The South African Civil Society Information Service
A nonprofit news agency promoting social justice. Seeking answers to the question: How do we make democracy work for the poor?
A nonprofit news agency promoting social justice. Seeking answers to the question: How do we make democracy work for the poor?
SACSIS’ Fazila Farouk talks to Marjorie Jobson, Director of the Khulumani Support Group, who provides an update of South Africa’s apartheid reparations case that has been on going for a decade.
According to Jobson, a lack of corporate accountability for apartheid crimes has resulted in apartheid era practices reproducing themselves in certain sectors of the post-apartheid economy, such as mining. She links the strife in Marikana today to the fact that mining companies were...
John Capel of the Bench Marks Foundation talks about the efforts of his organisation to widen the scope of the Marikana Commission of Inquiry (also known as the Farlam Commission), such that the investigation goes beyond and behind the killings of the 34 striking mineworkers, which shocked the world last year, to the socio-economic root causes of the strikes in the Rustenburg mining belt.
A study by the Bench Marks Foundation, first released in 2007 and later updated in 2011, shows huge...
![Picture credit: Lost in Transit [Keep St Joe Weird]/Flickr](/a/image.php?i=2013/04/1627948656c1ce18f3cdb513d9b8648d06da.jpg&min=2&w=150&h=150 "Picture credit: Lost in Transit [Keep St Joe Weird]/Flickr")
Jane Duncan -
Many people were shocked by the judgement in the Andries Tatane case, who was killed by police rubber bullets in a service delivery protest in Ficksburg, and are even more shocked that the National Prosecuting Authority has decided against appealing the judgement. The fact that his fatal shooting had been caught on camera led many to assume that it would have been an open and shut case, and the responsible police officers would be found guilty of murder, convicted and sentenced.
But this...
Fabulously talented singer, writer and actress, Masello Motano, is no ordinary pop diva. Hugely concerned about South Africa’s deep poverty, widening inequality and the disconnect between the country’s leaders and its people, she has launched the musical career of her alter ego, “Cyrilina Ramaposer” whose debut single “Makarina on Marikana” tackles the most pressing social injustices of the day. Edgy lyrics set to a profoundly effective minimalist tune,...
David Bruce -
If one wants to understand the common thread behind police brutality in South Africa, the cruelty that last week killed taxi driver Mido Macia, the massacre of the miners at Marikana or the killing of Andries Tatane, it is helpful to go back to the ANC’s 2009 election manifesto.
The manifesto largely rehashes old ideas. But in describing how the ANC will “intensify the fight against crime and corruption” there is one word in the manifesto that is relevant to understanding...
Leonard Gentle -
How soon we forget…When the striking workers were killed by the police at Marikana there was a universal sense of shock and horror. How could it have come to this? Just 18 years after apartheid and here we go again - the police mowing down demonstrators. Now AngloPlat has announced that it will retrench 14 000 workers and the mood amongst the commentariat is, “Well, what did they expect?”
Angloplat’s announcement seems to confirm our most dismal...
