Mercs, Beamers, Audis — they’re all the same to me. Generation X women and those who came before us have never been interested in car brands unless you’ve become a South African politician.

David Bullard’s Moneyweb column today is a pithy roasting of South African government officials’ wasteful  penchant for luxury cars, in which he confesses:

I am as a tight as a duck’s rear end when it comes to buying a jam jar. Anything costing more than a quarter of a million rand is ludicrously expensive in my book. Which is why I will either buy a used car with a low mileage at a bargain price or something cheap and highly reliable like a Honda Jazz or even a Daihatsu Materia. Boring I know but fortunately I have the personality to overcome such vehicular impediments.

Now, that’s interesting. I drive a Jazz (but then it’s the perfect mom’s car, what with all that parking you do — fetching and carrying the offspring. If you’ve never driven a Jazz, you won’t believe how small its turning circles is).

But I am trying hard to picture Bullard in a titchy baby blue piece of Japanese metal parked next to Xolela Mangcu’s

Fast cars and women ... from Mercedes-Benz's website

Porsche Cayenne.  I’ve asked Mr Conspicuous Consumption to ‘fess up and tell us what he drives. (I’ll let you know.)

On the subject of Wa Benzi, Fortune has a fascinating aritcle on Daimler’s CEO Dieter Zetsche (aka Dr Z), who is considering an agreement with BMW, rebranding Mercedes and gambling on the future of green cars. Yep — rebranding Mercedes! There’s something younger and fresher in the pipelone, it seems. Says Fortune:

Exactly what “younger, fresher, and more stylish” actually means in practice is a closely guarded secret, but there’s more than a sporting chance that it will also mean green. To be more precise: electric.

Popularity: 19% [?]

David Bullard’s at it again, stomping around Media Land upsetting everyone. You got to enjoy his love for the fight and excellent vocabularly. He introduced me to the world "bibulous" (usually applied to his former boss) and this week he reminded me of the fabulous word "mawkish".

DB, who gets the Tall Horse Award of the Week for Wordsmiths, has this to say in this week’s Out to Lunch column on Moneyweb on suggestions he should move on from his battle with the Sunday Times:

To them I would say this. Some men play golf, some hold poker evenings and some play squash. I prefer an hour of recreational loathing every morning.

Read the column here.

It’s well worth a read for Bullard’s own account of how the court case is proceeding.

I must admit I was confused by it being referred to the Statutory Council for the Printing Industry as I’d never heard of this council before Bullard came along.

Further investigation has revealed it’s an alternative to the CCMA for the industry and, I suspect, is a remnant of the days when the printers were a powerful union and a real force to be reckoned with. I don’t think they would see much white collar action so Mr Conspicuous Consumption should provide a breath of fresh air for the body.

Popularity: 9% [?]

Five things you need to know today

1. Top Gear’s The Stig has been revealed: it’s Michael Schumacher. Check out the vid below:

2. There much up in Media Land today. David Bullard has his High Court date with the Sunday Times.

3. And the Evil Empire in Ireland, parent company of the Independent newspapers in SA,  has come up with a discounted rights offer that is expected to be bought up by its lenders and two main shareholders though analysts question just how much cash Tony O’Reilly and Denis O’Brien have to hand. Read the Reuters story here.

4. IOL reports that Social Development Minister Edna Molewa has asked the Special Investigation Unit  to look into the release of R4.3-million to a Durban businessman from the SA Social Security Agency. Mabheleni Ntuli allegedly received R2.5-million from the agency for a lavish ANC pre-election party and R1.8-million to buy food parcels for villagers in KwaNxamalala, President Jacob Zuma’s birthplace in KZN. Read the story here.

5. The Times has a fun little story on former advocate Dirk Prinsloo, who was arrested recently for trying to rob a bank in Belarus. They’ve picked up an interesting snippet or two from the Belarus media that Prinsloo spent two weeks planning the robbery that involved the purchase of a toy gun and gas cannister. And he calls himself a South African! Where the AK47, dude? Read the story here.

Popularity: 31% [?]

Five things you need to know about SA today

1. If you’re wondering what SA’s richest  bachelor Mark Shutlleworth is up to, IOL’s got an extensive interview with him from London. Ubuntu is now apparently used by about 10 million people, he’s contemplating running a marathon and, yes, he’s still single. Click here to read.

