29 January 2021 - I was startled to discover that we are now entering the 14th year of load shedding. You may remember the chaos that erupted in late 2007 when South Africans faced rolling blackouts for the first time: robots stopped working, the streetlights went out, and peak-hour traffic became a nightmare at night-time.
Media
Every week we reach hundreds of thousands of people through placing arguments in the media in support of the principles we stand for. No other advocacy group in the country does as much as we do to promote support for policies that defend your right, and that of your community, to make decisions about your own life free from counter-productive government interference.
29 January 2021 - Prof Elmien Du Plessis’ argument (8 January 2021) that the Expropriation Bill sets out a system which will serve both the state and private property owners and provide ‘clarity’ is unconvincing.
29 January 2021 - South Africa’s continued insistence on implementing race-based policies, which have been shown to fail ordinary people, will help ensure that the country will not emerge from its economic crisis.
IRR to Cele: Empower communities and responsible citizens, make government work for the people to win fight against crime
29 January 2021 - It was reported this week that residents of rural villages in the Peddie district of the Eastern Cape took matters into their own hands after finally being pushed beyond the limits of patience by the lacklustre attitude and incompetence of the South African Police Service (SAPS). They stormed the remote Tyefu police station and locked six officers inside. Four suspects latterly appeared in court, the case being postponed to 18 February.
28 January 2021 - South Africa’s economy has not fared well over the past decade. Between years of indifferent, declining growth, stubbornly persistent unemployment and a steadily worsening fiscal position, and the sudden, knockout blow delivered by the pandemic and the lockdown meant to contain it, the country and its people have seen the varying manifestations of an economic crisis.
Challenge to Eskom’s monopoly shows how South Africans can take control to fix government’s failures – IRR
28 January 2021 - The recently stated intention of Stellenbosch Municipality to become South Africa’s first municipality to “not experience load-shedding” is a step in the right direction and shows how practical policies, such as the IRR’s Eskom Recovery Plan, can empower South Africans to save our country from the ANC’s failures.
28 January 2021 - ‘We do not have the money, that’s the simple truth that has to be put out there, we are constrained from a financing point of view.’ So said President Ramaphosa in a recent interview with eNCA, answering questions about relief to firms in distress as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic and the lockdown response to it. It was hardly a revelation, coming on top of the nightmare that was 2020, yet for the president to utter these words has a particular symbolism.
27 January 2021 - While the Democratic Alliance (DA) in the Western Cape has chosen to deal with the COVID-19 pandemic head-on, and to secure its own supply of Covid-19 vaccines, the African National Congress (ANC) is once again clinging to outdated thinking.
IRR to President Ramaphosa: The blame game on Covid-19 vaccines will not work – you failed South Africa
27 January 2021 - Yesterday President Ramaphosa delivered a “special address” to the World Economic Forum (WEF) at its digital Davos summit in which he tried to blame others for the catastrophic failures of his own government with regards to Covid-19 vaccines. The acquisition and roll-out of Covid-19 vaccines in South Africa has been a disaster because of the SACP-ANC government’s obsession with state control and its hostility to free enterprise and business.
27 January 2021 - South Africans must conclude from President Ramaphosa’s remarks this week on BEE that the African National Congress (ANC) government has learnt nothing from the catastrophic failure of race-based empowerment policy, while ignoring better alternatives.
26 January 2021 - Your editorial raised pertinent questions about the government’s misdirected decision to underwrite a foundering airline when billions are needed for vaccines (“Will vaccines funding be any different given our leaders’ atrocious budget choices?” January 22).
26 January 2021 - When South Africans finally get access to a vaccine (who knows when), you have a right to refuse it. But that doesn’t mean refusing is either clever or morally justifiable.