Ten years ago he was living in a presidential palace, with a gold-braided uniform, a bevy of bodyguards and a country at his command. In the visitors’ book in the palace’s elegant foyer, there was a warm message from Nelson and Winnie Mandela, praising him as a progressive leader who had brought his people ”back into the centre of the struggle”.
Most parties have not given much prominence to environmental issues, focusing instead on jobs and crime. Yet we are already seeing the first frightening heralds of climate change, caused by excessive greenhouse-gas emissions. This could mean crop failure and famine in Southern Africa in the near future. Are any of our politicians paying attention?
When President Thabo Mbeki visited the Eastern Cape recently, he was offered a cow and an ox as gifts by King Maxhoba Sandile at Mngqesha place. During the presentation, women journalists were barred from attending because their presence was said to be taboo. But, Lemmer has to ask, what about all those uncircumcised male journalists?
The thing is, we all now fervently believe that it is safe to venture out of the woods. The thing is, it isn’t. Consider this. Nosimo Balindlela, provincial minister for sports, arts and culture for the Eastern Cape, has just instituted a civil claim to the tune of R100 000 against a (presumably white) woman, Erika de Beyer, who called her a baboon in the parking lot of an East London shopping centre some time last year.
<img src="http://www.mg.co.za/ContentImages/41909/10-X-Logo.gif" align=left>President Thabo Mbeki is still an Aids dissident, United Democratic Movement leader Bantu Holomisa told about 25Â 000 cheering supporters at a party rally in Umtata on Saturday. The gathering, in the UDM’s heartland, was billed as the major rally of the UDM’s election campaign.
<li><a class=’standardtextsmall’ href="http://www.mg.co.za/Content/l3_fl2.asp?o=40922">Special Report: Elections 2004</a>
<img src="http://www.mg.co.za/ContentImages/41909/10-X-Logo.gif" align=left>When President Thabo Mbeki entered the crowded lounge of the Xhola home in Despatch’s Khayamandi on Friday, an elderly man rose to offer his chair. But the president didn’t take it. "[Mbeki] said he is younger than that old man and he said he would go sit there on the floor," said the household matriarch afterwards.
<li><a class=’standardtextsmall’ href="http://www.mg.co.za/Content/l3_fl2.asp?o=40922">Special Report: Elections 2004</a>
Health departments in the Eastern Cape and North West provinces were still investigating on Thursday the possible cause of recent outbreaks of cholera. Thirteen people died of the disease early in March in the rural Eastern Cape, and at least nine people are still being treated in the North West.
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President Thabo Mbeki was presented with a cow and an ox on Thursday morning as he kicked off two days of electioneering in the Eastern Cape. The presentation was made at the Mngqesha Great Place of Maxhoba Sandile, king of the Rharhabe or Western Xhosa.
Special Report: Elections 2004
Parties that campaign only to oppose the African National Congress are also opposing its efforts to deal with poverty and unemployment, President Thabo Mbeki said on Thursday. He was speaking to Rharhabe King Maxhoba Sandile and chiefs and counsellors at the Mngqesha Great Place north of King William’s Town.
<li><a class=’standardtextsmall’ href="http://www.mg.co.za/Content/pd.asp?ao=33497">A cow and an ox for Mbeki</a>
Twenty-seven facilities had met the basic requirements for accreditation to provide quality care for Aids patients, the national Department of Health has announced. The 27 facilities will begin admitting patients and performing HIV testing and medical examinations.
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The Democratic Alliance has accused the Eastern Cape African National Congress of ”high decibel” intimidation after a bid on Tuesday to disrupt a DA meeting with a massive sound truck. The truck parked outside a Port Elizabeth hall where a DA lunch-time meeting was in progress.
Special Report: Elections 2004
The number of man days lost in South Africa due to strike action fell from 945Â 000 in 2002 to 700Â 000 in 2003, according to labour analyst’s Andrew Levy strike report for 2003. The report says strike action in the country has levelled off significantly since the late 1980s and early 1990s.
Former security policeman Gideon Nieuwoudt on Tuesday faces interrogation by Advocate Kessie Naidu, the man who had South Africans glued to their television screens as leader of evidence in the recent Hefer commission hearings. Naidu was appointed at short notice to replace advocate Dumisa Ntsebeza.
<li><a class=’standardtextsmall’ href="http://www.mg.co.za/Content/l3.asp?ao=33347">Nieuwoudt mum on ‘interrogation'</a>
<li><a class=’standardtextsmall’ href="http://www.mg.co.za/Content/pd.asp?ao=33337">Nieuwoudt sorry for saying ‘terrorist'</a>
Former security policeman Gideon Nieuwoudt said on Monday he did not remember how he persuaded a trained freedom fighter to cooperate with him after being arrested. Nieuwoudt is applying for amnesty for the 1989 car bomb murders of three black colleagues and an informer at Motherwell.
