinking of Jonas Gwangwa. He was already leading the ANC’s ‘Amandla Ensemble’ in exile, and had just completed a week-long concert run in the Johannesburg Civic Centre. It was a personal greatest-ever big band experience for me.
I thought it would be fitting for such an eminent composer and musician to emerge from secret to public life back home, bringing us his wonderful music, and heading up a State Big Band into a comfortable retirement. I miss “Bra JG”. How should I feel, contemplating today what our “Flowers of the Nation” (from both sides of the conflict, as Bra JG always stressed) gave their lives for?
The liberation person agreed that a State President’s Orchestra was a great idea, and when I raised the question of who would cover the cost, he snapped
The money must be found!
Note how he turned that phrase: ‘be’ and ‘found’. What’s this? I mean, does money go about ‘being found’? Even today, my mind writes that phrase as ‘BEE FOUND’. The mention of ‘funding’ reminds me of EF Schumacher, who once described foreign aid as:
Stealing money from the poor in rich countries, and giving it to the rich, in poor countries.
Dawie Roodt and other economists point out that 80c out of every Rand are spent on servicing debt and 16c on corruption and wasteful expenditure, meaning that South Afrca effectively survives on 4c in each Rand. I think about that when I put a juicy lamb chop on the braai. I don’t want to live anywhere else in the world. I love the people I meet and greet! In the words of the great Satchmo song:
As I walk down the street
All the people give
Me a friendly “Hello”
I guess I’m just a lucky so-and so!
So, in the same way as that liberation person flipped money into something found rather than earned, I flip Dawie Roodt’s 4-cents-in-the-Rand:
South Africa will be twenty-fold awesome when we live on 96 cents in every Rand, and spend only 4 cents on debt and fraud.