The threads to the article contain so much good stuff; we must all that RWJ for stimulating our minds and getting us thinking. What is equally clear is that we have far more in common than might be apparent by just a quick scan through the comments. The differences are often nuance rather than core.

What is clear and certain is how much better we all as a country would be if growth had been at 6% since the year 2000 instead of the miserly 1% achieved; imagine an economy three times the size with GDP per capita twice what it is at present.

Imagine how much easier our World would look and feel, how at ease we would be with and to each other.

It is always ALL about the economy - everything else is just a pie-in-the-sky wishlist.

We need our President, Mr Ramaphosa, to fully take this on board; take off ALL the brakes holding us back - and this will and must include scrapping all the vestiges of BEE and cadre deployment, whites in any event, a rapidly ageing component are becoming irrelevant, yet as we all move to retirement there is so much we all can do to get us back onto and even keel, and our youngsters need and want a solid, growing platform on which they too can lead fulfilling lives.

As seminal for the DA as was the Freedom Charter for the ANC

[ It should be realised, for example, that the decision by Stellenbosch University to use English to an increasing degree is as big a blow to the Coloured community as the Group Areas Act was. ]

Wrong. Coloured students today overwhelmingly choose to study in English when Afrikaans language options are also available, e.g. at Stellenbosch university. The reasons are obvious - not being fully proficient in professional English is a huge disadvantage in contemporary SA workplaces. The proportion of white students doing the same has in recent years also grown tremendously. In a few years, the actual demand for Afrikaans language university tuition, specifically from students whose home language is Afrikaans, and even students who went to Afrikaans high schools, will have dwindled to near insignificance.

Anyone who does any kind of analysis of the language issue who does not take the above fact into account is fundamentally dishonest, pandering to conservative and nostalgic streams of thought over the reality on the ground.

The fact that Solidarity have managed to launch a R4.5bn project to establish a private university solely in the Afrikaans medium, disproves your assertion of dwindling and insignificant educational SA demand in this language.

Anyway, obviously there will be a significant number of students wanting to study in Afrikaans. That is not my argument. But if the number is, e.g. 20% of Afrikaans home language students, then the kind of argument often raised, e.g. that the Western Cape is an Afrikaans-majority province, falls away. One CANNOT simply assume that a sizeable Afrikaans home language population translates automatically into an argument for an Afrikaans-only academic university.

I don't know where people get their numbers from but the 20% home language prevalence paricularly in the Western Cape appears too low.

I do know from sheer experience that there is a very wide prevalence in the use of the language nationally, especially beyond the boundary limits of a few of our major cities that are predominately English speaking e.g. Jhb. I also know that goverment has not upheld its constitutional obligation to promote any of the official languages and indeed in the case of Afrikaans are making active attempts to suppress its use (and culture), particularly in the educational field. I therefore think the Stellenbosch University decision was a serious mistake that will further impoverish the rich cultural diversity of this country, and hold back Afrikaans speaking students in the process.

What better way then to disprove their false notions of general equity that lead to this decision, than for this Afrikaans speaking society to put their money where their mouths is and launch their very own private, commericially driven national institution. Good luck to them and many kudos for taking that bold step.

By the way you may have noticed that I have addressed this issue in the third person, as I like RW Johnson do not have an Afrikaans background.

I do think there's been a politically driven campaign from ANC government officials to remove Afrikaans from schools, particularly in Gauteng, which is unwarranted, totally unacceptable and probably unconstitutional. But this is not what happened at the Universities - they have autonomy to determine their own policies, and they themselves have opted to move towards more English university education for practical reasons.

Indeed it was a university decision, but it took a Constitutional court contest to pass it, so despite the practical motivations, it came with the baggage of a whole lot of objection and resentment and at the significant cost of marginalising a significant minority, whose culture and language had firmly rooted in this institution. Thus I believe that you cannot entirely remove the prevailing political factors from these regrettable decisions.

If the authorities were genuinely interested in preserving this country's heritage of rich ethnic and culutural diversity they would and should have done more to preserve and promote this institution's founding language.

Yes, a lot of smaller businesses, especially in rural areas, do use Afrikaans on a day to day basis. But it is the larger organisational settings, generally in the cities, generally with more diverse workforces, where english is the exclusive norm, for which you generally need to have university degrees.