<li><a class=’standardtextsmall’ href="http://www.mg.co.za/Content/pd.asp?ao=33337">Nieuwoudt sorry for saying ‘terrorist'</a>
<li><a class=’standardtextsmall’ href="http://www.mg.co.za/Content/pd.asp?ao=33325">Motherwell bombing hearings resume</a>
Former security policeman Gideon Nieuwoudt apologised on Monday for using the word "terrorist" to describe trained guerrillas who infiltrated apartheid-era South Africa. His application for amnesty for the 1989 car bomb murders of three black colleagues and an informer at Motherwell is being heard afresh in Port Elizabeth.
<li><a class=’standardtextsmall’ href="http://www.mg.co.za/Content/pd.asp?ao=33325">Motherwell bombing hearings resume</a>
Eastern Cape premier Makenkhesi Stofile says he would have no problem if a troubleshooting report on his administration were released before the coming election, because it contains ”nothing new”. The report was scheduled to be released two weeks ago.
It’s been a confusing few months for world-weary observers of African elections, as they’ve sat and watched South Africa and waited for the smoke to rise. Where’s all the razor wire? This isn’t an election campaign, it’s a queue. And no one is cutting in. Frankly, this year’s election campaign has been decidedly dull.
The Karoo dorp of Beaufort West is a curious mix. It is the birthplace of heart surgeon Christiaan Barnard and has a museum in his honour. It is the place where anti-apartheid activists downed a helicopter in the 1980s. Unemployment stands at an estimated 60% among the about 60Â 000 Central Karoo residents. Taking the Central Karoo from bust to boom needs more jobs that will stay.
The re-hearing in Port Elizabeth of the amnesty application of three former security policemen has been delayed by a controversy over a legal representative in the case. Gideon Nieuwoudt, Wybrand du Toit and Marthinus Ras are applying for amnesty for the 1989 car bomb death of the so-called Motherwell Four.
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UDM leader Bantu Holomisa has described local politics as ”nauseating”, saying the ANC, DA and NNP have failed to deliver on their promises and continued to campaign for votes on racial lines.
The bomb that killed three black policemen and one informer in Motherwell in 1989 will feature at an amnesty hearing starting this week. The justice ministry says the three former security policemen, including Gideon Nieuwoudt, who had been convicted of being responsible for the bomb would apply for amnesty.
The poor infection control practices in some of South Africa’s top academic hospitals raise the spectre of ”unexplained” HIV/Aids transmission, an article in the SA Medical Journal says. ”There is an urgent need to re-evaluate and improve infection control practices in health care settings,” the article concludes.
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A war of words has broken out between the Independent Democrats and the Democratic Alliance over a DA radio advertisement that allegedly vilifies ID leader Patricia de Lille and her party.
Special Report: Elections 2004
The police are to shut down a Cape Town employment agency following a visit on Friday by Labour Minister Membathisi Mdladlana, his department said. a spokesperson Snuki Zikalala said Excellence Domestic Employment had been operating illegally for the past five years.
President Thabo Mbeki launched the Urban Renewal Programme in 2001 to target development in the eight urban areas with the highest poverty levels in South Africa. Approximately R200-million will be invested in Khayelitsha and Mitchells Plain this financial year.
The African National Congress has reacted sharply to demands by the Landless People’s Movement in the Eastern Cape to either give it land, or see farms in the region occupied forcefully on election day. The ruling party said on Thursday it will not tolerate hooliganism aimed at misleading people and creating chaos and discord.
The hamlet where Nelson Mandela spent his boyhood may have attracted big businesses keen to link up to South Africa’s most famous name but it still faces huge social and economic problems that bedevil thousands of villages in the country.
The increase in the number of deaths on the population register is an indictment of government’s handling of the Aids pandemic, the United Democratic Movement and Democratic Alliance said on Wednesday. The number of deaths on the register rose by 68% over the past six years to 457Â 000 in 2003.
A recent international study conducted in South Africa confirms that social pensions play a significant role in alleviating poverty. The pension system is a firmly entrenched feature of South Africa’s social welfare framework. The country has an unemployment rate of more than 40%, making a conventional, contributory pension scheme unworkable.
A Port Elizabeth man is recovering from a horrific ordeal in which he was forced to watch a woman being repeatedly raped and, severely injured after being stoned and stabbed, he had to crawl through salt pans to seek help, Eastern Cape police said.
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/ 28 February 2004
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The name of former African National Congress Women’s League president Winnie Madikizela-Mandela does not appear on the party’s list of candidates for Parliament, released on Friday. Former ANC chief whip Tony Yengeni, convicted of fraud last year, is also not on the list.
Elections 2004 special report
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/ 27 February 2004
The Eastern Cape’s R31-billion budget was welcomed on Thursday by opposition parties and interest groups except the Democratic Alliance, which expressed some reservations about certain issues.