“Get ready mama prepare for your freedom. Freedom is coming tomorrow!” So went the lines of one of the songs in the hugely successful Sarafina musical. It’s a catchy tune too. In terms of the imagery of this Mbongeni Ngema song, freedom comes hurtling towards us at the speed of light, unstoppable and inevitable. Yet […]
Tinyiko Sam Maluleke
Tinyiko Sam Maluleke is a South African academic (currently attached to the University of South Africa [UNISA]) who suffers from restlessness, intellectual insomnia, insatiable curiosity, a facsination with ideas, a passion for justice, a crazy imagination as well as a big appetite for music, reading and writing.
He has lectured briefly at such universities as Hamburg in Germany, Lausanne in Switzerland, University of Nairobi in Kenya and Lund University in Sweden - amongst others.
Posted inNews/Politics
Around the world with Malema and Terre’Blanche
Upon finding out that I was going overseas last Thursday (April 8 2010) a friend suggested that I was fleeing from Terre’Blanche and Malema. I wish I could have. Terre’Blanche and Malema have haunted my brief traverse through three countries. From the other side of the grave, Terre’Blanche crawled into the TV screen in my […]
Posted inGeneral
Mourning Eugene Terre Blanche
I was busy showing off my mean dance moves at a Jazz gig late on Saturday the 3rd of April 2010, when my phone started to vibrate intermittently in my back pocket. During the break, I then checked my phone messages to see that friends, colleagues and journalists – local and international – had been trying […]
Posted inGeneral
Mourning Eugene Terre’Blanche
I was busy showing off my mean dance moves at a jazz gig late yesterday, when my phone started to vibrate intermittently in my back pocket. During the break, I then checked my phone messages to see that friends, colleagues and journalists — local and international — had been trying to reach me, either to […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Malemaisms and the art of distraction
Edged in national memory is that picture of a fat youngster who — except for his skimpy underwear, is totally naked — drunkenly leading a protest during the chaos that was the African National Congress Youth League (ANCYL) elective conference in Mangaung, Bloemfontein. At that conference, Julius Malema was elected president of the ANCYL. How […]
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Cool river? Cool guy! A tribute to Steve
The hall was full of what Archbishop Tutu would have called, the rainbow people of God. The air was filled with pain mixed with faith mixed with gratitude mixed with extraordinary hope. There was deep mourning and much open weeping. Occasionally, the sombre mood was punctuated with brief nervous bouts of defiant laughter. Spirit-lifting songs, […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Sad day for Zuma and my country
The Zuma baby story was expertly if also ruthlessly done. It contained all the “seeds” in all the right places in order to produce the drama and shock that was to follow, carefully dropping all the gory hints, expertly sprinkling all the grains of doubt, seedlings of outrage all nicely tucked in, “gently helping” the […]
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Mandela, De Klerk and the bird in our hands
Almost every culture has a version of the story of a group of stuck-up youngsters who confront the village sage with a trick. It is the stuff of many a funeral night vigil speech. It also pops up in motivational talks and sometimes in serious lectures. The sage is wrinkled, old and female. Sometimes he […]
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Back in South Africa…
Having been outside South Africa for ten days, I found myself playing a silly game as I re-entered the territory of Afrika Dzonga. How do you know that you are back in South Africa? You know you are back in South Africa when you switch on your radio and you hear episode 901 of Julius […]
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The boy who refused to die
It has been difficult in Haiti. Decomposing bodies still buried beneath the rubble and the stench that comes with that; survivors searching for bodies of their next of kin; the hungry and destitute turning to looting and violence; relief agencies in sixes and sevens; the army and police doing their best to control and calm […]
Posted inGeneral
An open letter to Zuma
Mr President, sir. The country is in panic mode as speculation grows that you are about to invoke the prerogative powers and responsibilities vested in you by the Constitution (84,2J) by virtue of you being head of state — your power to pardon. At the root of the rumours is the recent meeting you had […]
Posted inNews/Politics
‘Issues that arouse’
“The issues that arouse at the Special Conference of the South African Communist Party last year, in relation to the ANC delegation to the conference, will be finalised at a bilateral … ” So reads the last paragraph of the section dealing with the alliance in the ANC’s post-Lekgotla statement released today. Clearly this is […]