The votes are in, they have been tallied, and we can announce the hero and zero of the year for 2015. For the first time, both our winners are drawn from the same sector!
With 40% of the votes, our hero for 2015 is Colonel Hansia Hansraj, head of the Goodwood police station. She determinedly pursued what she suspected was corruption in the ranks, and her diligence paid off when she netted none other than Western Cape police commissioner Arno Lamoer and four co-accused.
Second, with 26.7% of the votes, were all the #MyHandsAreClean supporters from around the world who publicly committed to not allowing corruption into their personal lives.
On the zero side, with 57% of the votes, our unfortunate but popular winner was police minister Nathi Nhleko, who not only decided that President Jacob Zuma did not have to pay back the Nkandla money, but warned that taxpayers had not seen the last of the upgrades.
In the distant second place, with 14.3% of the votes, was labour minister Mildred Oliphant, who dealt transparency and accountability a blow when she suppressed a forensic report into her special advisor’s R1-million-plus shopping spree, making everyone who saw it sign a confidentiality agreement.
Because Public Protector Madonsela and President Zuma won the hero and zero respectively for both 2012 and 2013, in 2014 we opened our Hall of Fame, where multiple winners will be able to show off their awards for posterity. With the competition again wide open, in 2014 the heroes were the three arms deal critics Andrew Feinstein, Paul Holden and Hennie van Vuuren, and the zero was Eskom, which unnecessarily spent millions and millions of taxpayers’ money on labour consultants,
Our thanks to everyone who participated!
