In a speech earlier this week that was widely lauded for its clarity and conviction, Ramaphosa announced the impending lockdown, during which people will be allowed to leave home only to buy food, seek care, collect welfare grants or take walks by themselves. Running, dog-walking and even the purchase of cigarettes and alcohol have been banned.

On Thursday, Ramaphosa addressed the nation again, this time wearing army fatigues, a symbolic gesture never made before by the former business executive. Army and police personnel were deployed across the country to enforce the lockdown, but he urged them to be a “force of kindness” in a country that is still recovering from the trauma of decades of military-enforced apartheid that ended in 1994.

Their mission is the “most important in the history of our country,” he said. “Our people are terrified right now, and we should not do anything to make their situation worse.”

South Africa is one of the world’s most unequal countries. Gleaming, glassy business districts and suburbs pocked with swimming …continued .
[Source: Washington Post]