Crispin Pemberton-Pigott I wonder if you up in Johannesburg could hear us rolling off our chairs in laughter as we read Patrick Bond’s ad hominem response (M&G January 12 to 18) to Dominic Tweedie’s compelling argument for the provision of land first (and fast) to the homeless (M&G January 5 to 11). We who, like […]

The housing crisis: Three lively responses to this newspaper’s recent coverage Simplistic solutions to the housing crisis will bring unintended results — such as the apartheid-style settlement of the poor away from cities, argues Dr Angela Tait It is beginning to sound rather hollow to blame the housing shortage on the backlog inherited by the […]

Eddie Koch and Mehlo Mvelase Police either colluded in the Christmas Day massacre at Shobashobane or are guilty of negligence in the run-up to the attack that left 19 people dead in the KwaZulu-Natal village, according to a television documentary to be broadcast by SABC’s Agenda programme on Sunday night. The documentary includes strong criticisms […]

Brendan Martin questions who will benefit from privatisation of state assets There would have been no prizes for predicting, a year or two ago, that the fragile unity of the new South Africa would founder on government action to secure “black economic empowerment”. But how many sages foresaw that it would be the ANC’s alliance […]

South Africans are not alone in grappling with the balance between the financial pressures to boost its arms trade, and the cost to human rights. Britain this week deported Saudi dissident Mohammed al-Mas’ari to Dominica instead of considering his application for asylum. He had not breached any condition for political refugee status. It was not […]

Jacquie Golding-Duffy THE Congress of South African Trade Unions cannot count on the support of its main affiliate, the 300 000-strong National Union of Mineworkers (NUM), in its planned anti- privatisation strike on Tuesday. Although, as a Cosatu affiliate, the NUM is bound to some degree by the federation’s decision to strike, ambivalence is being […]

Raymond Mhlaba, Eastern Cape Premier, in The Mark Gevisser Profile You catch the similarity first in the tone: the ponderous and spare mode of delivery, a schoolmasterish stress on each syllable. Then you catch it in the ability — perhaps borne of a half-lifetime in captivity — to control a large, even gangly, frame with […]

John 8:32: “The truth shall make you free.” It is widely recognised that liberation takes many forms and that “freedom” was not finally won with the assumption of power by Nelson Mandela on May 11 last year. The horrendous matric results signpost the long walk to freedom still demanded of millions of our children before […]

Marion Edmunds The Foundation for Equality Before the Law has spent its last penny on its first rally, to be held in Pretoria on Saturday. Chairman of the Foundation, Dr Theo de Jager said this week that the Foundation was spending R22 000 on the rally at which it hoped to make its first public […]

Lungile Madywabe profiles four of the top footballers who will be thrilling soccer fans in the African Nations Cup SOME of the world’s greatest players will from this weekend grace South African soccer pitches. This is despite the debacle surrounding the withdrawal of champions Nigeria have the largest contingent of players plying their trade in […]