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Sandile Memela on black matric failure

Everyone has been commenting the South African matric results lately, including the fact that whites outscore blacks in marks and distinctions.

One black columnist doing some soul-searching is The Sowetan’s Sandile Memela. He writes:

"A few days ago I had a conversation with my niece Nomfundo about matric results.

She is a second-year science student at Wits University. She obtained one distinction at a private school in matric.

Nomfundo does not believe that whites have greater intelligence than blacks.

“It is not that whites are smarter. The fact of the matter is that black students are just lazy...

Jacob Zuma's speech in Zimbabwe

President Jacob Zuma has expressed his solidarity with the government of Zimbabwe on a state visit to that country. Here is his complete speech, as issued by the South African presidency:
27 August 2009

Your Excellency President Robert Mugabe and Mrs Grace Mugabe,
Your Excellency, Vice-President Mujuru,
Honourable Prime Minister; Morgan Tsvangirai
Hon Deputy Prime Ministers
Honourable Ministers;
Members of the Diplomatic Corps;
Distinguished guests;

I would like to thank you, Your Excellency, for your kind words
of welcome.
We further wish to extend our words of gratitude for the warm
and comradely hospit...

The authentic Ass-troturfers

It was wicked when assorted neoconservative organs and tools presented anti-war activists such as Cindy Sheehan as something other than what they were. And it is still execrable now that the left-liberal news filters are tarring anti-Obamacare town hall protesters as something other than what they are.

Sheehan's cause was just. She spoke stirringly against Bush's crimes in Iraq. Yet again and again she was dismissed by the neoconservatives as a George-Soros sponsored stooge (the details of that particular conspiracy evade me).

The outcry against state takeover of medicine is in the best of tradi...

Zimdollar 'dead', but still used for bus fare

A woman pays her bus fare with 3 trillion in old Zimbabwe dollars - the equivalent of 50 U.S. cents. The collector accepts the brick of neatly folded bundles of a trillion each without bothering to count the notes.

"No one seems to worry, and it works," said the woman, Lucy Denya, a Harare secretary who says she's seen police officers using old notes to board buses.

The Zimbabwe dollar is officially dead. It was killed off in hopes of curbing record world inflation of billions of percentage points, and Zimbabwe has replaced it with the U.S. dollar and the South African rand.

Yet the role of the o...

Destroying health care for the few uninsured

If the U.S. weren't already insolvent, I'd say that Obama was bankrupting the country, and sending the health care we have to hell in a handcart, for the ostensible benefit of less than 10 percent of the population. But the U.S. is already in the red, courtesy of the current president and his predecessor.

According to the Census Bureau report, "Income, Poverty, and Health Insurance Coverage in the United States: 2007? (p. 20), in 2007, the number of children under 18 years old without health insurance was 8.1 million. Uninsured, non-Hispanic Whites stood at 20.5 million. At 7.4 million, the num...

PTA Judge Criticises Public Protector

The Public Protector is obliged to probe claims that PetroSA siphoned State money to the ANC via a private company, the High Court in Pretoria has rul...

Jewish Group Firm On Inviting War Crime Accused

The South African Jewish Group Limmud is standing firm on its invite to war crimes accused David Benjamin, in the face of calls to cancel the visit.

"W...

Anglo American's Profits Plummet

Mining giant Anglo American reported plummeting profits as it released its results for the first half of the year on Friday.

The group -- which rejecte...

Two Men Arrested After Slitting Woman's Throat

Two men will appear in court on Friday for allegedly slitting the throat of occupational therapist, Miranda O'Dell, 48, during an attempted house robb...

New Head For Oprah Academy

The Academy for the Oprah Winfrey Leadership Academy for Girls had appointed Anne van Zyl as its new head.

The school's board of directors said on Thur...

Tshwaing Minicipality Uses Pool Chlorine For Water Purification

AfriForum has given the Municipality of Tshwaing to closing time today to give an undertaking that swimming pool chlorine will no longer be used in th...

Limpopo Cop Held For Stealing Cattle

A police sergeant was arrested on Thursday in connection with stock theft, Limpopo police said.

The policeman was allegedly a part of a syndicate steal...

ANCYL Investment Arm Flouting Companies Act

A probe has found a litany of shortcomings in the management of the ANC Youth League's investment arm, Lembede Investment Holdings.

"The company does n...

12 Joburg Clinics Closed During Municipal Strike

Twelve primary health care clinics were closed in Johannesburg on Thursday due to intimidation of staff by striking municipal workers, the municipalit...

Zuma, Guardian Settle Libel Case

President Jacob Zuma on Thursday welcomed the settlement in the United Kingdom High Court of Justice Queen's bench division, between himself and the G...

Obama and the Afro-professor

When I read the first Associated Press report on the arrest of Louis Henry Gates Jr., it was obvious to me that that particular storm in a teacup woul...

Robber Accidentally Shot In Mamelodi

An armed intruder who confronted a Mamelodi East man inside his home was accidentally shot by his own gun, Johannesburg police said on Saturday.

Captai...

Strike Season Hits SA

No trains and buses, minimal municipal services and understaffed pharmacies.

This is what South Africans face next week, if strike threats by no fewer ...