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News & Views by Terry Bell
The invisible Dr Survé
Proof of controversial South African media boss and businessman Dr Iqbal Survé’s widely trumpeted background is hard to find. In particular, there seems to be no available evidence of his major claim to fame: that he was the physician to, and personal friend of, Nelson Mandela.
Posted in: Investigative Journalism
Nothing new in ANC ignoring democratic will
June 25, 2016
There is nothing new about the ANC imposing candidates and leaders against the wishes of the majority of members. A long history of this practice extends into the exile years. But t2here are differences between the past and the eruptions in Tshwane over the past week.
Posted in: Commentary
Nothing new in ANC authoritarianism
June 24, 2016
Around the world, essential public services are under pressure as local, state and national governments seek to cut costs. But such services should surely never be driven by the profit motive? So who is to blame and what should we do?
Posted in: Inside Labour Column
Reasons behind the Canada firefighters’ strike
June 20, 2016
The sole priority for fire fighters and EMS is the preservation and safety of life and property. Profit, with its cost cutting requirements should never come into it. That, in essence, is what the recent Canadian strike was all about.
Posted in: Inside Labour Column
Glimmers of light in the gathering gloom
June 12, 2016
Educate, organise — agitate (for true transformation). South Africa's Bill of Rights provides a banner to rally those who are starting to demand the right to control their own lives.
Posted in: Inside Labour Column
The threat behind Zuma’s ’embarrassment’
May 20, 2016
According to South African President Jacob Zuma, opposition parliamentarians are an embarrassment to him, at home and abroad. “I go around Africa and people ask me very embarrassing questions about this parliament,” he told a national assembly boycotted by almost all the opposition parties following the physical expulsion of Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) members.
Posted in: Reports abroad
The prospects for a ‘confusion of unions’
May 7, 2016
The best way to describe the situation in the South African labour movement at present is that it is in a state of flux: of ongoing change in conditions of instability. As such, an appropriate collective noun may be a confusion of unions; confusion that may, hopefully, be resolved.
Posted in: Inside Labour Column
Zuma, the “teflon president” digs in his heels
May 7, 2016
The political teflon that seemed to enable South Africa’s President Jacob Zuma to slip out of one scandal and crisis after another has been ripped away by the Constitutional Court. But he still sows no signs of budging and even electoral damage may not move him.
Posted in: Reports abroad
Terry Bell Writes 
June 30, 2016
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