Responsibility and accountability do not appear to be traits of our public officials

Lockdown? There seems to be a selective attitude to this vital state of the nation.

There are those who, at great inconvenience, have studiously adhered to the regulations of the lockdown, and then there are those so-called “important” persons who violate the regulations with impunity.

In our little village, a seventy-year-old woman from Pennington was arrested after she had taken her dog for a walk on the beach.

Then the media last week carried the news that the communications minister, Stella Ndabeni Abrahams  had ignored the lockdown regulations by having a meal with a group of people at the home of the former minister of higher education, Mduduzi Manana.

This was a blatant violation of lockdown, but she went further revealing her arrogance of authority by posting a picture of the group having a meal on her Instagram account! No fear of any form of retribution.

The state president apparently called her to a meeting to “come and talk to him about the impact the visuals had”.

Responsibility and accountability do not appear to be traits that our public officials even know about. At the time of composing this article, there had been no mention of any censure being imposed on this member of the South African parliament.

By contrast, New Zealand’s health minister has been demoted after he ignored national lockdown rules and drove his family to a beach 20km from his home.

Last week Dr David Clark was photographed going for a mountain bike ride 2km away from his Dunedin home.

He apologised for the incident, saying it showed poor judgment at a time when all New Zealanders were being urged to stay at home and only exercise in their local area.

Clark had revealed a further indiscretion, calling himself an “idiot” for deciding to drive his family 20km to the Doctor’s Point beach on the first weekend of lockdown.

Scotland’s chief medical officer, Catherine Calderwood, quit after facing intense criticism for breaking her own rules to twice visit her second home during the coronavirus outbreak.

In a statement issued Calderwood said she had again discussed the controversy with Scottish first minister Nicola Sturgeon and concluded her position was untenable.

She said she realised it was impossible for the public to have confidence in official advice to avoid all essential travel if she remained in post: “People across Scotland know what they need to do to reduce the spread of this virus and that means they must have complete trust in those who give them advice.