I know a lot of the news these days is grim, but as I watched MK Party members celebrate Jacob Zuma’s 83rd birthday over the weekend, and recalled Dali Mpofu telling a court in 2022 that it was as a “jurisdictional fact” that Zuma had to be released from prison because he was “suffering from a terminal disease”, I was reminded that despite the gloom, miracles do sometimes happen. 

I’m not talking about Zuma’s continued robustness, of course: that would be in poor taste. But that robustness does bring other miracles to mind, like how no big pharmaceutical company has yet bottled Schabir Shaik’s terminal illness so that we can all add decades to our lives. ..