Sello S Alcock
No image available
/ 23 May 2008

Xenophobia: Why the police blew it

Police capacity to handle riots was virtually destroyed in a restructuring exercise in 2006, leaving officers ill-equipped to handle the wave of xenophobic violence that has swept the country in the past two weeks, researchers say. As the violence in Gauteng worsened this week, the police scrambled to bring in extra capacity from around the country.

No image available
/ 19 May 2008

The fear factors

The past decade has been torrid for South African farmers, with a nexus of factors conspiring to scare them away from their ”way of life”. The first of these, say most farmers quizzed by the Mail & Guardian, is the uncertainty created by South Africa’s land restitution and reform process.

No image available
/ 16 May 2008

Keep it in SA’s borders

The South African government is not opposed to civil action by victims against companies which operated in the country under apartheid — as long as the litigation takes place within South Africa’s borders, chief state law adviser Enver Daniels said this week.

No image available
/ 16 May 2008

In the wake of the Scorpions

The Scorpions’ successful model of investigation will be destroyed by legislation tabled in Parliament this week which absorbs the unit’s investigators into the police. The government previously indicated that the unit’s model of prosecution-led investigations would be incorporated into the new “super” unit set up to tackle organised crime.

No image available
/ 9 May 2008

Pikoli lays bare state’s blatant lies

The government’s astonishing bid to protect police National Commissioner Jackie Selebi from being arrested was laid bare this week in minute detail by suspended prosecutions boss Vusi Pikoli. Compelling evidence produced by Pikoli at the Ginwala inquiry in Johannesburg indicates President Thabo Mbeki and several other senior government officials colluded to save Selebi.