2. Meanwhile, Business Report’s Ann Crotty attended the beleagured Independent Empire’s AGM in Dublin. Gavin O’Reilly, the chief executive of Independent News & Media, which owns the Independent newspapers in SA, tried to be sketchy as possible about the group’s financial troubles and says there have been no offers to buy the London newspapers. The stakes are high. The company’s financial freeze expires on June 26 and if the parties fail to reach an agreement before then, the financiers could force a liquidation. Click here to read at IOL.

3. IOL definitely has the most interesting stories of the day. Read this one about two photographers filming the sardine run and having a narrow escape after getting separated from their boat.

4.David Bullard’s got a funny column about the Ponzi scheme at the Richmark Sentinel, which has one of the most unusual designs in the SA blogosphere. Also the grandest name! It isn’t the role of the courts to protect people against their own stupidity, says Bullard, so instead of pillorying Barry Tannenbaum for his nifty scheme, perhaps we should be demanding he receive a government rescue package. Click here to read,

5. And if, like me, you still don’t know what exactly the Confed Cup is, don’t despair.  You are niether stupid nor ignorant. Chris Moerdyk has a column saying the event is essentially unmarketable. Any big sporting event needs three ingredients, he says. It has to be relevant. It has to be desirable. And most of all it has to be affordable. Click here to read Moerdyk at News24.

Popularity: 13% [?]

I used to think the Independent group had the monopoly on unhappy hacks but these days I’m realising it’s a widespread phenomenon in the media industry. All over the blogosphere ex-employees of traditional media houses pop up and look back in anger at being treated shoddily, unprofessionally or unfairly — and then employees jump in anonymously and air their exasperation and unhappiness. The SABC, News24, Avusa, e.tv, the Independent group — everytime they come up in my blogs, I get comments, SMS-s and emails from people who are mad as hell or thoroughly dejected about the treatment of staff and the way the media companies are managed.

Sacked Sunday Times columnist David Bullard is certainly not unique in his outrage at how he was treated by his former employer. What makes him different is that he is largely a man of independent means so he says the things that many wish to say but fear to because they might need work from the Big Boys in the future.

I must put my cards on the table here and say I’m also circumspect about what I say for that very reason. And for those who know me, you know I also feel bitterness about my former employer. You try to look forward and forget but it does rear its head. That’s human nature and so I feel hugely sympathetic with Bullard.

One has to ask if this is unique to the media sector in this country as it’s largely managed by ex-journalists, not business men and professional managers. Or maybe it’s because people go into journalism because they love it and then their disappointment is all the  more when the companies behave… like companies. I’m not sure but I’ve been thinking about it a lot lately and I’d like to hear your views. It seems to me there’s a rotten core at the heart of a wonderful industry, which is a crying shame.

Popularity: 8% [?]

Five things you need to know about SA today

1. Boy, are temperatures are running high at the SABC. An email sent out at the weekend by a group of anonymous SABC “honest reporters”  says there are plan afoot to hold a shop stewards’ meeting “which would enable it to compile a comprehensive “action” report on each instance of  (SABC) mismanagement”. Says the email:

These dedicated broadcasters are now seeing their stirling efforts sabotaged on a daily basis by deployees of sinister gangs, whose drive to enrich a select few will stop at nothing. Incompetent girlfriends of deployees abound, and they abuse their “SABC given authority” to enslave their subordinates. “They are no more that cheap call girls. Some can’t even read or write, but the men who hired them – using your licence fee – advise them to be dictatorial with questioning servants,” said one union official.

Yislaak!  If it’s legit, there must be mnay revolutionary mutterings in the canteen. They say they will reveal themselves in due course and are looking for support from others in the media. Read the full email here and show your support by emailing honestreporter@gmail.com.

2. Rather timeously, veteran marketing and media writer Chris Moerdyk has written a good analysis at New24 of how the SABC’s mandate is totally unachievable and why it’s destined to fail. Read it here.

3. David Bullard is upping the ante as his court date with the Sunday times approaches. His latest column at the Richmark Sentinel, which goes out on a Sunday, is a laugh and a half, with him taking umbrage at making a list of SA intellectuals compiled by The Weekender. He says:

I may be many things…..cigarette scrounger, drunk, bottom pincher, Bonzo Dog fan even…..but don’t ever dare call me an intellectual. As Charles Bukowski said “An intellectual is a man who says a simple thing in a difficult way; an artist is a man who says a difficult thing in a simple way.

Hear, hear! He also challenges other hacks who made the list, his former Sunday Times editor Mondli Makhanya and Business Day columnist Xolela Mangcu, to a debate at Constitution Hill. Loser buys the drinks. Read the full piece here.

