Today I bid farewell to all those I have worked with at the World Bank. Soon, I will be bidding farewell to all the non-South Africans I have met here in the US. I then go to the beginning, having had a foretaste of possibilities.

We have spoken about a South Africa that has a quality democracy, quality education system, active civilians, quality health system, and many other conditions we want as attributes of South Africa. Indeed, we have spoken of these while sitting in impressive buildings, board-rooms with breath-taking views, dressed in suits, smelling of cologne until we actually believed that we smell that way, and we were important. But if the meaning of all of that does not resonate loud and clear, then the work that is needed to make the picture of South Africa we have painted will be left undone; work necessary to make this picture a living reality. And that is the real temptation, when the good board-room view calls for one to work hard to attain more of the view, and that often means no one else matters, because the good view says that it is success itself. Yet Africa needs leaders that have a non-monetary desire to lead it. Corruption is a result of a monetary desire; the leaders start off having good intentions, but their desire can be bought, and there’s always a justification for it. Let’s not pretend, we know that.

As I leave this place, what does this all mean?

What does it mean for my unemployed family back home? My poor and rather apathetic community from which I come? What about the fact that my university results clearly dictate that I cannot get funding because they are a bare avarage, and I cannot get further study loans from the government to finance further studies? Yet I’ve met people who say they see a leader in me? What can really be that different about me that I don’t end up like my brother who struggled his way through university and barely making it collapsed into alcoholism until today, becuase he saw his dreams shuttered? What about my sister whose company recently went bankrupt and is now unemployed? What about the many previously disadvantaged students who, like me, went to higher education only to be recruited to the South African Graduate Unemployment? I can point them out, I live with them back home.

The meaning of this opportunity speaks against the circumstancial destiny, and truly it has come at the right time. I think of all these people back at home, whom I am no better, because we all have a right to life, and a place to make a difference. I suppose that watching a lot of the South African soapie Generations (back in the times) taught me that I can run an advertising agency and be able to say “you are fired, effectively and immediately!”. That sounded good to me, and that’s how it started. But now I have grown, and understand that its not about the power to fire, but about the power to hire, to mobilise both young and old into the dream of dreams: a democratic and united South Africa supported by non-racism, non-sexism, good and ethical governance, a country which gives meaning to Africa and the entire World.

For me, this means that i have no less a responsibility to make this happen, no matter what!

I thank God for that.

May this be a heavy blog to read!