I agree with you that he is being a racist asshole about it. He is emphasizing the race part of the legislation over the bribe part of it, because that is more politically useful to him.
It does not make the legislation less problematic. The ANC is begging the world to invest in the country, but not because that is what the country needs, but because it feeds the state mandated corruption.
Both parties are in the wrong here.
You will be happy to know that the word for “shit” in afrikaans is “kak”, so the term is particularly accurate.
You never learned about the robber Barons of the 1880’s in school did you?
Only net neutrality and a ban on exclusivity agreements are required. Otherwise you get the US internet hellscape of local monopolies.
Just a bit of South African context. In South Africa, in order to get a telcoms licence, you have to comply with BB-BEE (Broad Based Black Economic Empowerment) requirements. Basically, you have to sell 30% (soon to be 51%) of your company to a local black owner. This is in addition to DEI requirements for employment.
For most businesses, these requirements are not mandatory to exist or operate, but gives you a bidding advantage for government contracts. For example, Microsoft, amazon and Temu can operate here, because they dont need any special licences. But for some sectors, companies need to aquire a license.
It can be argued that such legislation was necessary to incentivise business to diversify their employment and ownership to those previously excluded.
BUT, the way it is implemented, there is a huge emphasis on black ownership for various sectors. What will basically happen is a business needs to acquire a license from a government department. These licenses would only be granted if you give ownership of your company to the “appropriate” investor. Invariably someone connected to the government. They determine the price and basically get gifted portions of companies.
So what has basically happened is that this legislation only effective portion these days, is to enrich the politically connected.
So basically Elon is not wanting to pay the bribes necessary to get the required license to operate.
I Hate the buffoon, but on this he is correct.
We have an Island for people like him. It’s small, windswept, covered in bird and penguin poop. Civilization and freedom is close enough to see and swim for, but it is surrounded by great white sharks.
But we stopped sending people to Robben Island, instead of sending the right types of people there.
Tribbles!
Virus running in wine: “WTF is this place. It’s familiar, but it’s all wrong!”
Market shows that the market buys into hype, not value.
Agree, he is not taking a principled stance. He is playing the “I am being oppressed because of my race” card, despite his extensive privilege.
One correction, it’s not the state that officially takes ownership, it’s politically connected private individuals who get the ownership. The public gets zero benefit.