The majority will, again, vote for the ANC in the forthcoming elections. It is unavoidable as that seems to be the only party of choice that will gain more than 61% of votes, according to a voter poll. The C-Voter poll says 70% of citizens think the ANC will win at the polls on May […]
News/Politics
Posted inEquality, News/Politics
Condemned to obscurity: The state of our population register and the right to vote
By Liesl Muller I recently attended an election-observer training session in preparation for next month’s elections. I was inspired by the chance to play my part in the democratic process shaping the future of our country. Voting is an opportunity many South Africans did not have in the years before democracy and which South Africans […]
Posted inNews/Politics
What are ‘(post)apartheid conditions’?
This may seem like a straightforward question, requiring – and allowing – straightforward answers. Nothing of the sort, it turns out, and if one had any such illusions, the new book, (Post)apartheid Conditions – Psychoanalysis and Social Formation (New York: Palgrave MacMillan, 2013) by psychoanalytical theorist Derek Hook, rapidly disabuses one of them. Hook, of […]
Posted inGeneral, News/Politics
An EFF beret, Nkandla and Freedom Day
I have mixed feelings about Freedom Day. A sense of relief is mixed with a sense of frustration. Optimism is muddled with ineffable loss of something different, something a little better than what we have now. I think Nomboniso Gasa said it far better than I on Facebook yesterday: Freedom, I think, is never complete. […]
Posted inNews/Politics
The quiet violence of sexist language
“There will be more diplomatic language to countenance rape, torture, assassination. There is and will be more seductive, mutant language designed to throttle women, to pack their throats like paté-producing geese with their own unsayable, transgressive words …” were some of the observations made by Toni Morrison in her 1993 Nobel lecture. It was hard […]
Posted inNews/Politics
How the ANC’s gravity-defying levitation is achieved
As South Africa’s political parties approach the final straight it’s yet another one-horse race, if the bookies are to be believed. The African National Congress, says the latest polls, is set to achieve close to the two-thirds majority that it has maintained for the past 20 years. The opposition Democratic Alliance will apparently be fortunate […]
Posted inEquality, News/Politics
A Biko moment
I’ve been having a Biko moment for a while now. A “Biko [1] moment” is that moment when someone says something racist but I’m left wondering if I’m reading too much into the situation. That moment when I have to debate in mind if I feel welcome in a space because there’s an atmosphere of […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Placing my cross next to Malema’s face?
How to use their vote in the upcoming general election is a question confronting virtually all of my students. Some suggest they won’t vote, that they feel it is pointless. Others insist they want to vote but are anxious that their vote will have little or no impact. Then there are a substantial number who […]
Posted inNews/Politics
On the fall of the ANC
“How did the ANC manage to dupe the people of South Africa?” ask Prince Mashele and Mzukisi Qobo, the authors of a new book, The Fall of the ANC: What next? The 20th anniversary of electoral democracy and the impending elections, all within weeks, force us to take seriously the place of time in the […]
Posted inGender violence, News/Politics
The uncomfortable truth about white masculinity
Africa Check has published an article intimating that white women are more likely to die at the hands of their husbands, boyfriends and partners. This, and other research, directly challenges the notion of a “white genocide” carried out by “unknown black men”. Lisa Vetten, the researcher behind the article, along with journalist Nechama Brodie, Professor […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Vukani! Don’t waste your widow’s mite on May 7
Power is the currency of politics. Experienced politicians know instinctually when to hoard it, when to spend it and when to convert it into a bankable alternative. So for a brace of former Cabinet ministers to suggest voters should squander their power – their widow’s mite of the vote – by throwing it away, is […]
Posted inNews/Politics
When a ‘spoil-your-vote’ campaign might be effective
The Sidikiwe! (We are fed up!) campaign has been launched, calling on potential voters – particularly among those who might have supported the ruling ANC in the past – to repudiate the ANC in its current form in the forthcoming elections. The leaders of the campaign – including a former minister and deputy minister in […]