Shifting political ground challenges all parties (Polity 26 March 2018, reprinted Daily Maverick)

 

The removal of Jacob Zuma as ANC and state president and some of the early steps of the Cyril Ramaphosa-led ANC and government has posed challenges for opposition parties, especially the DA. Continue reading

Pit toilet school deaths and human dignity (Polity 19 March 2018, reprinted in Daily Maverick and enca.com)

“No parent, no matter how poor, should have to bury a five-year-old – a child that lay in faeces. -Equal Education

This week we mark Human Rights Day, on the anniversary of the Sharpeville massacre of 1960. It comes in the wake of the second known death of a five-year-old child, Lumka Mketwa, found in a pit latrine in Bizana in the Eastern Cape, birth place of Oliver Tambo. Michael Komape also drowned in faeces in a pit latrine in Limpopo, in 2014. Continue reading

Contestations in Ramaphosa era: what is an emancipatory route? (Polity 12 March 2018, reprinted Daily Maverick and enca.com)

The election of Cyril Ramaphosa as ANC president in December evoked high expectations from a range of quarters in South African society, because it was seen as a break from the Zuma years and various expectations arose over what this entailed. Continue reading

Rebuilding our political life (Polity 5 March 2018, reprinted Daily Maverick and enca.com)

What type of politics do we have and what do we need for every citizen to feel that he or she belongs in this country and contributes to the shape of its present and future?  Continue reading

The Ramaphosa presidency- constraints and choices (Polity, 26 February 2018, reprinted Daily Maverick and enca.com)

 

As one watches the unfolding of the Cyril Ramaphosa presidency one sees the care taken in preparing almost every gesture and presentation that Ramaphosa has made.  Continue reading