”Sitting opposite Nina is like looking at one of her paintings. Filled with bright colours, the image seems to vibrate with energy and burst with life. ‘Everyone always asks me [to describe my paintings], but I never know what to say,’ she says, her eyes sparkling behind cat’s-eye spectacles”. The M&G meets celebrated artist and activist Nina Romm and finds out that she has more on her mind than cats.
The battle against HIV/Aids suffered a severe blow this week with revelations of managerial chaos and bitter infighting in the country’s largest Aids body, the Aids Consortium. As a result, large amounts of money from international donor agencies are at risk.
”I love my country, it is beautiful — it has desert, it has a beach. But people are poor because of the war.” South Africa has become a haven for Ethiopian and Eritrean refugees who have fled their war-torn homelands. The M&G speaks to members of these displaced communities.
With the world marking International Women’s Day this week, women in South Africa might find themselves asking what benefits 10 years of democracy have brought them — especially in the important area of reproductive health. The country still faces problems relating to abortions, prophylactics and access to health care.
In an exclusive interview, Dr Peter Piot, executive director of the United Nations Programme on HIV/Aids, talks about the allegations that HIV/Aids statistics are inflated. "Our estimates are based on real-life studies, and the methodology is straightforward," he says.
No image available
/ 27 February 2004
Pity the person with Aids who is trying to find out where to go for anti-retroviral (ARV) treatment or how long it will take for the drugs to be available. The Mail & Guardian‘s attempts for the past month to obtain concrete information from each province suggest that public access to the life-prolonging drugs will be akin to a lottery and will depend on where you live.
No image available
/ 20 February 2004
School principals in Lenasia are apparently flouting admission policies to keep poor children out of schools. But threatened legal action on behalf of the children has forced the Gauteng department of education to act. Almost 30 learners living in Thembelihle, a squatter camp just outside Lenasia, south of Johannesburg, have been denied access to a number of schools.
No image available
/ 6 February 2004
”We are marching because we are concerned about the serious threat to health care in this country. It is the inability to pay doctors better — we are losing our experienced doctors.” Angry doctors will march on Parliament on Friday, the day of the State of the Nation address. Dr Kgosi Letlape, chairperson of the South African Medical Association, speaks out.
No image available
/ 23 January 2004
Take a prominent figure in a hotel room with a young female activist, a condom and an injured husband, add the backdrop of a social-values conference on foreign soil — and you have the ingredients of a juicily gripping scandal.
No image available
/ 23 December 2003
Drag racing takes place on Wednesday, Thursday and Sunday nights in most parts of the city. But if you are not looking for the underground gatherings you will never find them. Word of mouth or its contemporary synonym, the text message, offer the only way in, writes Nawaal Deane.