4. Also in media land, Avusa announced it has appointed a public editor, one of the recommendations made last year by Anton Harber’s team invited to look into problems at the Sunday Times and make recommendations. He is Thabo Leshilo, the former editor-in-chief of Sunday World and the Sowetan.  In April, Harber wrote that the Sunday times hadn’t “largely ignored” the recommendations so maybe they’ve dusted  the document off and are implementing things. I hope so. When The Sunday Times published the findings, I was shocked by how disfunctional the news room seemed to have become and how unhappy the hacks obviously are. Read the Avusa announcement here.

5. And outside media land, that controversial Wild Coast toll road is on again. Read the Dispatch story here. It’s sure to get howls of protests again though I must say I’m with the government on this one. As much as the environmentalists and surfers would like to keep the Wild Coast pristine, the people of the Transkei desperately need more infrastucture and money coming into the area — and that starts with roads.

Popularity: 14% [?]

David Bullard has been all over the blogosphere in the past week, arguing and trading witticisms and insults with Internet users in comment threads at Moneyweb, where his Out to Lunch column now  resides after being sacked from the Sunday Times for an allegedly “racist” column, and other blogs.

Some users profess to hate him but they’re still there reading his columns and comments.  The guy people love to hate is always clever, irreverent and articulate. Click here to read the recent Moneyweb column.

As his court date with the Sunday Times looms on June 22, Grubstreet spoke to the controversial Bullard about life after the Sunday Times, the Zuma apology and how tough it was to re-establish his reputation.  Click here if you’ve forgotten what all the fuss was about and read the column that got Bullard fired  — and for other links about Mr Conspicuous Consumption post-Sunday Times.

QUESTION. Give me a rundown of all the things you’re doing these days? You’re on Moneyweb. You’re on Radio Today (on satellite doing a media show)?
ANSWER.  I’m writing Out to Lunch on Moneyweb. I’ve got a new column on the Richmark Sentinel – that’s been going
two weeks and with Michael Trapido of Thought Leader so we’ll see what’s happen with that and I’m doing a clutch of
magazines still… I’m also doing quite a bit of corporate stuff, which I had been doing  before (leaving the Sunday Times) from time to time.
Quite a lot of that involves going to MC conferences and such like, which pays well. It pays better than writing. That dropped off after the initial sacking, obviously, because once your name has been tarnished by your employer, people tend to phone and say: “I’m sorry, we don’t want a racist being MC”. To which I would then say: “Well, have you ever had one before? Give it a go.” Fortunately that’s come back now because the credibility of the accusations are – shall we say – diminished so I’m back in favour, I’m happy to say.

Q. Well, let’s talk about that: about rebuilding your reputation. It couldn’t have been that easy?
A.  No, it’s a bit like having acid thrown in your face and then having the guys run away. I invited my accusers (at the

Bullard as we knew him every week at the Sunday Times.

Sunday Times) to come live on air both on TV and radio and they weren’t prepared to. Their diaries were too busy… I think to be accused of racism in this country is very emotive…
I took the view that I had to fight back because a). It’s a lie, and b). It’s also extraordinarily damaging and so instead of going tail between legs and hiding away somewhere in the Free State, I was on every radio and TV station who invited me to go on and discuss it. I decided that I would make a comeback. I think the fact that Alec Hogg (of Moneyweb), who is a respected business commentator, took on the Out to Lunch column says an awful lot for it as well.
It is incredible difficult and has been very traumatic for both my wife and I. And I have to say that I was incredibly depressed for two or three months – I was opening a bottle of wine at 10 in the morning and contemplating suicide but I thought I wouldn’t give them the satisfaction. I thought to fight back would be a better idea.

Q. Did you ever think of going back to the bond market and leaving media behind you?
A. No, that’s all changed quite a bit now. I think I was there in the heyday, when the market wasn’t particularly transparent and that’s when you make money. So the market’s very transparent now and, of course, under the rather more capable administration of the ANC, the economy isn’t as volatile as it was under the Nats. Which is a paradox but you had more money to be made under the Nats than you do now.
I also think you outgrow it. I had decided to do a bit of a right-brain activity by writing and I never really want to leave that and I do enjoy it.

Q. When you were with the Sunday Times, you famously shut down your blog and said: “This is for the birds”. But now you’re back blogging?
A. Well, I’m being paid. I didn’t think there was an awful lot of point spending time in the office at  the Sunday Times and not being paid to write (for the blog) when I was being paid to write for print and I just don’t think they were sophisticated enough to think that this might be the new way. So whatever I’m doing now, I’m getting paid for and I’m getting paid a slightly higher rate, I suspect,  than the newspapers pay. So that makes it worthwhile.
I do think things are going to change with Seacom and other cables and more people are going to be getting their information on a computer so my attitude to blogging and the Internet has probably changed a little bit over the past two years.

