21 June 2022 - Yesterday Health Minister Joe Phaahla proposed to the National Coronavirus Command Council (NCCC) that regulations which impose mask-wearing, limit venue capacity and insist on vaccine passes, should be lifted. The NCCC, constituted by the Cabinet, will meet in the next two days to decide the country’s fate.
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21 June 2022 - Yesterday Health Minister Joe Phaahla proposed to the National Coronavirus Command Council (NCCC) that regulations which impose mask-wearing, venue capacity limits, and vaccine passes should be lifted. The NCCC, constituted by the Cabinet, will meet within the next two days to decide the country’s fate.
20 June 2022 - Amid the noise and fury around the theft of President Ramaphosa’s forex, the sacking of the Public Protector and the arrest of the Gupta brothers in Dubai, a little noticed story signified something just as profound, brought to light in a statement by Democratic Alliance MP Leon Schreiber.
17 June 2022 - The Basic Education Law Amendment (BELA) Bill will transfer even more power over education from parents to government, despite the state’s mass education failures, according to submission to Parliament in which the Institute of Race Relations (IRR) warns against “damaging” proposed amendments in the draft law.
17 June 2022 - South Africa needs a more ‘activist’ state, President Ramaphosa told a media briefing last week.
15 June 2022 - President Cyril Ramaphosa’s comments that the state should play a more “activist” role in the economy continues the endless conversation about whether SA needs more or less state intervention to achieve its economic aspirations. This has been “debated” since well before the transition to democracy, and is notable for its fickleness.
13 June 2022 - In a rare face-to-face session with journalists last week, President Cyril Ramaphosa resuscitated the idea of using pension savings to bail out Eskom.
13 June 2022 - The Gautrain Management Agency has announced a proposed new route to extend its rapid rail network. That the Gautrain is a failure is just one reason to oppose it.
12 June 2022 - I immediately thought of fellow columnist Anton Harber and his recent plea for the restoration of news reporting when I read the first rather poor account of SA passport-holders somewhere overseas being made to do a test in Afrikaans before being allowed to travel.
11 June 2022 - The phrase 'curate's egg' can be traced back to an anecdote about a junior cleric – the curate – who found himself in an embarrassing position. An egg which he was eating at breakfast with his bishop turned out to be spoiled. The bishop offered him a new one, but observing propriety, the young man insisted all was in order. It was, he insisted, satisfactory for him.
10 June 2022 - On May 22 Dr Tim De Maayer wrote an open letter in Daily Maverick about the horrific and heartbreaking way in which the public health system had disintegrated, specifically referring to the Rahima Moosa Mother and Child Hospital.
10 June 2022 - The Institute of Race Relations (IRR) has offered to help labour minister Thulas Nxesi analyse the policies at the root of South Africa’s unemployment crisis, and recommend pro-jobs alternatives that offer a real chance of saving South Africa’s jobless youth from poverty and hopelessness.