By Gosiame Legoale I have a president who has an affinity for showers and an appetite for women, matched only by my imagination when boastfully declaring to any who would care to listen exactly how many skirts I’ve accounted for. I have a deputy president who has no official deputy first lady to utilise as […]
Julius Malema
Posted inGeneral
Malema swaggers to the gaming table in the Last Chance Saloon
Expelled African National Congress Youth League leader, Julius Malema, may know how to whip up a paramilitary posse of slathering, beret-wearing fascists, but when it comes to taking strategic decisions he just hasn’t a clue. When the chips are down he behaves like an alcohol befuddled gambler in the Last Chance Saloon, rashly doubling and […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Malema: Finish and klaar or klaar but not finished?
What now for Malema? Is the latest ANC national disciplinary committee (NDC) verdict plus the revised and harsher sanction the final nail in Malema’s coffin? Is he finish and klaar or is he klaar but not quite finished? For 12 more days at least, he is still president of the ANCYL. For 12 more days […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Dreams From Mangaung
For every occasion, there is an instance so poignant only the willfully blind and the intentionally deaf can miss it. Such moments tend to happen outside and in spite of the rehearsed and the orchestrated. They can be dramatic or surreal. In the FIFA World Cup of 2006, such a definitive moment occurred in the […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Malema could learn from Mbeki and Zuma ordeals
It’s time Julius Malema had some afternoon tea with SA President Jacob Zuma. This followed by a single malt evening with former president Thabo Mbeki. If ever there was a time for Malema to think outside the box, this is it. Though he has the option of appealing, there are dire implications, whichever way one […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Oh, Juju, baby! It’s gonna be cold outside
After years of taunting with impunity its elders in the African National Congress, the Youth League has discovered that president-baiting can be a dangerous sport. Their protracted tussle with the ANC establishment, embodied in its disciplinary committee, this week ended with them dazed, bloodied and effectively booted from the pack. Firebrand ANC Youth League president […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Berlusconi falls: Is Zuma next?
The downfall of Silvio Berlusconi leaves Jacob Zuma the sole custodian of an exclusive club of self-made, charismatic populists with persistent legal issues. Not to mention leaving no-one to send him pyjamas! “There’s not really much difference between Zuma and Berlusconi,” emailed my friend Christiaan. “Both are dogged by allegations of corruption and sexual exploits. […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Was Loyiso Gola the Zuma assassin?
Over the weekend South African President Jacob Zuma confirmed that, while he was still the deputy president, there had been a plot to have him assassinated, which was only thwarted because his loyal bodyguards refused to become involved. Along the lines of Valkyrie without the knobkerrie. Yet by mid-morning Monday only News24 and iAfrica have […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Blue-light buffoons: When frustrated drivers fight back
Google “blue light VIP” and click the “news” tab. Four stories top the list: 1. The DA’s Dianne Kohler Barnard’s parliamentary question regarding Malema’s alleged use of a VIP blue-light convoy; 2. The trial of VIP protection officer Hlanganani Nxumalo, accused of causing an accident by shooting a gun at a motorist; 3. Testimony by […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Is SA the next Zimbabwe?
The simple answer is, no. I’ve attempted to answer this question once before, in 2009. My argument at the time was that South Africa had a strong Constitution, which ensured the country stayed on democratic course. Unlike Zimbabwe, post-apartheid South Africa has endeavoured to consolidate democracy by empowering independent institutions such as the judiciary. Soon […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Winds of change for the ANC
The winds of change have finally started blowing for the ANC government, just as they started blowing for the National Party government in 1960. In 1960, this event was formally announced by former British prime minister Harold Macmillan in his famous address in Cape Town on February 3 that year. In this Year of our […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Dear ‘K-word’ and ‘K-the-boer song’
I know not everybody likes a letter, and when I think about it, you two surely don’t spend a lot of time reading either — but I love a letter, so here goes: Nobody can say that you two haven’t had your fun. You’ve shown your faces at some of the greatest and lowest moments […]