Q. It seems you enjoy arguing with people in the comments threads of blogs?
A. I love it. I’ve always enjoyed controversy and the great thing is people are very easy to get a rise out of. All you’ve got to say is: “I’ve got a bigger desk”… and it’s something that doesn’t go down well with people who don’t have a bigger desk.  You can always get a rise by talking about having lots of money and being allowed to ride a Bentley and things like that.

Q. Let’s talk about that. You’ve always projected yourself as Mr Conspicuous Consumption and independently wealthy. Are you in fact independently wealthy?
A. I’m probably well off enough to take the Sunday Times on in court but I do need a job. I’ve got a reasonable amount of what they call FU money but I still need to work. You know, all I’ve really done is provide for old age so I don’t necessarily want to lose it all because at some stage, I won’t be able to work and I’m rather hoping it will be able to see my wife and I through to old age.
When I was employed at the Sunday Times, I got into motoring because no one was writing motoring at the paper and then spent seven years travelling around the world down the sharp end of planes and driving very fast cars… And I did brag about it, of course, because what the point of travelling down the sharp end of an aircraft and driving fast cars if you don’t brag about it.

Q. Indeed. But when the court case is over or settlement is reached with the Sunday Times, what happens then because you have defined yourself as the guy who got fired from the Sunday Times and fought back?
A.  All I really want there is an apology. I’m not after lots of money, to be honest. I would like them to pay lots of money, which I would then give to charitable causes. I would like them to pay for the past 14 months when I wasn’t employed and to pay the legal fees but really I’m out for an apology. I just want fairness because I think putting posters around town saying: “Bullard sacked for racist article” was very dirty and completely untrue and was not something that the Humans Rights Commission have agreed with either. They haven’t come back and said: “Gosh, this guy is a menace to society. Let’s put him away”… I think, afterwards, I’ll probably stay on the Internet (doing what I am now).

Q. Can you tell me what the figure is you’re claiming?
A. I’m not claiming anything. I’m asking for my job back. I want an apology and my job back. I’m going for reinstatement because I contest I was wrongfully dismissed. People say: “Could you go back there with all the ill feeling?” and I say: “That’s not my problem; that’s their problem. Of course I could go back there”… But I suspect what they’ll probably do is say: “This doesn’t work” (and pay me to go away) or they’ll fight it in court… But an apology will be first prize and it doesn’t need to cost them a lot of money, to be honest.

Q. Now let’s talk about you apologising to Jacob Zuma. Tell me about the meeting?
A. I was speaking at a breakfast at Emperor’s Palace… and the lady at the table said: “You know Jacob Zuma is still suing you for R1.2-million? I don’t know if you know it but would you like me to make it go away?” I thought that sounded quite nice but I thought it was a wild play. Then I got a phone call at about 10am that day to say I must be at a meeting 4.45pm. (I went off and met) the lady in question, who handles Zuma’s legal affairs with newspapers, and she set up an apology within the day.
Mr Zuma sat at the end of the table silently while I made my speech to him, saying that having been on the other side – having been the hunted rather than the hunter – I understood what it was like and the damage that your family suffer and I offered my apologies. To which he replied: “I accept your apology without qualification, Mr Bullard”. The lawyers from the Sunday Times phoned the next day and it was all gone.
You know, people say: ‘Why did you apologise?” But if you’re unemployed and you’ve got a chance of someone dropping a R1.2-million court case, there is a pretty compelling argument that you should be thinking of apologising.
The fact is that having been on the other side, I also felt that we had been a little unfair and he didn’t have to accept the apology. But he did and I was very impressed with that. He didn’t interrupt me when I spoke to him. I was impressed with the way he did it.  We then spent 30 minutes chit-chatting about all sorts of things. I think he’s an incredibly resilient man.
I asked him if he ever got depressed about all the comments (made about him) and he just said no. I think he just takes it. I would have been hugely depressed about it, including (the things) written by the paper I used to work for – especially the things I’d written…

A. Do you want to add anything?
Q. The other one was the ANC. People said that suddenly I was endorsing the ANC. The reason for that is that I was invited to by the ANC. I hardly think that someone sacked from the Sunday Times for racism would go along to an ANC meeting and say: “Hi guys. I want to get my credibility back. Any chance I can address your party?” They would have said something quite rude.
I was invited to be there and I did it from the point of view that we have to live in this country and we have to live with the government. We have to embrace the new president and his cabinet and hope that they do well and, when they don’t, they’ll think that it’s our job as the media to point it out…
I’m quite impressed with what Jacob Zuma’s done thus so far. I would like to give him the benefit of the doubt and my support until I see a reason not to. I must say I’m much more comfortable with a Jacob Zuma presidency than I ever was with a Thabo Mbeki presidency… I feel quite relaxed living in South Africa under a Zuma government at the moment. I reserve the right to change that view though.