Not quite, because we're not talking about comparable scales. E.g. Stellenbosch Uni has maybe 32000 students, how many will Solidarity university have? I also see Sol-Tech will be a "vocational college", not an academic university.

Oh I do think their numbers will ramp up quickly. People will be keen to join it as there is a very strong demand for quality tertiary education in technical fields of which we have a shortage of skills. As regards to their vocational status you are morphing Blade Mzimande's mealy mouthed response to the news, by wanting to withhold their university status. If this university upholds international standards in this regard, our friend Blade can go take a hike for his resentful attitude.

Don't get me wrong, I think Blade Nzimande is completely out of line on this (and just about every other) issue and an all-round failure as a human being. But he is not the reason that they are a vocational college - this is presumably what Sol-tech applied for from CHEC and/or SAQA, who does accreditation.

Correct. As an Afrikaner I went to a dual medium school with mixed classes due to the foresight of my parents. I have used English as my professional language for 40 years and have partially lost the ability to spell in Afrikaans. My wife and I speak Afrikaans to each other but any messages are written in English.

A brilliant analysis of what went wrong in the DA. Perhaps some of its MPs may care to read and acknowledge the obvious? The DA needs leaders prepared and able to represent, articulate and defend core liberal principles, not gatekeepers and sheep who say nothing, question little and keep their heads safely below the parapet.

Brilliant article

A brilliant analysis and a complete policy and strategy document in a few pages. Reading it one can see how far off the mark the DA and particularly MM drifted away from core values.

As seminal for the DA as the Freedom Charter for the ANC

Good article, except for this: "Again, there was no need for disciplinary action: the young DA leader could have simply been rapped over the knuckles.)"

No.

Unless there is a very public purge of black racists like the prognathic Mphiti punk, white voters in the norther provinces will never return. It's simple: chase Mphiti, Van Dom and their ilk out of the DA, or face annihilation in 2021 and 2024 in the north.

"... if those universities lose their traditional constituency (as has happened at UKZN) this is then followed by a rapid attrition among other groups as well, standards fall and institutional decline sets in. ..."

A snapshot of the current UCT.

In our almost hopeless situation with disinformation, outright lies, cliches and propaganda as the order of the day, we are truly blessed having such an outstanding world class historian as RW Johnson, by letting us know what's really happening and how it come to it.

A detailed analysis, thank you Bill. You are without question, one of SA's heroes that should go down in the history books.

Quite frankly, this puts to paper what so many of us think and discuss over beer. I feel, there is one particular omission though; a special mention of the Pumzille van Damme debacle would have been prudent. That particular one irked me. It highlighted the double standards that the DA adopted along with the ANC and the media.

It's Bill to you, is it, eh? And discussions over beer with the man himself to boot, or is it only your real mates who find themselves thus so enlightened and happily unburdened?
The purpose of RWJ's article appears to have gone right over your head. Might one suggest you re-read it, this time for meaning.
Do you imagine that the likes of RWJ would be so crass as to mention the bleeding obvious in an invited submission to The Review Panel, upon the most austere subject of turning the goodship DA around?
If he'd named every barnacle that needed scrubbing from the hull, we'd be reading till next week.
Don't you dare call it an omission.

Calm down to a panic there Ingrid.

RWJ's name is Bill....and we are not on personal terms although you appear to presume that referring to a person by name implies as such. I'm not sure how you drew the connection between my comment about beer being in person with the man himself, whom I'd love to have the pleasure of experiencing, but have not yet. So, moving on from trivial nonsense....

Perhaps you can explain how the mentioning of how the handling of the Sweizer Reneke debacle is any different to the point I make. I think it is indeed you who has missed the point of my post. The DA's adoption of double standards with regards to how they dealt with their leadership of different races and how the traditional DA voter block has recognized this to the DA's detriment.

And when you refer to "Don't you dare call it an omission.", you remind me of that rant from Greta Thurnburg......very emotional.
https://www.youtube.com/wat...

You may well feel the need to be enraged by other people's point of view that doesn't align exactly with your perceived view of the world but just for a moment, take pause and think for a moment...one of the glaringly obvious issues that 'Bill' points out is freedom of speech. One of the core classical liberal values. So I'm sorry I 'dared' to use the word 'omission'....may I burn in hell for all eternity. Pffft.

