National Assembly speaker Baleka Mbete has raised eyebrows after a 49-minute interview with Al Jazeera’s Mehdi Hasan where she blamed South Africa’s legacy of crime on Europeans who colonised the country. “Criminality has been in South Africa for three centuries, especially after the colonialists came and brought crime from Europe to Africa,” Mbete said.
Among other things, she spoke well of the Nkandla upgrade and denied that the ANC was to blame for the state hijacking. She went so far as to say that the colonialists (see white) brought crime into the country and she does not know who was responsible for the Marikana massacre. Social media was not gracious with their judgment and condemnation of the interview and saw it as a painful reflection of South African political leadership.
Hasan of Al Jazeera – argued that while the British empire colonised South Africa, it did so to other countries too – also cited a World Bank statement which claimed South Africa to
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