Helen Suzman, the paragon of the ‘liberal tradition’ in South Africa and frequent interlocutor for the rightwing Sunday Telegraph on life after apartheid was interviewed by BBC 4 Radio to mark her 90th birthday, where she explained her motivation for going into politics. As reported by News24.com today: … She remembers that she wanted to [...]
Archive for November, 2007
South African liberal politics
Posted in Helen Suzman, Helen Suzman Foundation, liberals, National Party, photography, politics, South Africa on November 30, 2007 | Leave a Comment »
Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala: ‘The ideal Davos African’
Posted in Ngozi Okonjo Iweala, Nigeria on November 30, 2007 | Leave a Comment »
The Financial Times likes its African ‘leaders’ to be of a certain type. In a profile of former Nigerian finance minister and new World Bank managing director, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, the newspaper’s William Wallis can’t contain himself: Tough, articulate and Harvard educated, but dressed traditionally as a Nigerian, she is the ideal Davos African, in demand [...]
Africans in Space
Posted in magazine, Mogale, Ntone, Obs Festival, Observatory, Obz Festival on November 29, 2007 | 1 Comment »
If you are in Cape Town this weekend, check this out (I’m promoting this since I am a contributing editor for the magazine Chimurenga): Pan African Space Station, the soundsystem of Chimurenga Mag, will set up at Cafe Ganesh during the Obs Festival on Saturday 1 December. DJs Ntone Edjabe and Mogale will be at [...]
A Brother with Perfect Timing
Posted in hip hop, Mr Fat, tagged hip hop, Mr Fat, Music, South Africa on November 28, 2007 | 4 Comments »
When British journalist Patrick Neatee, visiting South Africa, was first introduced to Mr Fat, one half of the nucleus of Brasse vannie Kaap, he was immediately impressed by the larger than life MC: “… I meet … the owner of Ghetto Ruff, a guy called Lance Stehr who’s been in the South African music industry [...]
Baby Factory
Posted in Hollywood, Kristin Chenoweth, Madonna, New York Post, Page Six on November 28, 2007 | 2 Comments »
Spotted in what passes for the New York Post’s Sunday Magazine. You can’t make this stuff up.
Is Jacob Zuma having the last laugh?
Posted in Jacob Zuma, media, politics, post-1994 South Africa, South Africa on November 27, 2007 | 1 Comment »
Is Jacob Zuma guaranteed to be South Africa‘s next President? In an analysis piece today the BBC World Service‘s suggests so. Zuma seems to be made of Teflon as far as ANC branches are concerned. They are the key to election as party president at the ANC National Congress in December. That also means that [...]
New Dennis Brutus
Posted in globalization, IMF, International Monetary Fund, Kenya, Nairobi, Nepad, poem, poetry on November 27, 2007 | Leave a Comment »
The New Monasticsby Dennis Brutus Tall black-shadowed cypresses slender beside arcaded cloisters:thus were monastic enterprises: now with our new doctrinessecular-consumerist we bend with similar devoutness in service to our modern pantheon – Bretton Woods, its cohort deities – World Bank, IMF, WTO – diligently we recite “We have loved, o lord, the beauty of your [...]
Sound / Racionais MCs
Posted in inequality, Music, police, police brutality on November 27, 2007 | Leave a Comment »
Their song ‘Diario de um detento.’ Britian’s BBC4 is featuring a three-part documentary film series on the music and politics of Brazil. Racionais MCs, whose sounds and working class-down image is heavily influenced by West Coast gangsta rap, feature in the third, and final, episode.
Africa on Film
Posted in Mahen Bonetti, New York African Film Festival on November 26, 2007 | 2 Comments »
New York City annually hosts two major film festivals with an overwhelmingly African focus: There is Mahen Bonetti’s New York African Film Festival playing every spring at the Walter Reade Theater at Lincoln Center and Reinaldo Barroso-Spech and Diarah N’Daw-Spech’s New York African Diaspora Film Festival, happening every time this year at multiple venues around [...]
Middle Powers
Posted in IBSA summit, India, Lula, Manmohan Singh, middle powers, South Africa on November 26, 2007 | Leave a Comment »
AfricaFocus Bulletin on the growing alliances between Brazil, India and South Africa. Full details here.