Opinion and Analysis

FIFA, Qatar and the ugly game

The terrible tragedy of the earthquake in Nepal has been swept off the front pages and news leads by the bribery scandal and arrests at FIFA. But they should be linked because it is the blood and suffering of many Nepalese workers that is a major cause of soccer now being seen as the ugly game.

Terry Bell

Opinion | 8 June 2015

Has the president used the defence force legally?

To deploy the army is an exceptional measure. It implies that the police force is unable to control a situation that threatens a country’s security and well-being.

Lara Wallis

Analysis | 4 June 2015

Urgent need to decriminalise sex work

If sex work was accepted as legitimate and legalised, much of the violence and abuse that sex workers face would be eliminated.

Savannah Russo. Photographs by Eric Miller.

Opinion | 2 June 2015

Women and addiction: a much neglected problem

Mother’s Day has come and gone with the usual emphasis on happy mothers, loving families and children bringing breakfast in bed to their moms. For many this picture is a good reflection of what happens at home. But for some mothers this picture is far from accurate.

Adrienne Dodds

Opinion | 1 June 2015

An old lesson to which all should pay heed

“No man is an island entire of itself. Every man is a piece of the continent.” So wrote the English poet, John Donne although, for continent he meant planet. Today, this is something that can be applied equally to a village, town, country or continent. Just as it can be to a trade union, business or employer organisation.

Terry Bell

Opinion | 1 June 2015

City spends hundreds of millions of rand on informal settlement sanitation: a response to the SJC

The latest in a string of articles by the Social Justice Coalition (SJC), disseminating inaccurate and misleading information, further warps the facts and the realities within which the City of Cape Town must operate. But then, the SJC never let the facts get in the way of the pretty graphics that they have begun to share widely with such gusto.

Ernest Sonnenberg

Opinion | 29 May 2015

City chooses not to invest in informal settlements

The City of Cape Town says infrastructure for water and sanitation cannot be installed in 82% of informal settlements because the land is not suitable. Yet the City’s own data tells a different story, writes Dustin Kramer.

Dustin Kramer

Opinion | 28 May 2015

Progress in public sector wage negotiations, but key issues remain unresolved

My column last week, comparing the pay and conditions of nurses and teachers to those of cabinet ministers, seems to have touched a raw nerve. And mainly among both national and local government employees that I failed to mention.

Terry Bell

Opinion | 25 May 2015

Why mining communities will take government to court

Mining companies and the government are ignoring the interests of the communities that should be benefiting from mining, writes the author. Now civil society organisations intend to take legal action.

Christopher Rutledge

Opinion | 21 May 2015