The "Ethical" Billionaire

 -Marcus Oberlechner

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During a usual fever-crazed bout of doomscrolling through my most hated of social media platforms —Twitter… (I refuse to acknowledge its new name) — I came across a post about Jannie Mouton planning to buy Curro private schools. He had put in a bid of 7.2 billion rand, with the intention of converting all Curro private schools into a country-wide non-profit, educational facility to make schooling more affordable and accessible. Of course, in the comments of that same post the haters were going off screaming “tax avoidance scheme!” adding that, as a billionaire, there is no way that he would be doing this for purely philanthropic purposes. What crazed idiot would give away his money for the betterment of other less advantaged people? Nobody does that.

I then decided to read up about Jannie Mouton. A businessman, fired at age 48, who then went on to found PSG and Capitec Bank and turned himself into a Dollar Billionaire — an achievement that demands a certain level of respect regardless of how he managed to do it.

I am, if anything, an unapologetic cynic. I will find an underhanded nefarious reason for someone dropping a couple of coins in a blind beggar’s collection cup. So, despite my worst instincts, I have decided to give Jannie Mouton the benefit of the doubt and will believe that he, at this point in his life, has decided to give back to the country and people that enabled him to achieve his wealth.

Working in a corporate setting where shareholders are multi-millionaires, billionaires,and money obsessed individuals, where the mere thought of parting with a few Rands that doesn’t result in a greater benefit to them is cause for an aneurism. Philanthropy is a swear word, helping others is “wokeness”.  So, the story of this self-made Billionaire investing the future gave me that warm fuzzy feeling that partially and briefly restored in me some faith in mankind.

Not wanting to lose that feeling, I reminded myself of Alice Walton, the richest woman in the world who opened a medical school to train doctors, with free tuition, to produce community physicians, an initiative she wants to replicate in various other states.

Then there is Mackensie Scott (the ex-wife of Jeff Bezos) who has, since her divorce in 2019, donated upwards of 19 billion dollars to over 2000 organizations with no strings attached (much to the chagrin of her ex-husband). Her donations have proven to be transformative. Her philanthropy continues to this day and yet rarely does she meet or see the thousands of people she has helped. She gives because she can, it’s the right thing to do,. And as a bonus, it causes her ex immense pain.

Melinda Gates, once married to the then world’s richest man, Bill Gates, whose frequent trips to Jeffrey Epstein’s Island created an untenable situation for her, has personally donated 1 billion dollars to promote women’s rights and women’s health notwithstanding the billions given by the Bill & Melinda Gates foundation. (Rumor has it that the driving force behind the foundation was Melinda Gates, and Bill went along with it so that he could continue with the then status quo of a string of mistresses and those island visits. In order to continue with this narrative, lets accept the rumour as true).

What has become evident is that billionaire men never grow out of childhood and as soon as they have some disposable income they spend their money on very high-priced toys. I have visions of Jeff Bezos sitting at the edge of a lake playing with his remote control boat, or with a toy rocket kit he got for Christmas. Nothing much has actually changed except the price of the toys. Now he has a 600-million-dollar yacht and a phallic space rocket.

Or little Bill, with his little remote-controlled airplane flying it around the garden trying to avoid crashing it into the neighbour’s driveway. Now he has a fleet of 7 private aircraft of various sizes, and instead of a remote-controlled toy he can sit in one and fly around in it. Bless his little heart.

Then of course there is little Mark Zuckerberg who definitely strikes one as the kid who dreamt of living in his own boy cave, so now he is spending some of his billions to build a massive doomsday bunker on his Hawaiian compound. Never mind his own collection of yachts, planes and cars.

Take the Formula 1 season. 8 Billion dollars spent every year so that the boys can drive very very fast around a race track for the amusement of millions of others. Yes, there is the research and development component, but the results of the research are inevitably used to create faster toys for all the other little boys who wish they could also be driving very very fast around a track.

The city of Florence is a testament to the very rich investing the future. The Medici family paid for much of the beautiful art and architecture that adorns this city. How many people since the 15^th century have wandered its streets and been moved by the beauty of the place? What spaces of beauty are the very rich of today creating? Spaces that will be appreciated by the people of 2525? I cannot think of one. There is that saying: he who plants a tree knowing that he will not live to enjoy its shade is investing in the future.

The very rich of today are still mostly men and their corporations, whose sole interest is in creating profits for shareholders and accumulating wealth. When they perform a show of philanthropism it is for tax purposes or to gain some other financial or strategic advantage. The intensions are far from altruistic.

It is the extreme selfish nature with which the ultra-rich of today are using their financial resources that I simply cannot come to terms with. All the problems of health care, hunger and education worldwide could be solved with the resources currently available in the hands of a very select few.

It seems that the most philanthropic within the billionaire class are the 'mistreated ex-wives', because boys will remain boys who want toys, while women are instead helping humanity with the fruits of their former spouses' infidelities.

So in amongst all the greed, wastage and selfish financial manipulation exhibited by the world’s ultra-rich, Jannie Mouton comes along and does the unthinkable. He has donated without a nefarious reason. He is 78 years old and is fading. But he will be vilified, labelled a monopoly capital predator (whatever that means): how dare he give away and help the less fortunate without some kick-back to himself? He is planting trees so that future generations can enjoy the shade and that is 100% OK with me.