South African business coach and entrepreneur, Andrew William Smith, has a lot of opinions when it comes to the current state of South Africa.

He shared these opinions in a 14-minute video on Facebook, which has been attracting a great deal of attention over the last couple of days.

At the time of writing, it has been viewed more than 173 000 times.

According to SA People, not all of that attention has been positive.

Yesterday Smith revealed that in the past few days “I’ve been called a cry baby, a traitor, a loser, a wanker… just because I said what I said … REALLY!!”

Take it away, Smith:

He doesn’t specify the race of the young entrepreneurs that he wishes to help with their business start-ups, which brings us to why you have to be a BEEE company to help this country.

The short answer is because, according to the World Population Review, 79,4% of the country is Black African, 8,8% coloured, and 2,6% Indian or Asian.

If your company only benefits 9,2% of the country, then you aren’t making any kind of viable change to the economic circumstances of the majority of the country.

People also tend to forget that BEEE is also not only race-based, but designed to empower women and the differently abled as well.

Finally, let’s take a moment for the interlude in the speech where we have to listen to the sound his car makes when he goes fast.

More from Smith on some of his concerns:

Acknowledging that in South Africa he has great weather, great income and that “we live well”, Smith says there are those “eternal things that drive us crazy – crime, education level in certain sectors” and paying 45% tax to a government “that doesn’t use my money to make the country better”. He’s had enough of the “bribery and corruption” and too many (government) people syphoning the money. And the lack of appreciation.

Smith says he plans to keep 20% of what he makes in South Africa and put the rest of it somewhere else…. “because quite frankly I’m sick and tired of a government who doesn’t give a shit about me, taking my f***ing money that I work hard for and then pointing a finger in my face and telling me how ungrateful I am, that I f***ed up the whole country. I’m at the point where I’m saying I’m f***ing done. I’m tired of this whole mentality up there. It just drives me crazy. I’m just looking to offshore…”

Look, it’s no secret that our country is plagued by corruption. Our taxes aren’t always used for the benefit of the country and it’s sometimes difficult to justify why we pay them in the first place.

In that sense, he is speaking to a growing sentiment in South Africa that’s especially prevalent amongst SA’s richest 10%. 

Is the solution to leave and start over somewhere else?

That’s for you to decide.

[source:sapeople]