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Have you ever been president of a country?
Or at least of your sports club? Did you manage a minimum of two terms of said presidency?
What are the chances of you heading up a country without a high school certificate?
Are you able to provide adequately for your family?
Can you add a few more spouses and an entourage of children to the list of your responsibilities?
How many times have you transgressed the law then had your cases land several times before the Constitutional Court?
All the above scenarios are courtesy of a man that I would refer to as Mr President to his face and as a total idiot behind his back.
This time, however, I take a moment to reflect on this history-making marvel of a Zulu man. King Shaka has nothing on him!
The nation breathes a collective sigh of relief as President Jacob Gedleyihlekisa Zuma finally hands over the reins of the ANC to a captain who will presumably not drive the country under the influence of intoxicating power – as Zuma did.
Opinions are already filling column inches, radio debates and television interviews about the recently inaugurated ANC president Cyril Ramaphosa and his capacity to overhaul and restore the engine of the nation to its president Nelson Mandela glory.
I am asking that before we relegate Zuma to the dumpster of spoilt goods, please allow me to reflect on some remarkable lessons the man has taught me.
Zuma holds some resolution strategy lessons for me that I would like to share.
It is 2018 resolution time and, whether you believe the act of drawing up your own list is fruitful or futile, you can’t argue with the tidal wave of mass hysteria that surrounds this entrenched practice.
As I contemplated my own list of resolutions, I felt disheartened by the repeat offenders that appear once again on my list – as they have since 2011 or so.
Then I thought of Albert Einstein’s take on insanity: doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. On that basis I am certifiably crazy.
My crazy spell led me to dwell on Zuma’s tenure as president of his party and the country. What has Zuma achieved for every year he was in office?
We can all agree that the man has earned, begged, borrowed and stolen riches beyond his station.
Ethics and morality aside; Zuma’s journey is a classic lesson of self-determination that is available to us if we can sidestep our repulsion at his modus operandi.
Subjectively speaking, the man did not finish school, yet he rose through the ranks of his party.
He became deputy president; then president for two terms; he drew his wives, lovers and baby mommas into the presidential fold; he forged business relations that amassed wealth and power for his family members; all while ducking figurative decapitation by the Constitutional Court!
Before you accuse me of moral decrepitude for celebrating the actions of a man that should never, ever be represented in the scrolls of history as a shining example of anything – I agree.
I even concur that he is a fitting case study of Baron Acton’s “Absolute power corrupts absolutely”.
Acton elaborates by saying: “Great men are almost always bad men, even when they exercise influence and not authority; still more when you superadd the tendency of the certainty of corruption by authority”.
My view of this power conundrum and how it relates to Zuma is that his impressive dream got corrupted and with that the loss of its dignity.
I am attempting to wade through that whole swamp and arrive at the initial spring from which he drew inspiration.
The first lesson I learnt from Zuma, as I revise my resolution list: You can be whatever you want to be even if you don’t qualify on paper.
Your desire to achieve certain goals is often a compulsion that equips you for that sphere.
Take that first step, as Dr Martin Luther King Jr has encouraged, and watch the rest of the staircase unfold.
I have been so stuck on the semantics of my goals in the past and not enough on the end goal. Zuma became boss of a whole country, the least I can do is become boss of my own destiny.
Lesson two has to do with resources.
We all could use more money and possessions to accompany a life without stress.
In our Western, urban context, we normally have a nuclear family and a small extended family we coexist with.
The rands we have, have to be spread quite thinly across the family needs while basic economics highlights that we will always have limited resources for unlimited needs.
Now, Zuma has 22 children spread across several wives and mistresses.
He is a proud polygamist and has ensured that his whole family is provided for – albeit through alleged underhanded methods.
My point is this: How many men can provide comfortably for one wife and two-and-a-half children?
The socioeconomics are against many of us, but the personal determination to live the lives we want falls squarely in our “soloeconomics” sphere.
From Zuma, I learn that taking care of my own little family is nothing when compared to him taking care of his whole tribe.
I reckon that his whole polygamist stance was based on an unyielding drive to become rich and powerful enough to afford his chosen lifestyle.
How he went about it is questionable, yes, but what is impressive is that he has never been dragged to maintenance court for defaulting on papgeld payments.
The final lesson: The law. There are many laws that govern our existence. Accompanying them are the dangers and penalties for contravention.
Here, I refer to the law of cause and effect which states that for every effect there is a definite cause; likewise for every cause there is a definite effect.
On the positive front, our soon-to-be-former president has achieved a one-in-a-billion feat and I am inclined to think that was his destiny all along.
He caused his rise through the ranks by employing his magnetic personality to draw support from others who were probably more qualified on paper than he was.
The effect was a powerful support base that saw him through two terms, a rape case, corruption charges and a “Zuma must fall” campaign.
The converse cause of ethical and moral treason will likely have the effect of him being remembered as an ugly smear on the history of South Africa.
As for whether he will sustain his power and wealth – I think it will all depend on the cohorts he is holding ransom for being his accomplices.
The lesson for me is that every action, positive or negative, regarding my goal, will produce a like effect.
I am impressed by what Zuma accomplished as a traditional, uneducated man who got to steer a globalised, semi first-world country.
Sadly, he proves the proverb that your gift has the potential to take you where your character cannot keep you.
Nonetheless … Thank you, teacher Zuma for the lessons that provided the impetus for my New Years’ resolutions.
Setlaelo is an author, writer and personal development practitioner
