Gordon Brown has styled the Zimbabwean government as a “criminal cabal“, demanded that it accept international monitors and called for sanctions if President Robert Mugabe is not removed after the run-off. I could go on listing those who now condemn the president and his party, or simply refer you to Google or any other search […]
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Posted inNews/Politics
Zimbabwe Violence reminiscent of Gukurahundi massacres
This was a difficult contribution to make for a number of reasons. First, I am very close to the events that I am about to describe. In early 1982 to the late 1980s, Zimbabwe experienced an ugly period called Gukurahundi (a Shona word meaning, the early rain that washes away the chaff before the spring […]
Posted inGeneral
The university of the 21st century: Facing complexity
It is imperative to problematise the idea of a university relentlessly and insistently at the beginning of the 21st century, and for a number of reasons. The first is that, regardless of a widespread belief in the ‘neutrality’ of universities, they have not been unaffected by political partisanship. Perhaps this is unavoidable, given the fact […]
Posted inLifestyle
Are we starting to get it?
I have been on a bit of a hiatus from writing in recent times. I even went on a ‘driving nowhere slowly’ jaunt in the northern KwaZulu-Natal last week. I had meant to return with a piece about my experiences on the road. But that has to wait. In the past I have gone on […]
Posted inMedia, News/Politics
Who owns your mind?
I go face to face with Wadim Schreiner for the inside scoop on agenda setting and the battle for control of your brain. Schreiner is a specialist media analyst and the MD of Media Tenor South Africa and partner in Media Tenor International (Switzerland). He decodes and analyses media trends and interprets the media agenda […]
Posted inGeneral
The coach’s corner
Hello from a surprisingly overcast Johannesburg. For some reason we seem to take this weather with us. We had it in Somerset West for our training camp, and then the first part of the week in Bloem. It’s meant a few of us are fighting the flu, but hey, if that’s our only complaint things […]
Posted inGeneral
The world food crisis: intractable and explosive
In no other time during humanity’s recorded history is the savagery of market relations so paradoxically defined as in this age of plenty. We are able to transform deserts into oases, carve a path through hitherto impenetrable mountain ranges, successfully land an explorative mission to Mars. Human beings are manufactured in laboratories, the parched and […]
Posted inMedia
US sport: A marketer’s dream
This weekend, I watched a cricket match. I don’t mean I joined some fellow South Africans and crammed into one of the few pubs in the city that broadcasts cricket and rugby. No, I mean I watched a live cricket game, which, in the US, is about as rare an event as hen’s teeth. It […]
Posted inNews/Politics
South Africa “under siege”?
“Can I see a falling tear, and not feel my sorrow’s share? Can a father see his child weep, nor be with sorrow fill’d? Can a mother sit and hear an infant groan, an infant fear? No, no, never can it be, Never, never can it be!” “Does spring hide its joy when buds and […]
Posted inSport
Time for South African politicians to be good sports
I’ve just spent the afternoon letting those Welshmen on Will Carling’s site have it and then some. Pieter De Villiers’ finest have just shown the Six Nations champions that there is a world of difference between being the Northern Hemisphere’s top dogs and the team who hold the title of world champions. I would, however, […]
Posted inGeneral
Do white South Africans hate local soccer?
Sometimes we ask ourselves certain questions in the privacy of our minds, and then wonder if other people would be offended if we were to ask these particular questions in public. This is where the beauty of democracy comes in. This liberal system of ours must at least protect “the right to be wrong” and […]
Posted inGeneral
Santana’s do or die encounter
I foresee an influx of job-hunting Brazilians raiding our shores in the not so distant future. This would be one incoming swarm, which even our self-styled special tactics division in Alexandra could never stop. A precedent has been set. The likelihood that a Brazilian job-hunter could be valued at no less than R1 million is […]