I was always under the impression that a spokesperson was a sort of PR person for a company, celebrity or political party – there to make their employer look intelligent, thoughtful and concerned about whatever issues they wanted to appear concerned about.
But it seems to work a bit differently in South Africa, where ANCYL spokesman Floyd Shivambu seems to think the term ‘Rainbow Nation’ refers to the use of politicians’ colourful language.
On YouTube we can listen to the recorded telephone call from News24 reporter Jacques Domisse to Shivambu, in which the rather dim-witted sounding Shiv tells Domisse: “…you cannot force yourself to speak to people if they do not speak to you.” and then proceeds to tell the probably-rubbing-his-hands-with-glee journo to “fuck off”.
Then, a few days later, in lieu of an apology, he said that the report’s aim was to “divert attention” from the League’s national conference resolutions, and that reporters wanted to "engage in disgustingly provocative methods and means of engagement".
The “provocative” engagement on Domisse’s part was to ask for Julius Malema’s comments on the R78 000 His Jujuness spent at the Royal Malewane lodge, seeing as the Youth League prez likes to punt himself as a “champion of the poor”.
Baleka Mbete, the ANC’s chairperson, condemned the behaviour as being “unacceptable” – of course, in ANC-speak this means we’ll wait for it to blow over and forget about it.
It’s easy to write this off as arrogance or stupidity, but I think Shivambo is ahead of his peers when it comes to media relations.
He knows that when the Secrecy Bill kicks off they’ll be able to dispense with the tired response of “No comment!” and simply tell nosy media pigs to just “Fuck off!”
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