No home is complete without a nice garden, so it is hard to understand the fuss about the additional R16 million spent on landscaping President Jacob Zuma’s presidential compound, Nkandla.
This is but a fraction of the approximately R250m that the homesteads, rondavels, underground bunker, fire-pool, recreation centre, marital tunnels, helicopter pad, guard posts, cattle kraal and other essentials all cost.
Trees are a necessity, and not only because they exhale oxygen, thus giving the president more breathing space in his off-duty moments.
More importantly, they will hide all the buildings which make people so annoyed when they see photographs of them. The government may well make it a criminal offence to take pictures of Nkandla, on the basis that it is a key point where the many members of the Zuma family hang out, and it probably will be classified “top secret” in due course.
But turning Nkandla into a forest is a far better protection against the prying eyes of taxpayers anxious to see where their money went. In future the only signs of life will be people emerging from the trees or disappearing into them.
Another advantage is that the trees will enable the president to hide from his many enemies, and also provide cover for his security guards, ready to leap out of the boughs, like Robin Hood and his merry men, on to unsuspecting intruders.
One of the reasons the trees cost so much, at R7 500 each, is that they are being transplanted fully-grown. There was no point putting in mere saplings. Zuma is getting on in years and can’t be expected to wait until he’s 95 before he gets a decent bit of shade.
For the same reason, the compound is being carpeted with instant lawn, to ensure no grass grows under his feet.
When all the other landscaping is complete and ornamental lighting installed, the Nkandla forest will resemble a sort of Garden of Eden, where the president can stroll like Adam, in the cool of the evening, with one or all of his wives.
Who knows, he may even come face to face with God, enabling him to inquire discreetly when Jesus is likely to return to Earth, thus spelling the end of ANC rule.
So long as neither Sizakele MaKhumalo nor Nompumelelo Ntuli nor Thobeka Stacy Mabhija nor Gloria Bongekile Ngema, having been tricked by a snake in the instant grass, persuades him to take a hap out of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
Because he will then realise he is naked, and he and the whole bang shoot of Zumas will be ordered to leave Nkandla. He can talk to the trees until he is blue in the face, but (as the song goes) they won’t listen to him. Blaming his architect won’t help, either.
The main thing is not to plant aliens, or the Tree Taliban will be after him, as will God and everyone else.
What he might consider doing is building a treetop walkway, like they have done at Kirstenbosch and which they call the “Boomslang”. It would give him an overview of his kingdom, including the nearby rising town known informally as Zumaville.
It shouldn’t cost more than a few extra million – a mere bagatelle among friends like the water and sanitation minister, who are prepared to defend him tooth and buttock.
johnvscott@mweb.co.za
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