Open Letter to President Zuma: Dinner Date

Humble greetings the President of the republic of South Africa. My name is Sane and with all due protocol observed, I write this letter to you.

It’s taken me a while to acquire and finalise the conclusive audacity to write this letter to you because you are my president, the president of my beloved country. I have felt maybe, I would be skating where I shouldn’t skate! Where angels fear to travel as the song says. But I am no angel. I am just a concerned conscious black woman. A woman who cares about the livelihood of the people, about the future of the people and the future of this country.

To me from a distance, I must say I have failed to master the kind of person you are. At times, I have analysed you and made my own deduction to try to understand the man you are, to comprehend of the ideals you stand for and to understand your definition and bi-product of the democracy you fought for. Hence I am writing this humble letter to you.

You have been depicted by media, perhaps not just a mere depiction but a representation of reality, as a man associated with corruption and rape of which, you were acquitted of both charges by law. And under the confines of protocol, we have to observe the hand of law and believe it is legit. However, the credibility and transparency of those verdicts is not my point of focus right now.

I have found myself wondering about your legacy! ‘What legacy is President Jacob Zuma going to leave behind’? Is it going to be a legacy that he is proud of? A legacy which is worthy of being shared throughout generations to come? Then, I realise, maybe, legacy is the wrong word to use in this context because legacy constitutes of greatness, something worth being celebrated. And right now as things stand, there seems to be very little to celebrate in your name.

So perhaps the correct word to use would be ‘history’ because with history, you get the good history and the bad history. As the saying goes that in life, you must either be a good example or a terrible warning.

My request is to have your side of the story. Maybe, we have misunderstood you. Maybe we have misinterpreted you. I would like to have a dinner date with you where you get to share with me your ideals. To tell me what democracy means to you. To find out your passion in the political sphere? What drives you towards being in the political sphere? Occupying the highest seat in politics as the president of the country.

My basic question which is basically summarized in the above is, what makes you think you deserve to be the president of this country? Granted, society has raised its concerns as to why you don’t deserve to be. But I would love to know why you believe you should. At the risk of dictating the answer to you, I reckon, perhaps, it could be based on what you have done or what you plan to do. Maybe your achievements since occupying office and more importantly, the plans you have in your mind pertaining to the liberty of the people.

Hence I humbly request this dinner date with you. I would have said lunch but however during the day, I am at the plantation, otherwise known as work! Busy working and being taxed! So dinner is more suitable for me. Then maybe, if the date is a success, I can go back and tell the people, this is what the president said.
I hope your response is favourable to my request.

Kind regards.

Noted