Articles
Bennie Bunsee
By Keabetswe Magano Two years ago I had the opportunity to meet and witness the brilliance of Bennie Bunsee, the man with 50 000+ books in his home. At first I thought we were meeting him in a small community library but it was his home. There were book shelves filled...
Turquoise Harmony Institute Awards 2015
The Publisher of The Journalist, Zubeida Jaffer has received a Media award for her fearless commitment to journalism and a free media. The Publisher of The Journalist has called for action to secure the release of close to 50 journalists who are jailed in Turkey....
Celebrating women through stories
By Zubeida Jaffer The women of Cape Town remind me of the grey-blue mountains that hug our shores. They are forever present. They have been here for thousands of years giving life to those who have lived and live here at the furthermost point of Africa. Their stories...
UCT Academics Lock Horns
Two senior University of Cape Town academics have locked horns about a range of matters related to higher education transformation challenges, stirring interesting exchanges. The viewpoints of professors Xolela Mangcu and David Benatar were aired on the pages of The...
The Journalist’s Woolworths GMO story was correct
A recent series of articles on Genetically Modified Organisms, plant or meat products that have had their DNA artificially altered, at the food and clothing retailer Woolworths sparked intense public reaction. After apologising to Woolworths because we relied on a 1999 story to hold them to their commitment to ‘ban’ GMO some new evidence has come to light.
THE EIGHT YEARS OF JAN VAN RIEBEECK
By Zubeida Jaffer Jan Van Riebeeck arrived in South Africa in 1652. Who of my generation does not know this? It was drilled into all our minds at primary school. And even if we were not lucky enough to go to school, the mythology certainly did not pass us by. The...
Parliament & The Red Coats
Whose dignity is it anyway?
Govt operates at the pace of a village cow
“In Soccer, if you don’t listen to the referee, there can be no game,” says the Deputy Speaker of Parliament, Lechesa Tsenoli, defending the actions of officials in the latest fracas. The Journalist Publisher Zubeida Jaffer nailed him down between rounds in the...
South African scholar at Stanford questions Mandela statues
By Erik Fredner In the year since Nelson Mandela's death on Dec. 5, 2013, the impetus to commemorate the South African leader has increased around the globe, with memorials already completed in South Africa, the United Kingdom, the United States, Peru, the Netherlands...
Remembering Slavery in South Africa
By Gabeba Baderoon “I recognized Cape Town the first time I saw it,” Deborah Thomas revealed at a lecture she gave in the city in July 2014. A sociologist who works in Jamaica, she knew instantly that she was looking at a place shaped by slavery. What do you see when...
Remembering Madiba
By Jimmy Mathews Death, even when we expect it, always comes as a shock. The SABC spent years preparing for the inevitable passing of Nelson Mandela. We had plans for every eventuality, and teams ready to be deployed at a moments notice, but until it happened, we...
Honouring the Madiba Legacy
Tata Madiba’s name flips glibly over many tongues today. Some who hold him in high esteem were silent when he was incarcerated. They did nothing to support his vision of a united non-racial, non-sexist South Africa free from poverty. They only came near when the...
In Judgement of Ebrahim Ebrahim
By Zubeida Jaffer Rudolf Mastenbroek seeks to discredit the tortured and not write about the torturers and askaris that journalist and author, Jacob Dlamini writes about so sensitively in his latest book Askari. In a Sunday Times article (Nov 16) entitled “How do you...
The Evil of Banalities
by Faizal Dawjee Reviewing Anthony Sher’s one man show about guilt-ridden Holocaust survivor, Primo Levi, John Heilpern writes in the New York Observer: “The high-minded intellectuals with their nice clean hands who blame Levi for his apparent “suicide” are one of...
Minister of Economic Development, Mr Ebrahim Patel
This week The Journalist begins a series on Editorial Independence. It has been sparked by the eTV saga, starring Marcel Golding as our newfound ‘champion’ of media freedom. The Minister’s statement is run here to provide context for the analysis by Zubeida Jaffer and...
