Yolandi Groenewald

It must be the only South African town still presided over by a statue of Hendrik Verwoerd, out-and-out believer in white supremacy and the architect of apartheid. Eleven years after South Africa’s first all-race elections, Orania seems, more than ever, to be lost in a time warp.

The Department of Agriculture and Land Affairs is exploring the possibility of creating "agricultural suburbs" in rural towns to provide permanent housing for farmworkers. Glen Thomas, director general in the Department of Agriculture and Land Affairs, admitted to Parliament’s land affairs and agriculture committee that the Labour Tenants Act and the Extension of Security Act had not done enough to give farm workers security of tenure.

A black building contractor from Brits alleges he is facing bankruptcy after refusing to pay a R400  000 backhander to a local council official. After not answering <i>Mail & Guardian</i> questions for three weeks, council spokesperson KS Ngubegusha described the claim as "laughable".

South Africa is well on its way to meeting its Millennium Development Goals, according to the government’s report card released recently. The report will be presented to the United Nations world summit in New York. The country has been doing well in, among other things, decreasing the proportion of poor people higher rates of enrolment in primary schools and eradicating malaria.

Students at the University of the Witwatersrand have had enough of parties who are out of touch with their political needs. At the recent student representative council elections, the African National Congress Youth League/South African Students’ Congress alliance lost all 15 seats it won in a clean sweep last year.

A Welkom community comprising the poorest of the poor lost a total of R640 000 after housing consultants backed by politicians encouraged them to participate in a housing scheme. Among those accused of promoting the scheme is former Free State Premier and now national MP Winkie Direko.

When European settlers landed in South Africa, they hardly saw the locals as cutting-edge scientists and health practitioners. In fact the indigenous people harboured a treasure trove of remedies for all kinds of diseases, knowledge of how to farm effectively and principles of good nutrition.

For Grace Dinkwanyane, her community’s cows are miracles. They have become the gift of self-sustainability, she says, smiling at her own miracle, a Jersey cow named Beest. Dinkwanyane, a 45-year-old farmer from Groblersdal, says the cows owned by her and nine other women in her community have given them pride and confidence, as well as providing food for their families.

Clinics in rural areas often have hundreds of pamphlets on health issues, but very few of these well-intended leaflets reach their target audience. About 30% of South African adults are functionally illiterate and this figure is often higher in rural communities where many pamphlets end up as fuel for the household fire.

Maryna Blomerus is the editor of South Africa’s first new Sunday newspaper in 35 years, Die Wêreld. She spoke to the <i>Mail & Guardian</i>after reports this week that the paper was in dire straits and would not be publishing this Sunday.

An important new land study warns the government against setting up poor black South Africans for failure in the farming sector. The report, released by the Johannesburg-based Centre for Development and Enterprise, says the hard truth is that agriculture offers few opportunities for addressing unemployment, poverty or inequality on a significant scale, and provides an economic future for fewer and fewer people.

About 250 land claimants in Gauteng and North West have failed to collect more than R3-million awarded to them in terms of South Africa’s Land Restitution Act. Payment has been approved by the Gauteng and North West Land Claims Commission, but the claimants disappeared during the six weeks between the finalisation of their claims and the signing of the final settlement papers.

Despite the high priority government policy places on gender equity, tertiary education remains an overwhelmingly male-dominated terrain. Ten of the 21 universities responded to the Teacher’s request for data showing how many female academics are employed at each level. The universities of the Witwatersrand, Stellenbosch, Cape Town, Pretoria, North West, Zululand, Potchefstroom, Natal, Durban-Westville and […]

Academic freedom is one of those terms which are easy to preach and tough to practise. But for the Community and Individual Development Association (Cida) academic freedom mean exactly what it says – in every sense of the term. Located in the heart of Jo’burg city, Cida University caters to students from disadvantaged communities countrywide. […]

Despite achieving the best matric results in the country for three years in a row, the Northern Cape is not benefiting from the knowledge of school-leavers in the province. ‘We are suffering from a massive brain drain,” a worried Tina Joemat-Pettersson, provincial minister of education in the Northern Cape, told the Mail & Guardian. ‘But […]

A showdown looms in government circles over which government department will preside over environmental impact assessments (EIA) for mines. There is confusion about who will have the final say, after the publication of new EIA regulations. <i>Earthyear</i> reports on a power struggle over who should authorise environmental impact assessments for mining.

