News/Politics

This conversation from the movie Before Sunset provides a reason why the people who provide the little achievements of the day should be resting on Mandela Day. Céline: Yes, of course. (Hands him a cigarette.) Um, here. (He takes the cigarette and taps it three times on the table.) In my field, I see these […]

To be rich would be a wonderful thing. Now, I don’t mean to have a nice car and a nice home, but really rich. Rich like a Kennedy or a Bush. Rich like the GDP of a small to medium country. Because when you are rich, when you are famous and absolutely fabulous, when you […]

Predictably, the media is reacting to these recent ANC threats like a scalded cat instead of with the yawn that all this deserves. For whatever the control fetish of the ANC, government actually has little room for manoeuvre.

By Lucky Ntuli As South Africans, it is exhausting and frustrating to have to explain time and time again the behaviour of our politicians. In this particular case having to explain the childish, nonsensical, never amusing and utterly embarrassing Julius Malema. Now, I do not know the “man” nor do I want to. I do […]

Many people, myself included, had hoped and believed that the Congress of the People (Cope) would be a credible alternative to the ruling party. Sadly, Cope has from its start been plagued by two factions: those who are committed to and wanted to build this credible alternative, and those who opportunistically sought to advance their […]

Crass and insensitive comments by radio talk-show hosts unfortunately surface from time to time. One of these, brought to my attention in my capacity as anti-Semitism monitor at the SA Jewish Board of Deputies, was in response to reports that one of the World Cup venues had run out of beer. While I can’t cite […]

Government ministers had to exercise managerial oversight during the World Cup because they, in turn, for the first time were being held accountable. Not by a vacillating president or an endlessly forgiving electorate, but by the mandarins of Fifa and a demanding tourism market.

A South African visitor has so far cost New Zealand about one and a half million rands because of a rare infection she contracted whilst travelling here in New Zealand. After reading this spectacular sample of hospitality and humanity I needed to take a walk and chose Takapuna beach to clear my mind. Takapuna beach […]

Chauvinism. In a previous article I reflected on the hostility towards Uruguay after their defeat of Ghana, and given that this still appears to be a hot topic, I thought I’d explore this in a little more detail. You probably know the word “chauvinism” from the expression “male chauvinist pig”, but it has other uses […]

Moloko Moloto, writing for IOL, was reporting yesterday that the ANC in Limpopo was considering reconvening the disputed youth league provincial conference which would come as a political blow to ANCYL president Julius Malema. The gist of the article was that the Limpopo provincial executive committee met with Lehlogonolo Masoga — ostracised by Malema for […]