News/Politics

By T Osiame Molefe Okay, so I’m going to get skieted, skopped and donnered for this one but it’s okay. In the past 4 hours, I’ve seen three ThoughtLeader blogs go up lambasting Gareth Cliff for his Manto comments. I won’t repeat, if you haven’t heard/read them by now…look a space ship! For the rest […]

The silly season would be incomplete without clowns. Fortunately, with Julius Malema now a permanent centre-stage feature of South African political life, there is always some buffoonish behaviour to snigger at. But no matter how unintentionally hilarious the president of the African National Congress Youth League (ANCYL) seems to be, Malema is actually no laughing […]

Mantombazana ‘Manto’ Edmie Tshabalala-Msimang was a South African politician who will, no doubt, be remembered for her controversial policies on HIV-Aids while Minister of Health under President Thabo Mbeki. Unquestionably she drew fire from many quarters with some even calling for her to be held accountable for the deaths that resulted from those policies. She […]

As South Africans approached their elections earlier this year, many were apprehensive about the favours that were owed by the then presumptive President Jacob Zuma to the left wing of the ANC, Cosatu, the SA Communist party and the ANC Youth League. Indeed analysts and political observers expressed concerns that the President would land up […]

Are the fortunes of South Africa’s political enfant terrible – African National Congress Youth League (ANCYL) President Julius Malema – falling? Hasn’t he been recently called a ‘drama queen’, a ‘sound bite politician’ and a ‘joke’? Was he was not effectively booed out of a political conference, by his own South African Communist Party (SACP) […]

So Gareth Cliff is insensitive for speaking ill of the dead. We should obviously now accept the word of the ANC that Manto Tshabalala-Msimang didn’t use her influence to hijack a donor liver from somebody who’d been waiting much longer than she had, and the stories about her kleptomania were surely contrived by her political […]

Was news of Manto’s death the Hudson plane crash of South Africa? Did the passing of the controversial former minister of health mark a coming of age of Twitter in this country? While comparisons aren’t entirely neat — the landing of the plane in the river was first reported by eye witnesses, which was not […]

The news of the death of former health minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang broke on Twitter soon after lunch, and it was fun watching the back-and-forth between the editors and the public as the media frantically searched for someone to confirm the rumours. There was even a moment of drama as some claimed that Manto wasn’t in […]

Approximately a year ago the Congress of the People (Cope) burst onto the South African political scene with much fanfare promising a “New Agenda for Hope and Change for All!“. This agenda was to be informed by a commitment to being a modern political party underpinned by an ideology of “progressivism”. An impression of the […]

The City Press report, revealing that an embarrassed ANC Youth League president Julius Malema sent a threatening SMS to SA Communist Party (SACP) deputy general secretary Jeremy Cronin following his somewhat less-than-glorious appearance at the SACP conference, clearly demonstrates that post-Polokwane the strongmen are flexing their muscles and woe betide anyone that gets in the […]

A few months ago I wrote about Gauteng Premier Nomvula Mokonyane suspending the former director of Gauteng’s roads and transport department, Sibusiso Buthelezi. It’s been reported that a disciplinary process against Buthelezi was aborted mid-stream and that an agreement was reached. As a Gauteng citizen I am curious why such a settlement suddenly became necessary. […]