And for the record. I have the highest regard for RW Johnson.

Yes well, opine away then.......you're quite right.....the assumed familiarity did strike a nerve. But it's not an outrageous offence, merely disrespectful.
As for your other assumptions, I could agree with you, but then we'd both be wrong.

You presume that I assume a lot .... ;o)
Lets just move along, this is a silly debate.
Apologies to Mr Johnson if offense was caused.

What the heck??!!!

Helen Zille started a complete mess of note that Maimane presided over gloriously. After reading this I do not even think Maimane was incompetent but rather a plant from the ANC to destroy the DA.

Otherwise known as a sleeper agent. Although, I fear the use of the word 'agent' sounds a little like Cadre speak.

Not at all. It's used in intelligence agencies. Maimane might have been what is known as an unwitting agent. Used without himself knowing it.

Always suspected - he might not have even known it himself.

What is known in intelligence circles as an unwitting agent.

Informative and enjoyable. Has Cyril been provided with a copy? And what about the rest of the cabinet? Send it to them as a nicely wrapped Christmas gift.

Most probably that's already too late for a DA revival. The present political and economic situation and its logical progress precludes that.

Instead of getting the message to the more exploited than ever seas of hopeless unemployed and rural poor "masses that they matter and there's a future for them, but as long as they vote for the people that have their interests at heart and not the far worse than Apartheid's exploiters ever were, the anointing of an unknown preacher that behave exactly as if the position have instead been given on a similar plate to Malema or Gigaba's brothers...

Can't see the tiny Black elite looters and their party of the newly privileged let the trough be taken away from them, as has happens practically everywhere north of us.
with Mozambique, Zimbabwe and Angola as perfect examples.

Can't see a honourable leader committed to liberal values handle the nightmarish possible scenarios ahead of us, when ruthless ethnic strong men foment even more tribal chaos as they fight it out against all comers for the last bits of Mlungu's left cargo , including the usual Congo type of brutal child soldier warlords intent on mass rape and genocide.

Long before the situation were to degenerate to such cataclysmic levels, just can't vision known looters escaping the utterly barbarous "people's justice"...

Apologies for sounding so negative... But the possible acceptable options are few and the time left for action practically non existent...

As has been proven time an again locally, the Boer tribe but now together with the other Whites and the coloureds, already are and will continue to be the sole possible pacifying force in existence on the ground and that's most certain that they will use and impose it to their full ability.

No, enough of the tokenism, the DA must stick to it's principles.
BTW not only Afrikaners switched to the FF+
Yes, blacks of integrity should feel at home in the DA, but your example of one is a joke.

How can you say Mashaba has integrity, when he's hand in glove with the EFF - *with* the usual fat juicy tenders going their way?

Afrikaners have learn through hard experience never to trust a liberal. Liberals will woo you with nice concepts for votes, but when it comes to promote your interests, will drop you in favour of someone else that promises more votes.

I totally disagree with your lonely voice in favour of political pragmatism. Without an ideology, the party you vote for today may transform overnight into the party that populated your nightmares.

"competent black people with integrity ... like Mashaba", Huh?!

"Coalition means compromises." like letting the EFF dictate who gets the municipal positions?

The entire tone of RWJ's articles and commentary is that the DA has lost the plot, you seem to think the plot has stood in the way all these long years since 1959?

Im going to get myself a tshirt saying "i love rw Johnson"

Mine already says

"RWJ is RIGHT.
If you don't agree, your'e just WRONG."

A 'woke' noisy minority are given far more credence and consequence than they should enjoy and many people who consider themselves liberal are quite happy to tread on the rights of some for the benefit of others.

R W Johnson sums it up very well when he discusses how disregarding the party's liberal history caused the drift away from liberal principles. He recognises the party grew precisely because it was liberal and thus offered a rock for those cast adrift by change, to cling to as they recognised the refuge offered by liberal principles. The growth of the party allowed people who were not nurtured in its liberal culture, as a result of its democratic nature, to rise to leadership positions and start forming various collectives. Anathematic to the founding principles of the party that offered them a home, created by the very principles they then sought to undermine. I still can't understand the anachronism of a women's league within the party and which purpose it is supposed to serve. The idea was mooted several times earlier and very determinedly shot down as sexist and insulting to the women volunteers who had kept the party afloat during its cash strapped days and who refused to be relegated, besides the idea was contrary to the founding principle of respect for the individual discounting gender or sexual orientation.

