Dear Mr Zuma,

Given some of the stuff written lately, one can’t blame you for being sceptical about anything from the Fourth Estate. But the national mood is so dismal, that I hope you’ll replace prejudices with a generosity of spirit by reflecting on what follows.

Neither of us should have been surprised that yesterday’s TNS survey on corruption painted a bleak picture. But to read that 90% of South Africans believe corruption has become a way of life in our country must have come as a shock even to one who interacts regularly with ordinary citizens, as you do.

It’s just perceptions, I told myself. Things can’t be that bad.

Then I started replaying things in my mind. And remembered how just last night my teenage daughter told of an acquaintance who was so drunk after a night out that he forgot to take off a ballet tutu he was wearing. On his one-eyed weave home, the tutu-wearing drunk was pulled over by a SAPS officer.

But there was no night in jail and an embarrassing court case for this accident-waiting-to-happen. My daughter says the lad’s only complaint was that because he was so smashed this time, it cost R600 to bribe the boy in blue. Much more, he bragged, than he usually had to fork out.

That also got me thinking again about the Glenn Agliotti affidavits.

Remember, those sworn statements signed by the self-confessed gangster and “friend, finished and klaar” of our crooked SAPS Commissioner Jackie Selebi. Just in case they’ve been kept from you, the affidavits are at the bottom of this page.

They are morbidly fascinating, reading like a sick novel.

In his effort to cut a deal, Agliotti now doesn’t seem to know what he believes nowadays. But his affidavits are so specific and obvious that there can be no doubting the veracity of much which emerges from his gut-spilling. It might even have been an addendum to economist Steven Levitt’s Freakonomics where the New Yorker delved into the criminal world to see what made the underclass tick. Insights that are similarly obvious in Agliotti’s contributions.
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So now we have Zuma sprouting off that it is the ANC’s God-given right that they rule South Africa until the end of time!

He has recently made some very disturbing comments when he said: “Even God expects us to rule this country, because we are the only organisation which was blessed by pastors when it was formed. It is even blessed in heaven.”

Furthermore he went on to say: “hat is why we will rule until Jesus comes back. We should not allow anyone to govern our city (Cape Town) when we are ruling the country”.

These comments have me seriously worried about the future (not that I am not already worried!).

When you start saying you have a divine right to rule, you hearken back to the age of kings and empires. This was the age of despotic, dictatorial rule where any challenge to the ruling person was interpreted as a direct challenge to God. Is this what we are heading to? Isn’t this precisely why Mugabe is still around? Opposition is seen as evil, sinful and an instrument of the devil. Such people are usually destroyed and persecuted.

Making such statements are not only blasphemous, but they also remind one of elements of the old apartheid government who felt that they too were the instruments blessed by God! They feel that like Zanu-PF that they will rule forever, regardless of the will of the people.

Do we want a person with such beliefs to lead our country?

A Catholic woman may have been blinded for life after she tried to emulate a Benoni girl who claims to have seen the Virgin Mary by gazing at the sun.

Eye doctor Percy Amoils said Amal Nassif’s eyes had been severely damaged, reports The Star.

Amal Nassif believed 17-year-old Francesca Zackey when she said the Virgin Mary would appear if Nassif gazed into the sun.

Now 37-year-old Nassif, a devout Catholic, may be blind for life.

She went to Zackey - the Benoni girl who claims to have repeatedly seen the mother of Jesus - to receive a blessing.

The Catholic Church has told Benoni teenager Francesca Zackey to stop blessing pilgrims after a woman severely damaged her eyes.

The Southern African Catholic Bishops Conference, the highest Catholic authority in the region, asked Zackey not to receive pilgrims, not to speak to the media and not to encourage people to look into the sun.

“Several priests spoke to the family to urge them to take time to themselves. We would consider it better if she (Francesca) took some time off to think about what has happened,” spokesman Father Chris Townsend said.

He said the church’s investigation into whether the 17-year-old’s visions were genuine was due to start at the end of the week. Three priests and a nun have been assigned to carry out the probe.
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It seems as though every second person is talking about ‘Our Lady of Benoni’ these days. So here is a little update on this visitation.

Francesca’s great-grandfather came from Lebanon and the Zackey family are Maronite Christians. This is one of the eastern Roman Catholic churches which was founded in the 7th century by John Maron. You can read a little more about them by clicking here. This church is the main Christian church in Lebanon today.

Her father is a self-employed scrap metal dealer and he has three other daughters.

At age 15, in standard 8, her father took her out of school. This was in the same year that she was confirmed and discovered that she had certain gifts, namely. speaking in tongues and seeing certain visions.

From 7th May, she claims to have seen the Virgin Mary a number of times in her house. The Virgin’s presence was always announced with the smell of roses. Francesca claims that they Virgin told her to “pray the rosary, and to get others to pray it, as though it were the last day on earth” and that she had also said: “I love all my children.”
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I have always thought that what South Africa needs is a ‘holy’ site, such as Fatima, Lourdes etc. It would be great for a regular, steady flow of tourism. Now it appears that we may just have such a place!

Recently the papers have reported a ‘miracle’ in Benoni. According to the papers Francesca Zackey, a 17-year old girl, claims to have had over 20 visitations from the Virgin Mary in the space of a month.

Apparently thousands of people have been travelling to see the site at the girl’s Alphen Park home. Parts of the garden have been marked with statues, showing where the Virgin allegedly appeared, and one area, marked with a rose on a garden chair, indicates where Mary supposedly sat.

Although her parents have not seen the apparition, they claim to have smelt the smell of roses when she is said to have appeared. It was the smell of roses that drew Francesca to her bedroom on May 7 where she claims to have seen the Virgin Mary for the first time.

“I found her sitting on my bed. She had blue eyes and long brown hair. She was wearing a royal-blue veil and light was coming from her open hands.”

Francesca says she asked: “Is that you, my lady?”

“Yes,” Mary is said to have replied.

Francesca claims to have touched the lady’s “baby soft” hand when Mary cried sadly about “gays, gay marriages and abortions, saying they were not from God”.
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