Now for the real consequences of the Zuma years

Former South African president and MK party leader Jacob Zuma. Picture: Gallo Images/Daily Maverick/Felix Dlangamandla There’s something to be said about sowing seeds before it rains, but nobody ever tells you how to prepare for a drought. The phrase “when it rains, it pours” unfortunately doesn’t come with a drought equivalent, so for the time being, saying “when it dries, it’s arid“, doesn’t quite capture the severity.

Never mind-we won’t have to imagine a phrase if we’re about to live it. Sadly, playing the “I told you so” card can come across as doomsaying, but the petrol hike in the forthcoming days is going to expose a stack of doom for a stack of people. Decisions made back then and attempts to fix their consequences are going to impact an array of basic things that influence us all.

How much diesel are we burning to avoid load shedding? That’s just one example that brings about so many resultant questions… What will a 20% increase in the diesel price do to the electricity supply and cost? What will increased diesel prices mean to farming and the cost of food?

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What will it mean for food security in an already food-insecure environment? Tell me about the impact it will have on the industry and the employment of seasonal workers and independent contractors. The knock-on effects of this impending price shock are scary to even speculate, let alone realise.

And yet, all this stems from increased dependence on foreign fuel when we have a whole Sasol that pioneered commercial synthetic fuel out of low-grade coal. We have piles of low-grade coal, and we even have mines that can get it out of the ground. But the rail infrastructure collapsed, so we can’t move the stuff, and investment in Sasol tech never really seemed prioritised of late.

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