Political animals in a zoo

Barolong Seboni | Friday October 10, 2014 17:38

Are they lions, sharks or tigers? Are they vultures, eagles or doves? Or are they chameleons and rats? But what is the difference? You may well ask, dear inquisitive reader.

The difference is that the first group of beasts are political predators who have an insatiable appetite for power. They feed on power, they breath power, they exude power.

Power comes out of their nostrils and their pores involuntarily. They can even smell power when it is around them the way you and I can smell something akin to rotten fish and we exclaim, “Ah, something fishy is going on!”

But our olfactory sense is not as keen as theirs and sometimes we mistake the smell of fish for a dead rat and we shout, “I smell a rat!”

The second group of political animals are not animals in the strict sense of the word. They are really birds and they are endowed with a powerful sense of vision. They can see things from way up there in the sky. They really know how to scan the political landscape and are always on the ready to swoop down and prey on political rats. The doves notice this and fly off, not wanting to get involved and thereby bloody themselves.

The last group is of course the weakest. These are the chameleons and rats who change political colours every five years. But do not underestimate them, my dear reader. They know how to crawl all over the political landscapes without detonating any of the political landmines! They are truly the political and biblical snakes in the grass.

But I can hear you ask, “Where do the fellows of the Nitty Gritty belong in the political zoo? What species of political animals are they?”

Alas, dear reader, to whom I am bound to tell the whole truth and nothing but, the fellows of the shebeen Nitty Gritty are, have been, and always will be, political reptiles! You can see it in their manner as they lounge around the shebeen on the green couches that Ausi Maggie inherited from the used inventory of the government supplies department. You can detect it in their speech as they yawn and burp incessantly, pontificating and pointing fingers at each other around the oblong table.

You can discern it in their very posture as they bask in the glory of their speeches within the cream white walls of the taverna Nitty Gritty. They are the political lizards lounging around the oblong table, ruminating around the room on chicken livers, dintshu and menoto. Swigging and swirling alcoholic spirits, saying sooth. For the truth will have to be told. Ausi Maggie is the mother hen who stretches and spreads her wings over them to shield them from the hawks and vultures flying the political skies.

“Heei banna wee! Gatwe wareng monna, ware re menkgantsutswane?”

“Nyaa rra, I never said that. I never said you are house lizards. I said you were political reptiles,” I replied, defending myself from the onslaught of accusations.

“In a way I think that description is rather accurate,” muses Nikita, “because I see myself as the crocodile. The biggest reptile of them all!”

“What, wena? A crocodile? You are more like an iguana!”

“No, no! For once I have to agree with Nikita,” Walkie intervenes, “he really is like a crocodile. He drinks and bathes in dirty water, he basks in the sun all day while we are all at work sweating it out. He has also been known to get stuck in the mud a few times, and on a good day he opens his mouth so widely that you can actually count his teeth!”