There was a time when journalists knew not to ask too many questions. A time when they knew not to dig too deep. There was a time when they had a healthy respect for authority and knew their place. The Mail & Guardian‘s leak of the Nkandla report marks that moment when the journalistic profession […]
Nkandla
Posted inNews/Politics
Malema’s problems will be over soonish
Let me tell ye how it shall be! The sun will be a blazing mass in the sky, rivers and oceans will run dry, massive swarms of locusts will roam the planet as human beings wither and die, blood will boil and turn to scabs as animals suffocate and drown in their own vomit … […]
Posted inMedia, News/Politics
Finding truth in a culture of secrecy
By Vinayak Bhardwaj The release of the “Nkandla files” reported in last week’s Mail & Guardian was the product of a long battle against a fast-calcifying culture of secrecy in our public bodies. Through bureaucratic delays, misinterpretations of the law and the overuse of “national security” as a basis for non-disclosure, public and private bodies […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Of thieves, crooks, thugs and so on
Business people the world over work to build political connections in order to gain competitive advantage. There is no law that prohibits the creation and existence of such mutual relationships between business and politics. Both are intrinsically linked and cannot exist without the other, especially in a pretentious free-market system. The lowering of ethical standards […]
Posted inGeneral, Media, News/Politics
It is all The Media’s fault
It is The Media’s fault for tarnishing South Africa’s image. If it was not for them the world’s wealthiest people would be investing all their trillions here. Even the local investors would invest in their own country. If it were not for the bloody media we would not know about any of this: What Safa […]
Posted inGeneral
Bar One man audits Nk*ndla, arrests Malema
As entertaining as the Bar One Man rescuing a keg of beer from a burning building may be, it suffers the same fate as anything produced by the WWE wrestling crowd, everyone knows it’s rigged. Now the brand is putting together a reality television show with “tough physical and mental challenges”. Instead, and in order […]
Posted inNews/Politics
FNB’s Steve the answer to the ANCYL’s PR woes
The election of Pope Francis by a conclave of cardinals in the Vatican, the African National Congress Youth League’s NEC being dissolved by the ANC and the Oscar Pistorius shooting incident have been dwarfed into insignificance again this week as “recordings” of “Steve” from beeb Bank to FNB customers are played and replayed on 94.7 […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Cry (wolf racism) the beloved country
There is probably nothing as tiresome, irritating and reactionary in contemporary South African discourse as the knee-jerk accusation of racism in response to anything critical of the ANC government, of any black person or of any institution that happens to be managed by black people (in the broadest, Biko-esque sense of “black”). Ironically, this knee-jerk, […]
Posted inGeneral, News/Politics
Nine New Year’s resolutions for Parliament
Many of us make New Year’s resolutions as a sign of a fresh start or courage to reach a specific goal. This year I decided to write a few for Parliament. 1 Forgotten (or to-be-forgotten) reports Our legislature has become very comfortable with writing comprehensive reports but does not implement them. Dusty reports include the […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Insurgents closing in on Zuma, he’ll be gone by 2014
The opposition’s motion of no confidence in President Jacob Zuma coincided with the Shakespearean fall of CIA director David Petraeus. Both Zuma and Petraeus know about modern insurgencies. Petraeus wrote the US Army counterinsurgency strategy handbook when America was losing her wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Zuma, with less success, is trying to fight off […]
Posted inNews/Politics
How should we remember Zuma’s presidency?
History is a complex social construction but a few grand narratives tend to stick out. Among other stories we’ll remember Mandela as the reconciliatory president, asking us to throw our “pangas into the sea” and forgive. We’ll remember Mbeki’s poetic appeal to our African identity, an aloof renaissance man and, bitter-sweet, as the statesman who […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Why SA demands a reluctant Obama
President Barack Obama’s re-election last week reminds us that the embrace of diversity is America’s greatest gift to the world. South Africa, like the United States, is one of the world’s most diverse countries with a similar burden of history of racial separation. This had led some of us in the small cocooned world of […]