Popularity: 13% [?]

The column that called all the fuss: “Uncolonised Africa wouldn’t know what it’s missing” (The Times).

News24 reports on the Sunday Times dropping Bullard, in which editor Mondli Makhanya says the column reeked “extreme 19th century racism”.

Bullard apologises for his column in Business Day.

The Sunday Times announces that it is dropping  Bullard.

Bullard apologises to Zuma (The Times).

Popularity: 9% [?]

David Bullard’s having a go at Business Day columnist Xolela Mangcu over at the Richmark Sentinel website.  Click here to read.

He takes isue with a recent Mangcu’s column for Business Day, in which Mangcu said cartoonsit Zapiro and Vrye Weekblad founder Max du Prees are racist. It’s vintage Bullard — amusing and cutting — and sure to get Xolela ranting so this could be a lot of fun. This is what Bullard has to say about his fellow columnist:

For Mangcu is an intellectual as he tirelessly reminds us every week. He neglects to mention that he received a generous donation of shares from Mr Tokyo Sexwale part of which he turned into a Porsche Cayenne. This allows him the leisure time to loaf around the Seattle Coffee shop in Hyde Park looking…..er intellectual.

And then he leaps to Zapiro and Du Preez’s defence with a couple of sideswipes as he goes, especially for Max, whom he refers to as:

…bitter and a tad boring but he certainly isn’t racist. He just has that unfortunate colonial habit of patronizing the darkies and talking down to them as though they were children.

"With you, the force may be."

I bet Du Preez is already sharpening his pen.I hear Bullard wrote a pice for the Sentinel over the weekend about the Sunday Times  (remember that gis juicly court case against the paper is set down for June 22 though the word is that the Crimes may settle on the steps of the court).  Bullard apparently took more than a few potshots at editor Mondli Makhanya but it was taken down as it was too defamatory.

I’m afraid I couldn’t locate Mangcu’s column on Business Day’s website, which has been a new look today. My only beef is that they’ve forgtiten to link to The Weekender, which, if you’re outside Joburg, Cape Town and Durban, you can’t lay your hands on in print form. However, the good news they’ve finally added RSS feeds which means I can remove them from my favourites folder labelled: “The plonkers without RSS feeds”.

Popularity: 19% [?]

1. It’s time to choose your team for the IPL, which kicks off this weekend. Check out this M&G run down of the eight teams. I’m supporting Kepler Wessels’s Chennai Super Kings, who came third last year.

2. We live in an odd country. Business Day has a story about a Port Elizabeth engineering firm with no black ownership or management control that has achieved the highest rating under SA’s codes of good practice for BEE — simply by meeting other criteria under the empowerment laws. Read the story here.

3. The ANC is unimpressed with Gauteng Health MEC Brian Hlongwa telling the Sowetan that he’s so rich that he does his MEC’s job for the love of the poor. Party spokesman Brian Sokutu told The Times the ANC was supported by the poor and ,therefore, “making such irresponsible statements where one brags about his wealth is inconsistent and un-ANC”. Read the story here. Oopsie. Looks like no one told Brian that the SACP and Cosatu are running the show in the alliance these days.

4. Zoopy has the pilot epsiode of cartoonist Zapiro’s TV show, Z News, that the SABC censored last year. Click here to go to the Zoopy page.

5. And Moneyweb’s Alec Hogg is dispelling Zuma gloom, which is worth a read here after ex-Sunday Times columnist David Bullard wrote:

Personally, I think we will look back on a Zuma presidency in years to come as a welcome relief from the divisive and racist misrule of Thabo Mbeki. Jacob Zuma is a man comfortable in his own skin and is intelligent enough to know what he doesn’t know. With any luck he’ll gather the necessary skills around him and listen to advice; something Mbeki seemed reluctant to do.

Read the full Bullard column here.

Popularity: 12% [?]