Aubrey Mokoape: A revolutionary with a human face
Many activists who were at the forefront of the fight against apartheid are not household names. Mokoape too. Yet, alongside Sobukwe and Biko, he fought. And only death stopped him.
Features
A glimmer of hope for Aggett’s sister and friend
Jill Burger and Gavin Andersson are not holding out any hope that a former security police officer will reveal the truth about Neil Aggett’s death. A ruling that it was not a suicide will be enough.
Motherwell brothers turn dumpsite into art gallery
The Nyendwana brothers sell their art from the gallery in front of their home and have now launched a clothing label that is attracting global attention and raising awareness about Covid-19.
New Books | The Brutish Museums
Dan Hicks questions the continued display of objects looted by colonial powers in the West and calls for cultural restitution, repatriation and decolonisation.
Cartoon | Too small for those boots
In this week’s cartoon, Jacob Zuma has the gall to compare his legal woes to those of Pan Africanist Congress of Azania liberation hero Robert Sobukwe…
Racist malpractice fuels conspiracy theories
Could the long history of racist medical malpractice, social media conspiracy theorists and big pharma profiteering threaten the success of South Africa’s biggest vaccination programme?
Caleb Mutombo dreams big
Born in the DRC and raised in South Africa, the bodybuilder’s indomitable spirit has seen him through childhood trials and the death of his brother.
From the Archive | Memphis workers’ strike
The US state has sanitised Martin Luther King Jr’s legacy. But it is often forgotten that his final days were spent organising Black workers in a city seething with racism.
Cartoon | Loss of Face
In this week’s cartoon, Russian President Vladimir Putin sows the seeds of his regime’s demise by poisoning and then imprisoning activist Alexei Navalny.
Exhibition | Nuclear power and spaces
This online visual project examines how landscapes, humans, plant and animal species as well as objects exist in relationship to the Koeberg nuclear power station and Cape Town.
‘Major gaps’ in the impact of human noise on fish
Fossil fuel companies have targeted South Africa’s oceans for new oil and gas discoveries, using loud equipment to explore the seabed. But how will growing noise levels affect marine life?
Hiding from the sun, the stares and the killers
The albinism community remains marginalised, vulnerable and exploited, yet little is being done to protect them from human rights abuses.
Hair and beauty courses help refugees and migrants
The Jesuit Refugee Service’s skills programme uplifts refugees, migrants and South African women by teaching them business skills and offering beauty and hairdressing courses.
Cartoon | Loose Cannon
In this week’s cartoon, Minister of Social Development Lindiwe Zulu oversees (and then defends) the police taking a water cannon to a queue of elderly and disabled Sassa grant recipients in Bellville, Cape Town.
From the Archive | ‘No Serenity Here’
Poet Keorapetse Kgositsile casts an unflinching eye on the fallout of imperialism in Africa, refusing to let the struggle die while arbitrary borders break up the continent.
Long Read | Mystery of G4S and its prison stranglehold
The company controversially continues to bag huge contracts despite dramas and scandals in the correctional facilities it runs in South Africa and the United Kingdom.
New Books | The Life and Times of a Black Wobbly
As an organiser and orator for the Industrial Workers of the World – historically, America’s most radically inclusive union – Ben Fletcher was a working-class hero in his time.
Bollywood continues to caricature trans people
The mainstream Hindi cinema industry’s negative representation of trans people further otherises and demonises India’s third gender, which is struggling for acceptance and equal rights.
Cartoon | Cheery Silence
This week’s cartoon celebrates Twitter’s long-overdue muting of the hate-mongering lame duck named Donald Trump.
Photo Essay | Comfort in an old Cape favourite
As 2020 came to an end, residents of the Cape Flats attempted to carve out some fun within the everyday chaos of the pandemic by visiting the Sea Point swimming pool.
The activists who are greening Wesselton
Residents of this township in one of Mpumalanga’s coal-mining districts have been benefitting from grassroots initiatives to turn ugly dumping sites into precious green spaces.