François Hollande hast joined an exclusive club called ‘Men Who Can’t Stay Away From Women Who Aren’t Their Wives.’ I know that is quite a mouthful, but that’s the only way to describe this group of powerful men who have been floored, literally. I will not beat about the bush on this one. I just don’t understand why presidents or highly placed officials don’t think twice before they do certain things. We should not blame the media for being intrusive when people who should know better, continue with inappropriate behaviour. When you hold a position of responsibility, you’re supposed to act in a certain way because there are scores of people looking up to you. So this business of public figures expecting their private lives to stay that way just doesn’t make sense. I will never look at Bill Clinton the same way after ‘Lewinskygate.’ In the Oval Office? Come on! Same goes for Jacob Zuma who famously took that shower. How do these people even get re-elected? There’s also Silvio Berlusconi and his Bunga-bunga parties, and Morgan Tsvangirai whose star was rising until he shot it down all by himself with his apparent preference for women over policy. Robert Mugabe didn’t even have to rig the vote. Last I heard, Tsvangirai’s third marriage is on the rocks. Over the weekend, a couple of friends and I were mulling over who would win the Ballon d’Or and for me, it was a no-brainer. Messi wasn’t going to win again and neither would Ribéry, despite his tremendous achievements this past year. Looks like those underage prostitute liaison allegations have stuck. Back to Hollande, that was one serious case of poor judgement and he should fire his advisers who stood by as he rode that scooter to his alleged mistress’ apartment. I find it hard to believe that a man who has and continues to take decisions as tough as deploying troops to tricky zones didn’t have the foresight to ask the mistress come to him instead. Like I said, poor judgement. Funny how just over a year ago, Hollande called Dominique Strauss-Kahn on his sexual indiscretions and went as far as pointing out that the former IMF chief no longer had a role to play in politics. The only person I feel sorry for is Hollande’s partner, Valérie Trierweiler. I can’t imagine having to settle for “First Girlfriend”, with many sections of society not even acknowledging you and then learning that this whole time, your partner of seven years has been having an affair. Ms Trierweiler is 48 and my advice to her is to walk away. If you can’t get the ring, at least reserve your dignity. Speaking of dignity, not many people seem to have it around the office. At our End of Year Party, we got to meet our boss’ wife for the first time and I have to admit she’s stunning. Guys were hitting on her and I thought it was the booze. However, she dropped by the office again just this last week and I saw them falling over themselves to get her attention, which I found not just disrespectful because this is somebody’s wife, but irresponsible too. I did ask one of the guys if he wasn’t worried about getting into the big man’s bad books and possibly losing his job and his response baffled me. “As long as I score with the girl, the job is not such a big deal,” he said. Judging by his tone, he wasn’t joking. I don’t like stereotypes but there’s one I think actually holds. Lots of men seem to reason with a certain part of their anatomy. I’m just glad that women, especially those in positions of authority don’t have this problem. I’m yet to read about a woman president or Member of Parliament caught up in a sex scandal and I guess they deserve a pat on the back.
