Social transformation depends on people and their actions. Too often dogma, simplistic metaphors and inappropriate examples have been the staple answers of socialists and communists to the challenges facing our society. South Africa’s national democratic revolution in the context of our negotiated transition and the strength of global capitalism require not dogma but critical thinking, writes Phillip Dexter.
The wait for Apple’s iPhone in the United States was a non-story — but also, perhaps, the moment when teleÂvision news changed forever. In the queues were people with small cameras hooked to laptops using mobile phones to upload live video to the internet. They are ”lifestreamers”, people who simulcast their lives 24 hours a day.
It was a bit like the old days of the Weekly Mail Film Festival – a movie under threat of banning, an audience eager to see it, a contentious panel willing to discuss it and all the issues in detail. But there were no protesters outside, and the attempts to halt the screening came not from state censors but the SABC, which had originally commissioned the film.
As white-collar crime continues its upward spiral the commercial branch of the South African Police Service (SAPS) has come under the spotlight. Questions are being asked about its effectiveness and purpose. White-collar crime has risen by 12,6% in the past financial year and the highest number of incidents (61 690) in six years was recorded in 2006/07.
Deep in the Congolese jungle is a band of apes that, according to local legend, kill lions, catch fish and even howl at the moon. Local hunters speak of massive creatures that seem to be some sort of hybrid between a chimp and a gorilla. Their location at the centre of one of the bloodiest conflicts on the planet, the civil war in the Democratic Republic of Congo, has meant that the mystery apes have been little studied by Western scientists.
Sitting in the shade close to his 4×4, the portly ”land invader” overseeing two workers constructing makeshift shacks in the Mkondeni area near Pietermaritzburg was the antithesis of the dispossessed. No rags, no wheelbarrow containing all his belongings and definitely no hungry glint in his eye.
Violent crime in northern KwaZulu-Natal — thought to be the work of Mozambicans filtering through the porous border — reached new heights this week. An armed 14-member gang stormed the Thonga Beach Lodge in the Greater St Lucia Wetland Park, tied up staff and guests and made off with five 4×4 vehicles.
The Democratic Alliance is drawing up a secret 14-day programme to oust controversial Western Cape politician Truman Prince, after his successful appeal for reinstatement as Central Karoo District municipality manager. DA provincial leader Theuns Botha refused to give details, but said the plan would be put into operation next Monday.
About 5,2-million children under seven are not catered for in South Africa’s early childhood development (ECD) programmes. Only 1% of the R104-billion education budget is allocated for ECD. Yet a major report released recently shows that investment in ECD pays massive dividends in the health and emotional wellbeing of the children — and in national economic terms.
Zimbabwe has been placed last for the second year running in a league table ranking 178 countries by how happy and long-lived their citizens are. But South Africa is not far ahead, at 156th. The European Happy Planet Index used carbon efficiency, life satisfaction and life expectancy to rate the countries.