News/Politics

Someone needs to tell the self-appointed ‘thought police’ to stop their fascist behaviour. Nobody has the authority to dictate to other people what to think or how to behave because of similarity of skin colour. In fact, it would be a good idea for thought police to go on a holiday in Europe or Asia […]

As we near the 2009 National Elections, South Africa once again finds itself in a position where the voice of the voter is marginalised because of the lack of regulations on political party funding. The impact of this on our democracy cannot and must not be underestimated. And until the ANC and the DA get […]

As reports start filtering through on the United Nations Security Council meeting which dealt with the election impasse in Zimbabwe, the Times of London confirms: “South Africa led efforts to block the dispatch of a UN envoy to Zimbabwe yesterday, as the UN Security Council met on the election stand-off for the first time.” The […]

I calculated that my flight from London to Italy for the Human Rights Film Festival resulted in 0.340 tonnes of carbon dioxide. The flight to Dubai was 1.259 tonnes, and then another 0.130 tonnes to get to Qatar for the Aljazeera Documentary Festival. Were the benefits gained from these events worth it? Many human rights […]

Like everyone else I’m reading everything and anything on the Austrian father, Josef Fritzl, who kept his daughter captive for 24 years and fathered her seven children. Unbelievable – beats anything I’ve seen as a criminal attorney. Yet one thing keeps haunting me – how could Rosemarie Fritzl not have known what was going on? […]

One of the reasons I have steadfastly steered clear of writing about politics (if you ignore my alarming ignorance on politics) is because I find politics excruciatingly boring. I’d rather spend eighteen hours a day picking prickly pears without gloves than spend fifteen minutes watching that insomnia-busting nothingness called Parliament Live featuring a riveting debate […]

It’s time to come clean. Against my better judgment, I think I may have had a soft spot for Hillary. Just a few weeks ago, I dreamt that the two of us were walking hand–in–hand. She was unusually charming. I was feeling guilty for not supporting her bid to become America’s next top commander. And […]

Sunday’s City Press saw a column by deputy editor Lizeka Mda who repeated her standing antipathy to government grants for child support. In the past, she’s argued that if her tax money is encouraging girls to have babies, at least they should be required to present school certificates when the children are old enough to […]

Reflecting on the crisis in Zimbabwe, one is immediately struck by the preoccupation of most commentators with President Robert Mugabe and the land reform programme. Many have touted the confluence of these two issues as the main drivers of that country’s political, economic and humanitarian woes. This particular perspective, which is most dominant in the […]

When Iraq was invaded in 2003, ostensibly to crush the imminent threat posed by Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction and undeniably as a belated form of retribution for the 9/11 attacks, there were those in the western world who felt that it was a plausible response for the acts of terror that had materialised […]