Madonsela: ‘The most unforgiving people I know are among those who call themselves Christian’

Former public protector Thuli Madonsela had social media in preach mode at the weekend when she took to Twitter to reflect on how some Christians can be the least forgiving people.

Madonsela often tries to impart pearls of wisdom and insightful musings to her followers, and took to her page on Sunday to share her thoughts about forgiveness.

“The most unforgiving and resentful people I know are among those of us who call ourselves Christians. Yet we all pray The Lord’s Prayer and say: ‘Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive others their trespasses’.”

She also spoke of courage not being about “hitting others hard”, but engaging with those with whom you disagree.

“Sometimes courage is not about the ability to hit others hard but the ability to engage face to face with disagreeable people with a view to influencing and inspiring them to think and act as you believe they should,” Madonsela said.

Her comments came as she weighed in on the proposal for a basic income grant.

Last week she responded to a News24 report that President Cyril Ramaphosa has been given a strong warning not to implement a permanent basic income grant due to the risks it holds for the country and the damage it could do to economic growth and job creation.

“Ultimately it will depend on whether the president only listens to libertarian orthodox economists or also listens to development economists and common sense.

“There’s no way a basic income grant, which is not even pitched at the poverty level, could prevent job creation. Pay the grant,” she said.

She returned to the matter on Monday morning, calling on South Africans to avoid “generic economic theories” while looking at how to implement the grant.