News/Politics

The Star newspaper reported on Monday that President Jacob Zuma had met with Bobby Godsell on Sunday afternoon, in an apparent departure from his stance not to interfere in state enterprises. Zuma would have shown a lack of confidence in Public Enterprises Minister Barbara Hogan’s ability to handle Eskom’s management crisis, and that he had […]

Last week it was announced that Mugabe’s Kimberley Process cronies have decided to give him until June to withdraw the soldiers in the Marange diamond fields. The army runs smuggling operations and use forced labour in mines whose profits benefit Zanu-PF. Human Rights Watch exposed the horrors of Marange in June. A task team from […]

Whether in Kabul, London, Washington or Pretoria global leaders appear to believe that big mouth is more important than sound math. In South Africa only a small percentage of the populace pay tax, electricity bills or television licences, they are also the best educated and most productive part of the population and those most likely […]

A funeral attended by presidents past and present. It is Senator Edward Kennedy’s final farewell held at Our Lady of Perpetual Help in Boston. A milieu has come full circle in American politics. The “new king” presides over a ceremony rich in symbolism, a king spiritually descended from the noble line of Camelot. America is […]

I am no apologist for Allan Boesak, who hit the headlines again this week after he resigned from the Congress of the People. However, I have known the man for a long time and have tried to understand his mind through all the dramas in his life. These dramas, of course, include the Di Scott […]

A genocide which has claimed more lives than Adolf Hitler’s gas chambers: the 20th century African holocaust. Who is to blame this time? What devil lurks in the background wreaking such ruin on our people? The answer is plain and simple — party politics. A chapter in the long Aids death march has come to […]

I am often one to criticise the media for generating unwarranted fears. I see the swine flu “epidemic” as one clear example of media hype being larger than the real problem. South Africa is perceived to be one of the most violent countries in the world with the crime and violence widely reported in the […]

I’m sorry, but has everyone gone mad? Wherever I turn, it’s Joost. Joost and his wife (not to mention her equine flatulence), Joost and his apology, Joost and his book. Really? A book? Have we not all suffered enough? I tell you, I have had it up to here with Joost. And considering that Andre […]

“The National Union of Metalworkers on Monday called for the nationalisation of the wealth of South Africa’s richest man, Patrice Motsepe, and ANC struggle hero Tokyo Sexwale. This comes after South Africa’s ‘Rich List’ was published by the Sunday Times on Sunday. The list, compiled by Who Owns Whom, showed that Motsepe was the richest […]

So it is a pleasure to say that I feel like our president is doing some really good work (or is at least saying he is going to). With the address to the National Council of Provinces on October 29 he has finally ended a nearly decade-long state denial of the HIV and Aids problem, […]

ANC Youth League president Julius Malema has for the first time praised former president Thabo Mbeki as a hero of the ANC, whose struggle credentials can never be erased from the history of the ANC. Malema in the past has been very critical of Mbeki, even accusing him of leading a political conspiracy against President […]

There is some confusion over whether the idiom should be a “600-pound gorilla” or the much larger “800-pound” creature. The usage also differs with some using it as a form of praise for companies that have dominant positions in markets, and others using the idiom to describe a difficult situation, which is not being addressed. […]