Thursday night was one of those nights when one despairs about South Africa. Before the 5km Randburg Harriers Time Trial, I listened to the action in the Houses of Parliament. Fortuitously it was question number six; the issue relating to Zuma and Nkandla. It was less a reasoned discourse than a puerile series of inane points of order. It was South Africa’s very own impromptu soap opera at work. If it were not so serious, it would be entertaining, but it is indicative of paralysis and lack of leadership that pervades South Africa in general and the ANC in particular.

Abject failure abounds. South Africa is trapped in a quagmire of corruption, ineptitude and kleptocracy with Zuma leading the pack. Zuma might not be well qualified, having only a standard three certificate, but he is extremely astute. The sum total of his response to the EFF as they fulminated against him having benefitted from the Nkandla upgrades, was to calmly state that the matter is in the hands of the Parliamentary Select Committee.

It was a veritable battle of wits. Gone were the niceties; present were the faux pleasantries such as the oft used honourable member used a spear rather than a mechanism to engender debate. Their use might have become ritual like much of etiquette but insincere pleasantries indicate contempt.

The 5km run came as profound relief which cleared the mind of all anxieties and negative thoughts much like an elixir.

Instead of continuing in that melancholy, morose vein, I chose a slaying for a different purpose: sustenance. Unlike the killing of animals such a the notorious slaying of Cecil the Lion, this is not for pleasure but rather survival. Like all predators, killing other animals is their modus operandi for obtaining their nutriment or “daily bread.”

Surely this lion kill could not have been better choreographed than this one.