Michael Trapido

While aid agencies are confirming that thousands of unreported Zimbabwean deaths are taking place as a result of the collapse of the country’s healthcare in tandem with a breakdown of communications, the Times of London are leading with ANC president Jacob Zuma’s view that mediation offers the best solution to the current crisis. This comes […]

Leah Chishugi, a survivor of the Rwandan genocide and a trained nurse, went into the DRC and filmed the testimony of over 400 women who were raped and abused by militias in flare-ups in the eastern regions of the Congo. The Guardian (UK) carries footage of her coverage. In November 2007 South Africa (and Angola) […]

Rosa Mitterer, a former maid in the employ of the mass murderer and Nazi Fuehrer Adolf Hitler (1931 to 1935) has finally decided to break her silence and share some of her wonderful memories with us. The fact that it has taken this 91-year-old woman a mere 63 years after World War II to reach […]

Although Sky New’s Emma Hurd’s figure of 10 000 Zimbabweans crossing into South Africa every month is yet to be confirmed, it will certainly be in the ballpark as disease and starvation grips our northern neighbour. Their towns and cities are becoming more of a death camp than a place fit for human beings to […]

What is the world coming to when African leaders can’t take their hard earned money and pop over to Europe for a spot of rest, perhaps purchase the odd car or two and pick up a decent bit of property? Dear oh dear oh dear. It seems that the French chapter of Transparency International (headquarters […]

Starvation, Aids and cholera have now been joined by an outbreak of anthrax, which has already killed two children and one adult in Zimbabwe. The killer infection is threatening to wipe out around 60 000 livestock in the northern Zambezi valley thereby compounding the horrific problem of starvation facing five-million locals. An acute disease, anthrax […]

I met with Mbhazima Shilowa, former premier of Gauteng, general secretary of Cosatu and now convenor of the new Congress of the People Party this morning and asked him to give me his views on matters of concern to South Africans both here at home and abroad. This was his take. On Cope The majority […]

The US intelligence community in terms of a report styled “Global Trends 2025”, suggested that the planet will be living with the daily threat of nuclear war over the period of the next two decades. As we watch the events in Mumbai unfolding the bleak picture that they have painted for our medium to long-term […]

Two areas of former president Thabo Mbeki’s term of office are undergoing scrutiny in the international media; his administration’s policies on Aids and Zimbabwe. Neither are going to serve his legacy well. Mbeki’s achievements have been well documented throughout this blog and it would be unfair and unkind to dismiss them during the course of […]

The National Prosecuting Authority’s appeal against the decision of Judge Chris Nicholson, in favour of ANC president Jacob Zuma, in the Pietermaritzburg High Court will be heard by a full bench of the Supreme Court of Appeal in Bloemfontein on Friday. Nicholson’s judgment amounted to the granting of an application brought by Zuma on the […]