There comes a time in all our lives where all of us take our job titles very seriously. For Honourable Minister Fikile Mbalula, the Minister of Sport and Recreation, that time is now. Mbalula is taking the “recreation” part of his job title quite literally; just take a gander at his Instagram profile. If anybody mistook him for a high-rolling hip-hop star, we’d forgive them.

In all his splendour, Mr. Razzmatazz spent the past weekend “balling for days” (his words, not ours) with some of the big stars of America, chilling courtside at the NBA All Star Weekend. What a fantastic life he must lead. Daddy Swag Sacks is bossing it and everybody is loving him; just look at his Twitter feed and all the compliments he can RT! Everybody loves him. The adulation that seeps from the internet is enough to make Mmusi Maimane go to Harvard of his own accord, because he will never have all this swag and love.

Now, before you get tetchy and think this is coming from a “hater”, just chill. Nobody begrudges the Honourable Minister the privilege of having a nice time. It’s great, go democracy! We’re not even questioning who paid for the outing.

What is irksome is that he does it so in your face and so in the face of those who are not always supported by his department. Like, for example, the Khayelitsha Boxing Academy, who just last week got rejected for funding for the third year running. It meant that their amateur boxers (one of whom is a two-time junior champion) had to pay their own way to get up to Pretoria for this week’s national championship. These fights are crucial, since they pave the way for the boxers to get onto the Olympic Cycle, allowing them the opportunity to qualify for next year’s Olympics. But they have had to resort to the power of social media to raise their funds. In fact, the academy does not even have a boxing ring. These boxers have to train in a tiny room with almost no equipment. But hey! Mbaks is having a nice time with world-famous boxers, he has no time for the petty woes of South Africa’s future hopefuls.

But let’s not look at the one little academy, one with the only South African coach ever to take boxers to the World Student Games in Khaza Russian. Ayanda “Ginger” Mapasa clearly doesn’t have enough swag for the minister to chill with.

Let’s cast our gaze elsewhere. Facilities are equally dire at both primary and secondary school level. Rugby has over 1,300 “primary schools in jurisdiction participating”, while cricket has just over 1,500. Playing facilities available to those schools are badly lacking. Rugby has just 813 while cricket has 905.

That means the average number of facilities per school for rugby, football and cricket is less than one, restricting the number of teams and league competitions that can be accommodated -counterproductive to any footprint and participation increase exercises.

But, don’t worry. It’s all razzmatazz and snazz and when it comes to talking about transformation in sport. The Honourable Minister will razz up your tazz and talk about how South Africa is failing at it, all while window dressing with quotas.

Because hey, finding sustainable solutions for massive problems just isn’t enough of a publicity opportunity. It also won’t wash to simply explain “moer hulle” or talk about what a bunch of losers the department is for failing the youth time and time again.

We dare not waste our time thinking that the department was established to achieve measureable outcomes in both sporting excellence and sporting challenges. Hell no. The measurable outcomes are clearly all in the recreation department. Shem, we’ve been so stupid all along.

It’s all about the Instagram likes and hogging the spotlight whenever there is a TV camera present. So let that be a message for once and all, dear South African citizens, we dare not expect the Minister of Razzmatazz himself to actually be seen visiting impoverished areas, where the fields are poorly maintained and children cut their feet on glass while training on sand. We dare not expect him to go and help out cutting the grass on a cricket pitch that’s been neglected – but it will have to do, because that’s all there is. Because we dare not ask for a little more sport and little bit less recreation, please. Not until those struggling the most have a camera and swaggering celebs present to capture the opportunity, anyway. DM