Many people have also been seduced by the pseudo liberal narrative published by the ANC to disguise their inherently and unremitting socialist agenda. They should remember the old saw "Actions speak louder than words" Being a tree hugger is not necessarily liberal although many liberals are green.There are accepted studies that contend intelligence is allied to liberalism. Here is a link to one of the many studies that support this. https://www.discovermagazin...

You seem to be implying a "women's league" formulated in the DA? I never heard of such a thing and would have run away to the hills, screaming much longer ago than these past elections had I got wind of it.
It's almost as bad as being labelled a Chairwoman once elected to the Chair?

Crumbs, what more does liberalism stand for than 'live and let live' at core?

Maria, I remember well the article you draw attention to. Also, on a simpler level, Maslow's hierarchical theory says that the ability to think beyond the self moves one up the tree; this would be a classically "liberal" trait .... and linked to intelligence?

Quite so, Jon, indeed it does, is and shall continue to be, though the virtue-signallers might wish to suppress all knowledge of it.
Not a great time to be an Anthropologist, one fears.
Were Mazlow to attempt publication today......let's just say, we'd not know of his theories.....they'd be "cancel-cultured".
If this is not enough to scare you into recognition of the extreme danger our Western civilization, arguably that which has most advanced the intention of poverty-alleviation more than any other system ever devised, please point me to the dearth of reading-matter my own education has clearly robbed me of.

Were Mazlow to attempt publication today......let's just say, we'd not know of his theories.....they'd be "cancel-cultured".

Exactly why the IQ differences between races, continents and countries are decried by the woke grouping as being scientific racism.

Zille lacks gravitas? You have got to be kidding.

Liberalism goes back a long time, to the days of Andries Stockenstrom in the 1830s.

Nationalism also goes back a long time, to the days fo Hendrik Potgieter, Piet Retief and Andries Pretorius, who experienced the same from the liberals then that Afrikaners and Afrikaans speakers are experiencing from liberals today. The are welcome as voters but not worth caring about issues that matter to them. The ANC's cultural theft of Afrikaners heritage was not only condoned by the DA but supported strongly.

Focussing on "principles" and the individual's "rights" in order to build a non-racist non-whatever society in a multi-nation, multi-cultural, multi lingual, multi-value system population means diluting your focus to such an extent in to becoming everything to everybody that you end up being nothing for nobody.

This leaves the field open to the more realist politicians that play identity politics which in turn emasculates individual rights.

Liberalism sounds beautiful on paper but it only works in nations where the people have a common ancestry, history, language and value system. Social cohesion is a strong prerequisite for liberalism to flourish.

Interesting how few Afrikaners are cited as leading lights in the Liberal firmament.

I think any attempt to undermine the Afrikaans language (a language rich in idiom: which I enjoy immensely) is complete folly. I would think it was largely symptomatic of the ‘opera bouffe’ that was Mmusi’s and his tenure. I don’t agree with your desire to conjure up ‘Anglo Boer war 2019’ (albeit verbal) that serves nobody: a lot of Anglo’s served in SWA something a lot of you Afrikaners willfully ignore. And not all “Anglo’s”are Anglo’s.

Thank you for your reply. I have no intention to conjure up Anglo Boer war 2019. I apologise if I gave that impression.

However, I am tired of how glibly the Leftists easily blame everything that is worng in Seffrica on apartheid and by implication Afrikaners and how casually the appropriate for themselves the high ground as being the good guys that had no deleterious effect on the course of history.

I am very much aware that history can not be changed. However, there are many people, even contributors on PW, that can not resist the temptation to refight the 1948 election as if there was election fraud, or refight AB2.

I am also aware that although hindsight has 20/20 vision, people often or usually take decisions at a specific time completely unaware of the end destination of the road that they have set themselves on. Decisions are usually taken and policies adopted with the best of intentions but not properly thought through.

All I am trying is to get some balance in the discussions on PW.

If the DA had kept Zille and employed Johnson as advisor instead of Coetzee, they'd be running a coalition government at national level by now.