To add a new twist to an old idiom, one might say there is no smoke without smoke. Except if you're minister in the Presidency Khumbudzo Ntshavheni, in which case “smoking out” zama-zamas at a disused mine in Stilfontein has nothing to do with actual smoke.
Addressing a post-cabinet briefing, the minister, who is not unaccustomed to putting her foot in her mouth, took a hard line against the illegal miners, warning: “We are not sending help to criminals. We are going to smoke them out.”
When her crass comments went around the world (and the smoke got in her eyes) she took to X to explain that “smoking out” is “a metaphor that means to force someone out of hiding”.
Ja well, no fine! Which should teach this week’s mampara, that when you’re already in a hole, stop digging.
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