Posted inBusinessNews/Politics

The global leadership crisis

The 2008 global financial crisis has exposed the dearth of global leadership, especially in responding to the complexity of multiple global events that characterise our modern existence. The eurozone has been subjected to absurd economic policies that have plunged its economy into deeper trouble. Unimaginative leadership should be blamed for failing to propel the eurozone […]

Posted inEqualityGender violenceHealthNews/Politics

Deadly circumcision and initiation practices should be outlawed

Nelson Mandela in his autobiography The Long Walk to Freedom recounts his childhood experience during this rite of passage from boyhood to manhood. He writes: “When I was sixteen, the regent decided that it was time that I became a man. In Xhosa tradition, this is achieved through one means only: circumcision. In my tradition, […]

Posted inNews/Politics

Of thieves, crooks, thugs and so on

Business people the world over work to build political connections in order to gain competitive advantage. There is no law that prohibits the creation and existence of such mutual relationships between business and politics. Both are intrinsically linked and cannot exist without the other, especially in a pretentious free-market system. The lowering of ethical standards […]

Posted inGeneral

The duplicity of the West in Libya

As the tidal wave of popular uprisings swept across the Arab world, the February 17 movement in Libya appeared to be on the same trajectory as other movements that led to the downfall of dictators in neighbouring Egypt and Tunisia. What was crystal clear from the onset was the open wish of the international community, […]

Posted inGeneral

The (No) Growth Path

South Africa has recently been invited by China to join the group of fast-emerging economies, BRICS, as they will be known going forward. BRICS, with the exception of South Africa, each contribute to more than 1% of the global GDP. Our economy has in the past struggled to reach the 6% GDP growth target despite […]

Posted inGeneral

Rise Africans, rise!

“Nothing will come of nothing,” the old King Lear lashed out at his youngest daughter Cordelia. Cordelia unlike her older siblings, Regan and Goneril, had failed to shower the King, who was nearing the end of his mortal existence, with praises in order to earn an inheritance. This enraged the old king. For having “nothing” […]

Posted inGeneral

The imagined threat of ‘die swart gevaar’

It is often difficult for human beings to readily discard particular views and prejudices that had long been imprinted in their minds through socialisation and experience. Often our worldview is informed by these particular conceptions, however preposterous they may be. People interpret facts before them according to their well-ingrained conceptions of what reality is and […]

Posted inGeneral

In defence of conspicuous consumption

A debate has been raging recently, led by self-appointed economic moralists and social activists, who have been on a war-path against conspicuous consumption; something they perceive as unethical consumerism and an affront on the moral principles of society. Anyone with a shade of active grey-matter would realise that such moral arguments are absolute nonsense. This […]