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?
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"The better the ANC does in this election, the worse its future," argues Jonny Steinberg in this comprehensive discussion on South African politics that was hosted by the Frontline Club in London last night. Panelists, all South Africans living abroad, weighed in on the forthcoming elections with views on the range of political parties.
While nobody is expecting the ANC to relinquish its position as ruling party in the forthcoming election, panelists all agreed that this...
In Venezuela, opposition party supporters are on the streets calling for President Nicolas Maduro’s resignation. Protestors are largely students from the middle and upper middle class segments of the populations that attend elite universities. There are actually many thousands of students in the Bolivarian University and other universities that haven't participated.
Venezuelan expert, Gregory Wilpert, argues that the opposition’s frustration has been boiling under the surface...
Ukraine is in a state of crisis two days after the country’s democratically elected president was ousted following months of street protests that left at least 82 people dead. On Saturday, Ukraine’s Parliament voted to remove President Viktor Yanukovych, a move Yanukovych described as a coup. Ukraine’s new leaders also announced the ousted president was wanted for mass murder of peaceful protesters. Russia condemned the move to oust Yanukovych and recalled its ambassador...
Talking about the nationalisation debate in relation to the mining industry in South Africa, black economic empowerment (BEE) expert Duma Gqubule explains that the value of untapped mineral resources in South Africa’s is US$4.7 trillion. Put differently, the value of these mineral resources is worth one million Rand per South African citizen. Gqubule argues that the mistake our country made in relation to BEE was to set a target of 25% for black people. By definition, a black...
According to David Puttnam, "Those in the media set the tone and the context for much of our democratic discourse. Democracy, in order to work, requires that reasonable men and women take the time to understand and debate difficult, sometimes complex issues and they do so in an atmosphere which strives for the type of understanding that leads to, if not agreement, than at least a productive and workable compromise. Politics is about choices and within those choices politics is about...
According to a new article co-written by Glenn Greenwald published this morning by The Intercept, Britain’s top spy agency, the Government Communications Headquarters, or GCHQ, secretly monitored visitors to a WikiLeaks site by collecting their IP addresses in real time as well as the search terms used to reach the site. One document from 2010 shows that the National Security Agency added WikiLeaks publisher Julian Assange to a, quote, "manhunting" target list, together with...
