Alec Hogg: A day Brand SA will definitely want to forget
Yesterday wasn't one of Brand SA's better days. In the UK, millions were treated to a lengthy whine by former diplomat Michael Shipster's travails when returning to from Sunny South Africa. His article revelled under The Times's headline of "Grief. Guns. Guards. My hellish trip home from South Africa".
Shipster (above), who had a spell at the British Consulate in SA, was in the country last month to comfort a dying brother-in-law. His return from the Covid Red List nation required a 10 day quarantine in a pre-allocated Third World hotel near Heathrow. Reading that part of the story almost evoked sympathy.
But those emotions evaporated when SA's recent visitor shared how his host in Johannesburg "insisted on driving me everywhere I go…….every time he edged anxiously out of his barricaded fortress in his car with his Walther PPK 'James Bond's weapon of choice, you know' (I did) he truly believed that he was risking his life for me." Seriously? With "friends" like Shipster…
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