News/Politics

I don’t know about you, but I prefer my leaders smart. I don’t want their intellectual capacity to be open for debate. Even if a leader is a jackass, I want to be able to say: “Sure, he’s a jackass, but he sure is smart,” like many people thought of good ol’ Mbeki. I don’t […]

British writer Oliver Kamm, in a column that appeared in Monday’s Guardian, would suggest that rendition in certain circumstances, primarily to combat terrorism, is justified. Moreover, according to Kamm: “Rendition does not mean torture. It means moving someone from one country to another without reference to a formal extradition treaty.” In layman’s terms, “rendition” is […]

This week Americans have been rocked, according to the New York Times, by Governor Eliot Spitzer’s patronage of a high-end prostitution ring. Just for my own entertainment, I’ve made a few simple changes to the paper’s report, imagining what it might be like if the public reacted as viscerally to Bush’s recent veto of a […]

Every now and then in the messy quagmire that is diplomacy and international relations, the true hypocrisy of all this jostling for national position becomes glaringly obvious. Lightly camouflaged behind a veneer of garish moral make-up and far from the bright lights of CNN and the BBC, the diplomatic whores and pimps of our world’s […]

When a group captain at the Wittering air base near Peterborough, England, advised Royal Air Force personnel not to wear their uniforms in public, it sparked an enormous outcry. Weren’t these people part of the armed forces responsible for the safety of Britain and, accordingly, entitled to the public’s respect? Closer to home, we could […]

I sat stunned and paralysed with anger at an upmarket lounge a few days ago when a friend, sister and wife, Letta Mofokeng, told me with a heavy heart that she did not understand why she was a widow and her children were without a father. Shimi Mofokeng’s neck, heart and liver were ripped into […]

For anyone in Cape Town and interested in Tibet and creating more awareness around the country’s problems, I’ve just found out that Cape Town will be the first official African supporter of Tibet’s 10th of March Freedom Day at lunchtime on Monday. There will be a statement from the Dalai Lama, a flag-raising and a […]

The appointment last week of Soweto-born Simpiwe Tshabalala as the chief executive of Standard Bank’s local operations is a fabulous move indeed. I have personally always admired Tshabalala and even more so after reading a piece about him yesterday. It turns out Tshabalala went to a Catholic school called Marist Brothers and has his hard-working […]

Jacob Zuma’s interview with the Financial Times of London, wherein he expressed the view that it is the ANC rather than the government that is the centre of power, has given rise to a call for early elections by the trade union Solidarity. In the interview with the British newspaper, JZ claims that the national […]