Love in the Time of Treason -Photographs
These are series of photos. Click here for more information about the book Love in the Time of Treason - The Life Story of Ayesha Dawood by Zubeida Jaffer
The Funeral of Ayesha Dawood
Ayesha Dawood rose to prominence as a struggle activist in Worcester, Western Cape, and was one of the leaders charged in the 1956 Treason Trial. She passed away on the 28 May 2014. These are the photos of the funeral that took place at Aesha Dawood's residence in...
The Open Mosque Saga: Progressive Politics or Neo-colonial Posturing
By Sa’diyya Shaikh and Shuaib Manjra The notion of an ‘Open Mosque’ is an alluring idea: such a mosque which is inclusive, non-discriminatory and embracing of human diversity naturally resonates with us as Muslims, feminists and proponents of human rights. There is...
The President Holds the Key
By Zubeida Jaffer* Lets not defend the indefensible. President Zuma has led his party and the country into a quagmire. Last weekend’s story in the Sunday Times has further added to the drift, leaving many of us hanging our heads in confusion and disappointment....
20 Years of Unshackled Journalism
A paper delivered by Mathatha Tsedu on December 1, 2013, at the Vodacom Journalism Awards 2013, Johannesburg. Thank you Programme Director. Acknowledgements are in order for the Editors, Vodacom Executives, Judges of these awards, Journalists, Finalists and fellow...
SHOULD THE MEDIA SPARE MADIBA’S FAMILY
By Zubeida Jaffer Let anyone who is without sin, throw the first stone (The Bible, 8: 7) The Mandela family has been at the receiving end of publicity as the head of their family lies desperately ill in hospital. It could be said they have brought all this controversy...
Van Riebeeck’s Hedge
These trees are a remnant of the hedge planted in 1660 by Jan van Riebeeck as a boundary to the newly established settlement at the Cape. Jan van Riebeeck, an employee of the Dutch East India Company (VOC), arrived at the Cape in 1652, to set up a refreshment station...
Memorandum from Senior Commanders and Commissars of the former military wing of the ANC, Umkhonto we Sizwe.
1. We, the undersigned, are all committed cadres of the African National Congress, having served our glorious movement for many decades. Throughout our lives, and whenever the need arose, we did not hesitate to raise our hands to be counted among those who could be...
Fetal Alcohol Syndrome Research
What is Fetal Alcohol Syndrome? Fetal Alcohol Syndrome (FAS) is caused when a pregnant woman drinks alcohol. The alcohol can reach any part of her body and the baby within 20 minutes after she has taken a drink. The alcohol is toxic (poisonous) for the unborn baby and...
Media bashing is in vogue
By Makhudu Sefara , editor of the Star 7 June 2013. Johannesburg - On the sidelines of a lunch I attended in Sandton this week, an executive asked me: “What on earth was Sanef thinking, writing a petition to the Competition Commission?” And, before I could respond, he...
MEDIA TENSIONS IN THE SPOTLIGHT
By Zubeida Jaffer Star editor, Makhudu Sefara opportunely broke a dignified silence today. This was a tense two weeks for journalism. His voice articulates the levels of annoyance circulating amongst media professionals. If he had not spoken today, many were at risk...
JURISPRUDENCE: THE LAW, LAWYERS, AND THE COURT.
The Real Mismatch The Supreme Court should not force universities to trade affirmative action for socioeconomic diversity. Schools can have both. By Lee C. Bollinger Graduates from Columbia University's School of Public Health Photo by Keith Bedford/Reuters The...
The Mathematics of democracy
The 2012 Helen Suzman Memorial Lecture Jonathan D Jansen University of the Free State “So teach us to number our days that we may gain a heart of wisdom” Psalm 90 v 12 Introduction The first and only time I met the politician Helen Suzman was in a principal’s office...
Jansen: Let the memory of Imam Haron inspire us to fix education
University of the Free State Vice-Chancellor Jonathan Jansen was in Cape Town on Tuesday to deliver the fifth Imam Haron Lecture, held annually to commemorate the memory of the Muslim activist, murdered during Apartheid, whose name it bears. Jansen wasn’t pulling any...
THE TRANSKEI
Similar struggles against the Bantu Authorities Act were fought in the Transkei, where the resistance of the peasants culminated in the Pondo revolt which broke into the open early in 1960. At first the government pretended that nothing untoward was happening in...