Experts in the dark art of propaganda know if you repeat a lie often enough, people eventually believe it to be true. Witness Hitler’s attack on Jews; Verwoerd promoting white superiority; and Mao and Stalin’s attempted genocide of “anti-revolutionaries”.
Fortunately for society, truth is the ultimate cleanser. No matter how powerful the self-serving narrative, when properly exposed to the glare of sunlight, these modern day vampires turn to dust.
Over the weekend, former IEC chair Brigalia Bam added her substantial voice to those challenging South Africa’s “democracy” – a system of government defined as rule by the whole population whose wishes are voiced through accountable elected representatives.
How can SA claim to be democratic, she asked the Franschoek Literary Festival, when just five people decide who runs the country? And where “elected officials” are mostly unknown to voters, accountable only to the leaders of their party? How indeed?