By Walter Bhengu As the dust settled over the #PayBackTheMoney incident in Parliament, the speaker of Parliament, Baleka Mbete, recommended that the 20 EFF members involved should be charged and faces the music before the powers and privileges committee. Pay back the money is the now famous phrase that was directed at President Jacob Zuma […]
News/Politics
Posted inNews/Politics
SA hungry for genuine, effective leaders
By Kriss Mukenge We want more because we sense at the core of our beings that proper leaders bring about positive, true and lasting change; we want more because our memories tell us that the greatest developments and innovations of our times were possible thanks to great leaders who dared to dream more, believe more […]
Posted inNews/Politics
SAPS, try not to get sued
When SAPS tabled its 2013/14 annual report, the media was quick to pick up on the massive amount for contingency liabilities; a total of R20.5 billion. This represents just under 30% of the total 2013/14 SAPS budget. Contingency liabilities are all claims pending against SAPS, and might or might not result in payment when the claim […]
Posted inGender violence, General, News/Politics
Listening in: An Open Book Festival review
I arrive at Fugard Annex 1 cradling a tumbler of red wine and find an empty seat on the second last row at the back. On stage is the host, Ferial Haffajee (editor of City Press), with her guest Maria Phalime, to talk about her memoir: Postmortem, The Doctor Who Walked Away. The room is […]
Posted inGeneral, Health, News/Politics
Nuclear power carries risks that are simply not worth taking
In the wake of President Jacob Zuma’s recent lone ranger escapade to Russia, evidently to secure Russian President Vladimir Putin’s assistance regarding South Africa’s energy needs — the status of which seems to be uncertain at present because of accusations and denials of him acting unilaterally flying to and fro — the question, whether one […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Lost for words to describe Jacob Gedleyihlekisa Zuma
It is something that is always at the back of the minds of leaders: the question of how they will be remembered by subsequent generations. In the deferential East, the Chinese will happily bob and scrape to such obvious fibs as The Great Helmsman to describe mass murderer Mao Zedong, while North Korea hails Kim […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Why Beijing is likely to continue pushing a hardline stance
By Walter Bhengu The recent student-led protests in Hong Kong have been massive, the streets of Hong Kong have been in disarray and the Chinese government is not impressed. The so-called Umbrella Revolution has been gaining momentum on the streets of Hong Kong and has captured the imagination of many around the world. Beijing has […]
Posted inEquality, Gender violence, News/Politics
Emma Watson’s HeForShe campaign just what we need
Emma Watson invited men into “the movement” and the feminist world is in uproar — split into the yay and naysayers. It’s even gone to the extent of fractures along racial (according to one blogger it’s white feminists who support her), regional or even socio-economic background. But identity aside there is some good and bad […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Protecting the dignity of politicians
One thinks of politicians as vain and thick-skinned. Arrogant and shameless. Duplicitous bullies. People to tolerate but rarely to love. Men and women with the backbones of amoebae but the survival instincts of cockroaches. It appears one is just so wrong, for it seems that they bleed emotionally like any of us. All the way […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Whose South Africa is it anyway?
“All those who live in it”? Well, at least according to the Freedom Charter. Cute, don’t you think? Ah, reminds me of when I moved out of my parents’ home to pursue “first-time renting”. Though I snagged a tight-spaced bachelor unit, next door to a Celine Dion friend, who often blasted her music into the […]
Posted inMedia, News/Politics
Brett Bailey must choose – respect Africa or be damned!
There is a lot of consternation in some quarters following the cancellation of Brett Bailey’s visual arts show, Exhibit B, which purports to give insight into the dehumanisation and violent brutality of Africans by colonialism. Many of the supporters are aggrieved that the work of this over-rated and provocative white African artist has allegedly being […]
Posted inNews/Politics
‘Start with the room you’re in, change that conversation’
By Suntosh R Pillay “We have too much faith in leadership. It lets us off the hook so we can say someone else messed up.” This was the warning of Rama Naidu, a panellist at the third annual Conversations for Change in Durban. An initiative of The Mandela Rhodes Community, it was held amid tense […]