Vicki Robinson

The war against HIV/Aids has been officially declared. General Manto Tshabalala-Msimang has issued a ground-breaking operational plan — which includes her African potato and garlic remedies, alongside the long-awaited roll-out of anti-retroviral (ARV) treatment.

"My dream of being able to tell strangers: ‘I have a job,’ came true," Maria Gaanbi, a Sowetan resident and single mother, told the <i>Mail & Guardian</i>. She is one of about 30 000 people working on a Gauteng public works initiative called the Zivuseni project — a short-term job-creation programme to combat poverty.

Racism, sexism, lack of transparency and "exclusion organised around … whiteness" — these are the experiences of staff employed at the University of Witwatersrand. A survey of Wits staffers’ perceptions of change finds university still in the grip of the ‘old guard’.

The symbol of the South African economy today is no longer the miner in a hard hat of the mid-1980s. The person standing at the traffic lights with a poster board saying “No Job" is also a symbol of the worker of today, testimony to the fact that one in three economically active South Africans is unemployed.

More legal action against tertiary mergers is in the pipeline as massive rebellion builds up in the Eastern Cape against Minister of Education Kader Asmal. His announcement last week that the merged institution to be created from the University of Transkei (Unitra), Border Technikon and Eastern Cape Technikon will be known as the "Eastern Cape University of Technology" sparked deep anger at these institutions.

Critical questions about the state of education in South Africa have emerged following the release of the country’s education statistics this week. One prominent educationist has called on the national Department of Education to explain "what the hell is going on".

"I dreamed there was a helicopter flying, flying, and it went straight for my head. A bomb fell. The people around me — all of them — died. And the police came and they told me to take the corpses and stack them". Poppy Buthelezi had this recurring nightmare after she was shot in the back on June 16 1976, the first day of the Soweto uprising.

The third and most devastating wave of the HIV/Aids pandemic is now ravaging Eastern and Southern Africa. So warns a United Nations report presented at the 13th International Conference on Aids and STIs (sexually transmitted infections) in Africa, held this week in Nairobi, Kenya.

Pupils are held up at gun point during their lunch break at school. A girl has a broken bottle held to her throat in the corridor. Pupils cannot flush toilets because the ablution facilities are so blocked that the floor is already covered in an inch of sewage. This is the daily reality for pupils at Johannesburg Secondary School in Mayfair.

The government will now intervene after months of seemingly unstoppable senior management turmoil at the University of Durban-Westville. On the eve of the university’s high-profile merger with the University of Natal, this dramatic intervention is thoroughly welcome, senior UDW staffers say.

The government is failing to protect the interests of thousands of children who attend farm schools — one of the most vulnerable sectors of the public schooling system — according to legal and human rights experts.

"Hunting dogs are sent into the veld by their owners to catch animals. When the dogs have caught them, the owners eat all the meat and then throw the dogs the bones. The only difference between hunting dogs and mineworkers is that we are sent underground to catch gold."

If South Africa does not find solutions to its current land impasse, it faces "grave circumstances … that are most likely to spill over into violence". A University of the Western Cape programme is unique in addressing land concerns.

The stench inside is so strong that one of the building’s residents likens it to "dog manure simmering in the sun without a breeze to blow it away". Johannesburg’s social housing schemes enjoy mixed success.

Nelson Mandela once said: "If there are dreams about a beautiful South Africa, there are also roads that lead to their goal." This weekend’s launch of Johannesburg’s long-anticipated landmark bridge, named after the great man, will constitute a physical memory of his words.

<li><a class=’standardtextsmall’ href="http://www.mg.co.za/Content/l3_fl2.asp?o=21465">Celebrating Mandela</a>
<li><a class=’standardtextsmall’ href="http://www.mg.co.za/ImageGallery.asp?a=138">A life in pictures</a>

The Mineworkers Development Agency (MDA), the development and job creation arm of the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM), has temporarily shut its development centres and retrenched 43 staff.

The New Partnership for Africa’s Development (Nepad) talks about African self-reliance and ownership by people united in their diversity – but the people themselves were never consulted in the process, say most African civil society organisations.

The Department of Arts and Culture has established an audit committee to investigate why Johannesburg’s Windybrow Centre of the Arts appears to be on the brink of bankruptcy. The Windybrow ran at a loss of R580 600 last year.

The Southern African Catholic Bishops’ Conference has launched a programme of moral regeneration to complement Deputy President Jacob Zuma’s programme. A week-long SACBC plenary session that started in Pretoria on Wednesday will discuss moral issues.

Chaos erupted in the Khayelitsha Magistrate’s Court on Thursday in the latest clash between police and members of the Anti-Eviction Campaign in the Mandela Park settlement in Khayelitsha. The drama followed two weeks of violent conflict between protesters and the security forces.

A LIFETIME quest and sheer dedication has seen the traditional crafts of the San people of the Northern Cape turned into useful, marketable products