During my recent holiday in Johannesburg, South Africa, to catch up with friends and family I was energetically harassed into meeting up with an old acquaintance (let’s call him Bucky ) who’d found me on Facebook. 

 I hadn’t seen Bucky in over twenty years. I couldn’t understand why he was so mad keen to meet up, but had no reason to say no. I recalled him as a charismatic, if occasionally ill-tempered man who tried to live his life to the full even if that meant him falling down drunk and kissing the pavement with his forehead several times a week.

 I’d originally met Bucky in the mid-90s at nightclub in Yeoville, a liberal, ethnically diverse suburb of Johannesburg, during a late-night pool competition. Once we got to know each other better, Bucky  , a former member of the South African Defence Force (SADF), would often  amuse himself by joking about the irony of having been raised to defend the South African state against communists, blacks and morally corrupt homosexuals, and now having these peoples as neighbours and drinking companions.

 Come the early morning hours, after downing several drinks, Bucky was prone to raising his hand as if he were holding a gun, taking aim at a black face sitting across the room and slowly squeeze off an imaginary shot. 

 “I was good at my job,” he’d say. “Trust me, Sam, if things change now and the country comes off the rails, I’ll take you out too without any worries.”

 I once asked Bucky  if he he’d ever thought of taking part in some kind of reconciliatory SADF-MK (Umkhonto Wesizwe – the armed wing of the ANC) meeting. Bucky  had looked at me as if I were mad and said, “Look at all the bank robberies going on now. Look at the crime. They’re all MK. They’re getting reconciled in their pockets and that’s all they’re interested in.”

 Naturally, Nelson Mandela, was a frequent topic of discussion. 

 With a steady hand and on his hardened veteran heart, shaking his head with a genuine bewildered sincerity Bucky would solemnly tell me how Mandela was obviously a living saint who would one be recognized as such by the Vatican. A different species of human. A visiting soul from another better universe who had landed on the earth for a short period to clean up the mess Christ had left behind. “Trust me,” he would say, “If Mandela doesn’t steer this country to a safe shore, we’re going to see a monumental fuck up here the likes of which this continent hasn’t seen before.”

 Of course, I’d argue with him. He’d tell me I was talking nonsense: I was a black man from England who didn’t know Africa or Africans. The ANC were a group of con men who were going to rob the country blind, fuck their own people in the eye, and laugh all the way to their overseas banks while they were at it     

 Bucky   and I would argue passionately. A lot of cursing and name calling flowed between us. We never came to blows. 

 Back to 2019. The Bucky  I met was inevitably slower and heavier. He had two failed marriages behind him and three kids. He greeted me with a slow jab to my stomach and a short, warm embrace.  We sat down at the table and ordered two coffees. Bucky   told me I looked like a Nigerian drug dealer and warned me to be careful out on the streets in case I got shot by local cops who wanted some of my drugs. 

 “If the cops don’t get you the locals will,” said Bucky  and asked me if I’d heard about the local xenophobia attacks. 

 I said the attacks were hard to miss. 

 Bucky  threw me one of his “I am a man who knows everything” smiles and said, “This is fucking ridiculous. Everything about this country goes one step forward and three steps backwards to the same fucking place. The last time I saw you, wasn’t there some guy going around stabbing foreigners in Yeoville. Weren’t you warned to get out before something happened?”

 It was true. Way back in the day in Yeoville-past, talk had spread about a mystery man known as “The Coloured” who was going around stabbing non-south African blacks in the back. Friends and neighbours had warned me to stay inside and to be extra vigilant.   

 Bucky  had called me up and told me he’d be only too happy to stay at my place and shoot anyone who tried bumping me off. There was no risk for him. He was bound to be a hero after defending the life of an overseas black man since I was the only black the press gave a shit about.

 “Like I keep saying, the more things change, the more they stay the same,” said Bucky  gleefully as he reached for his mobile phone. He showed me various PDF files with the relish of a man about to drop a newly sharpened guillotine on a helpless toff.

 The files were all saved news articles relating to various ANC state capture investigations. “Every day brings more of this,” he said. “Look, I’m running out of storage on my phone.”

 I saw various clippings of numerous ANC ministers and luminaries as well as members of the infamous Gupta family. There were many photoshopped photos of Jacob Zuma under duress. 

 Bucky knew the name of ever ANC minister he had a picture of, as well as precise details of their supposed misdeeds, and was able to quote detailed financial estimates from leading South African publications of how much money had been stolen from the nation’s coffers. 

 There was no stopping Bucky now, it was as if he had spotted me walking along the motorway and was determined to drive his fifty-ton, long-haul truck of an argument right over me. “Sam, how many times did I tell you this would happen. You laughed at me. Called me a racist. Acted like you knew better.  You didn’t believe me. No one wanted to believe me. And now look at where we are! It didn’t take a genius to see this coming. But all you smug, know-better foreigners wanted to cover your eyes and perpetuate your lovely black fantasy on the rest of us.”

 Taking a long diversionary sip of my underwhelmingly weak Americano I realised, too late, that “our reunion” had come about to enable Bucky to indulge in one long, decades’ in the making “I told you so!” moment. 

 Bucky was practically drooling over me as he showed me a collection of his greatest “ANC fuck up” hits on his phone: images of rundown apartments that had once been the most desired properties in the suburb, clapped out blocks of concrete that had once been colourful well-maintained, tattoo shops, burger joints, diners and cafes. All now metamorphosed into… let's just say business venues of a less classically upscale appearance. 

 Bucky cast me a truly pitying look as he wagged his finger at me. “I hate to say I told you so, Sam, but I told you so. Look. Look!” 

 We continued to bicker for a while and thankfully moved onto discussing what we’d been both been up to for the past twenty years. The clock ran down. It was time for us to part. We shook hands and wished each other well. 

Bucky had one last ruefully wise offering for me before moving on. “Sam, you know what the best thing about the past twenty-five years has been? Now I have black friends who hate the ANC as much as I do!”

 I took this last smirky blow in my stride, called my Uber and moved on. I had the feeling I wasn’t the first or thee last person who would have to sit through Bucky ’s well-honed and painfully carnivorous monologue.With my Uber easing along the highway I cast my eye over all the nearby residential homes. I wondered how many conversations between ageing progressives, worn down by defending the ANC and increasingly bellicose non-ANCers were happening at the same time in these buildings. 

 At least these conversations were visible. The same couldn’t be said for the harsher chat groups chats on WhatsApp I’d never be privy to.  Only time will tell how long it will be before the ANC grabs a hold of its proud legacy and stops embarrassing the shit out of its members, supporters and backers in every private and public venue imaginable. Defending the indefensible is an untenable, piss-poor position to try and hold over a dinner table let alone at a political husting.