The past month has held quite a few interesting progressions for South Africa, the xenophobic attack in South Africa lead to nation wide strikes and riots, forcing all deliveries nationally and internationally to come to a halt - meaning that South African trade came close to a complete stand still, this is over and above the fact that the attacks nearly lead to a state of war between Nigeria and SA.
There is also the fact that farm attacks are still on a steady increase as farmers are being forced to leave their land - and this leaves nothing to wonder about the impact that this will have on the South African economy.
All this while South Africa is continuously making loans from China that is directly fed into a corrupt system in stead of being appropriated to bettering the country as that is what the loans were intended for, meaning that the country ends up selling off their mineral rights and assets to China in order to repay their unnecessary dept. This is directly related to China slowly taking over the mining industry in SA, placing their own people into working positions, leaving even more South Africans jobless, in a country where unemployment is at an all time high as it is.
And as if all of that has not caused enough harm to a country that is already clearly in dire straights - the South African banks are planning a two day nation wide strike!
This means that ALL THE BANKS right over South Africa will be closed down for two days, including ATM machines and speed point services and internet banking.
The reason for the Strike?
Well, it is said that the banks are going on strike due to the fact that they want to stop planned retrenchments.
You see the problem is that actions such as the constant strikes and heinous decisions made by a government without any foresight of future implications is hurting the South African economics so bad, that they are then forced to close down branches of companies and corporations, including bank branches, and now it is thought that an even worse strike is needed to rectify the matter, when in fact it will only worsen the state of the situation. (And I am not even leaning towards the implications that all of this has on the individual person earning a salary that will not receive that on time as these strikes are happening over month end, or privately owned business, especially those reliant on daily trade and income in order to survive)
Can you imagine an entire country that is completely and utterly reliant on fiat currency and the banks, unable to use either? And even worse, can you imagine the roll over economic impact that this will have on the country? And in addition we get to watch foreign investors from all over the world pull out their capital from the country - Oh What Fun!
“People must just make sure that they withdraw enough money because the ATMs and speedpoints will not be working. We are not punishing the citizens of this country, but we are fighting job losses,” SASBO's banking sector national strike on Friday: Joe Kokela Well Joe - sounds like you want to make matters worse in stead of better to me.
*Sasbo = South African Society of Bank Officials
The strike is planned to start on September 27 and is part of the build-up towards the national strike called by the Confederation of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu), and is intended to be the biggest strike that South Africa has seen since 1922.
What happened in 1922?
The 1922 strikes were also called the "Red Revolt" it was a strike that stemmed from the dispute between the Chamber of Mines and the coal miners about the employment of not whites in skilled mining positions (yes these are the same mines, and the same jobs that these people were fighting for then, that is now being willingly sighed off to china). These strikes only ended after South Africa, at that stage standing on the brink of cavil war, had declared marshal law.
You can read more about that incident here
And the governments biggest concern with all this?
A: PAY YOUR TAXES IN TIME
"The anticipated protest action may impact transactions related to tax payments and tax refunds. Sars would like to ensure that the impact of the strike on these transactions are minimised for both the taxpayer and Sars. To this end, taxpayers are encouraged to submit their payments two business days in advance and similarly, conduct any tax transactions that may result in a payment to Sasr, two business days in advance." source
Summary:
In short South Africa is striking, in order to curb job losses, directly caused by strikes in the first place, all while the government is freely giving away more jobs that that in dispute by signing off mineral rights. And other than the economical despair - experienced farmers are being forced of of their land, thus pressurizing the country's food production...