The time has come to convene a panel on presidential jogging

Our leader definitely needs a route plan that avoids the imposing Sandhurst gates of dodgy tenderpreneurs

- Bhekisisa Mncube

Ah, Chief Dwasaho! It seems your jogging route passes only through the most fragrant gardens where cash, guns and tenders bloom in perfect harmony.

A brisk morning stretch of the legs before another day of running a country (your side hustle) that can barely crawl, teetering on the edge of economic and moral collapse.

You tell us you didn’t know whose house it was. You didn’t go in. You weren't coming out. You just happened to pause outside, where the tender air was thick enough to slice with the National Treasury knife.

You see, my leader, in South Africa even jogging is political. I jog, therefore I am a jogger. But perhaps not.

The video shows you, head glistening, security detail alert, pausing to greet a DJ who spotted you outside the home of a man we've come to know as Hangwani Morgan Maumela of the Tembisa Hospital “mafia”, nephew by marriage and tenderpreneur of national (dis)repute. The DJ captured the moment: laughter, hugs, warmth and that presidential aura that melts suspicion into selfies. Hollywood, anyone?

The video doesn’t lie; you was (sic) there, my leader. Your spin doctor confirmed it. Yet, in your defence, you claim ignorance: “I didn't know whose house it was.” Truly? “I didn’t go inside. I wasn’t coming out.”

My leader, that’s a powerful trilogy of denials worthy of the Book of Proverbs remix: “I was there, but I wasn't there; I saw, but I didn't look; I paused, but I didn’t stay.” A whole head of state jogging blind through the alleys of Tenderland? My leader, the optics (stench) would make even Shakespeare weep: to jog or not to jog, that is the question.

But my leader, South Africans are not naive joggers in this political marathon. We have run this route before. We have heard the “I didn't know” refrain from CR17 and Marikana to Phala Phala. It’s the national anthem of plausible deniability.