The State of the Nation Address (Sona) by President Cyril Ramaphosa was expertly drafted and edited by a good speech writer. The speech itself only meant to tell what South Africans like to hear and was void of what they do not need to hear.

I have long come to the conclusion that South Africans do not really need an honest political leadership, but sweet talkers who will still allow for some protest action entertainment.

Dreamers, charlatans and populist smooth talkers are exactly the kind of politicians who will continue to prosper in this country, perhaps for decades to come. Maybe this is an African problem.

It could be that its root is the fact that most Africans are so used to successive royal leadership.

Democracy and the accountability of politicians to the electorate is still a foreign and racist notion to us.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with dreaming, but there are two kinds of dreams - good and bad ones.

After each dream, a plan is needed and this is exactly what Ramaphosa does not have.

All over SA, the cities built by the apartheid government are collapsing due to poor governance and lack of skills by the officials.

If existing cities are too difficult to maintain, who will build a new one big enough to replace all of them? Current cities under the ANC government are dirty, crime-ridden and overcrowded.

The ANC government cannot even build better RDP houses and maintain apartheid infrastructure, but would like to magically graduate into smart cities. A simple toilet is taking over a quarter century to build in rural schools.

The essence of Ramaphosa's speech was fantasy and love. This sthandwa president has no concrete plan whatsoever, except to charm the (Ace) Magashule camp and ordinary people to love him.

Khotso Moleko, Warrenville, Mangaung