Mining is never a pretty sight. It has a deserved reputation for defacing nature and putting profit before everything, including the environment. By their very essence, mining and conservation seem to be antithetical concepts. Many old, abandoned mines are unrehabilitated and environmental hazards. <i>Earthyear</i> finds out what’s being done to clean them up.

If conservation is to be mainstreamed, its practitioners cannot afford to ignore big businesses such as mining and oil companies, says Valli Moosa on taking over the reins at the largest conservation NGO in the world. <i>Earthyear</i> spoke to Valli Moosa the day after his election as president the IUCN-The World Conservation Union.

Both established and emerging farmers are facing massive losses and possible bankruptcy as the drought tightens its grip on the country. Crop failures and lower market prices are making it impossible for farmers to afford wages. Almost a third of the 3 000 workers on wheat farms in the Western Cape may be retrenched.

The Treatment Action Campaign (TAC) has laid a formal complaint with the Advertising Standards Authority against the Dr Rath Health Foundation for publishing advertisements undermining the effectiveness of Aids drugs. An advertisement published in the <i>M&G</i> has sparked an advertising storm. A spokesperson for the TAC called the advertisement "dangerous and irresponsible".

Between the Shashe and the Limpopo rivers, South Africa, Botswana and Zimbabwe come together to form a special place filled with history and wildlife memories — the Tuli Block. Husband and wife team Roger and Pat de la Harpe studied and photographed the region in detail and wrote the book <i>Tuli- Land of Giants</i>. <i>Earthyear</i> reviews.

The tourism industry is becoming more colourful. After years of white domination, innovative new businesses are being set up by communities who once saw tourism as a curse and a burden upon themselves. Nevertheless, there is still much to be done, before tourism can be beneficial to everyone in South Africa. Many believe tourism holds the key to economic upliftment, but who really benefits?

The South African Secret Service (SASS) is selling a luxury waters-edge property it bought less than three years ago as a discreet pow-wow venue for President Thabo Mbeki and his diplomatic guests. The 14ha Hartbeespoort Dam estate is being marketed at R26-million to R30-million — an all-time high in an area that has become a playground for Gauteng’s very rich.

In parts of South Africa, thousands of people inhale a deadly cocktail of chemicals every day, and far too many children suffer from preventable respiratory problems because of toxic emissions from oil refineries and other industries. After decades of suffering, a new Bill to update dinosaurian legislation may soon give them their first breath of fresh air.

The national government on Thursday ordered an urgent independent forensic investigation into 14 contentious deals in Mpumalanga that have cost the taxpayer R72,1-million. Chief land claims commissioner Tozi Gwanya has instructed senior independent property valuer Derick Griffiths to verify whether sales prices for the 14 vegetable and dairy farms in Mpumalanga’s Badplaas valley were inflated or otherwise manipulated by land speculators and government officials.

The government says it will meet and even surpass the water and sanitation targets set at the World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD) in Johannesburg two years ago. Director General of the Department of Environmental Affairs and Tourism Chippy Olver told the Johannesburg +2 conference last week that by 2010 all South Africans will have access to adequate sanitation and safe drinking water.

For many years, during apartheid, the Ndumo Game Reserve in KwaZulu-Natal was an area the local Mathenjwa community avoided, a place that held the animals they were not privileged enough to enjoy. But, when the Ndumo Wilderness Camp was erected in 1995, the community gained a stake in the wildlife that previously had held no interest for them.

"Energy is a huge problem all over the world because the world is power-hungry, as <i>Time</i> magazine put it. What is always strange to me is that people who criticise us for investigating other sources of energy such as nuclear do not realise the immense damage that our reliance on fossil fuels is causing this country." Marthinus van Schalkwyk speaks to <i>Earthyear</i> about his future plans.

One of the biggest criticisms to come to light was the bureaucratic romp-slomp in processing EIAs. In some cases, it can take up to four years to get a record of decision from the government. In our last issue we explored the process required for environmental impact studies, but developers complain about lengthy delays. <i>Earthyear</i> investigates new DEAT regulations aimed at speeding things up.