THE African Union (AU) has belatedly reacted to the drowning of hundreds of would-be migrants from Eritrea, whose boat sank off the Italian island of Lampedusa on October 3.

After its mystifying initial silence, the AU Commission on Monday declared November 3 a continental day of mourning for one of the worst verified migrant sea tragedies in the Mediterranean.

The victims were at least 339 men, women and children from Eritrea, which is so closed that it is the only African country that can be compared with North Korea.

They drowned in sight of Lampedusa, Italy’s most southerly island. It was the heaviest loss of life in a single incident during the past decade, when thousands of Africans have died in the attempt to reach political or economic sanctuary in Europe.

The AU’s failure to offer even a word of condolence was noted by some media, including in an October 8 editorial by Business Day.

Four days later, Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma spoke about the tragedy in Addis Ababa and on the same day African leaders took the decision to commemorate it, Monday’s statement said.

“The continental day of mourning will serve as well as a call for all Africans, including the youth, to reflect on appropriate actions to be taken with a view of finding a lasting solution to this persistent problem that leads to the loss of African young people without whom the continent cannot build a prosperous and peaceful future,” it said.

The Insider can only note of the AU’s behaviour: better late than never.

Unusual sort of car trouble

A COLLEAGUE of the Insider knows somebody who had to abandon his crashed car — these damn Joburg trees get in the way from time to time — one night, and take a taxi home.

The man was astounded the next morning to find his car had disappeared, but not as astounded as he was six full weeks later when the car was found.

After having been “inspected, detected and defected” by leery police and suspicious insurance inspectors over the weeks in which the car was mysteriously lost, the car was found — in a police pound, where it had languished for the entire time, but about which nobody at the South African Police Service knew a thing!

Those reticent spokesfolk

A WATER-cooler discussion between some of the Insider’s colleagues revealed what each had individually suspected — dissimulation appears increasingly the order of the day in government departments, with more and more departmental media statements not only devoid of real information (such as things like details, facts and the like), but also of proper contact details for spokes-people. How to lose (media) friends and keep voters, perhaps?

Wise words

“EVERY revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy.”