#5Mampara of the week: Gwede Mantashe

ANC chair Gwede Mantashe, who has mercifully announced his retirement from public life, saw fit this week to give the unemployed a lecture from his ivory tower, telling them to stop ”basking in the sun” while expecting the government to give them jobs.

Among his pearls of wisdom was: “You queue for a job, you look for the advert, and you apply in real terms.” Saying the ANC had given citizens a “fishing rod”, Mantashe — who has done very well for himself, thank you, as a highly paid minister amid rampant unemployment — asked: “Must it now catch fish for you?” This mampara’s attempt to deflect from his party’s failure to deal with unemployment is understandable. But gaslighting the victims takes the cake.