Forgive me, I meant to do it!!!

Blair and Bush Jr claimed that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction ready to be unleashed within 24 minutes of decision taking! Both were prime minister of Great Britain and president of the United States of America respectively. Bush Jr needed to avenge his father Bush Sr because Saddam didn’t like the older Bush and said bad things about him. And as we say in Yoruba eni a bu baba re,a gbe san! And Bush Jr was holding the sword at the hilt and ready to stab Saddam. And what Bush Jr wants Blair gives him! So, they get Powell to grovel in the desert and find pictures of toys that looked like nukes buried in the sand.

These were played in front of the nations of the world and presto Saddam did have weapons of mass destruction actionable in fifteen minutes. So onward western soldiers, matching unto war!

Years later, after hundreds of protests and thousands of deaths of British and American soldiers and millions of Iraqi civilians are dead and displaced, or placed where they have nothing doing, Blair would apologise and Bush Jr would simply smirk his lips and each plead that they thought they were right when they did what they thought was right. But now that it has been proved that they were wrong they accept that they were wrong then but they thought they were right. And if they thought they were right then, it means that they were right. Which does not mean that there were weapons of mass destruction but still they were right. Sorry o!

The latest addition to this abuse of apology is Jacob Zuma of South Africa. Some twenty-four million dollars was spent on upgrades in his Nkandla homestead in Kwa Zulu Natal. As part of security, a swimming pool was installed where water can be drawn in case of fire, amphitheatre for collecting people in case of emergency, Visitor Centre for dangerous visitors, Cattle Enclosure in case Fulani cattle men come to Nkandla and a Chicken run for chicken races. The chapter institution called the office of the public protector found that these five items could really not be considered security items and so the president should pay for them. Zuma laughed and said only clever blacks thinks there is something called corruption that has taken place in Nkandla, blacks who keep dogs! One ANC member of parliament said that the woman who occupies the position of public protector does not know her weight, does not know her position. Zuma got parliament to write its own report on Nkandla and explain those five items which parliament did.

Well, while the president and his members of parliament were laughing and picking their teeth with the abuse of the public protector, Malema of the EFF and his older brother Maimane of the DA walked up to the Constitutional Court and filed against the president and the parliament in the matter of Nkandla and there arose the hatchtagpaybackthemoney. There were protests and protest matches up and down the country. Quickly, Zuma went to a court in Cape Town and the court said Zuma did not have to pay anything back. So, he and the ANC laughed more and picked more of their teeth dissing the public protector. It was generally a difficult time for the protectors of the constitution. There were even murmurings on the corridors of power that the constitution could be changed; was it not just a piece of paper?

Then on Thursday, March 24, the Constitutional Court pronounced on the behaviour of Jacob Zuma and the South African parliament in the matter of Nkandla. Both the president and the parliament had behaved against their constitutional responsibilities. They had failed to protect the constitution that they swore to uphold. They were guilty. Zuma must pay back part of the money spent on his homestead.

On the following day, Friday, March 25, President Zuma speaks to the nation and apologised for doing what he did. He had not meant to disrespect the nation’s constitution, it was just that he was following a different interpretation and no harm meant. And now that it has been pointed out that he was wrong he accepts he is wrong and he will pay back the money. In fact he had always meant to pay it back anyway. So he apologises on his behalf and on behalf of the government. Those who were thinking that the president was going to resign were not disappointed. He did not resign!

Is an apology punishment for an offence? Not one dictionary claims this meaning for apology. If apology is not punishment for an offence, why is an apology sufficient for some guilty people? The fact is that an apology does not mean, in these days of tyrannical democracies, that you are wrong, and the other person is right. It just means that you value your position more than your ego, more than your pride, more than your dignity, perhaps even more than your soul. This apology is the equivalent of the Yoruba compromise of all compromises, which says that there is nothing wrong prostrating for a dwarf, because why, because when you stand up, you will still be taller than the dwarf!

In the meantime though you have sold your ego, you have rubbished your pride, you have diminished your dignity and you have exhausted your valued earnings and you are worth nothing to those who used to hold you up. You will continue in your position, earning your fabulous salary and luxuriating in the position to which you were voted. But both in your face and behind your back nwon a ma yinmu si o! They would say of you that you said you would do this and you would that, that you would reduce hills and level valleys but you could not turn a pebble from one place to the next, you could not move a handful of soil from one ditch to another, o danimo re! You ask for forgiveness in spite of the fact that you meant to do it!!!