Human Rights
Leaked email: companies intended to campaign against government policy
A leaked email shows that a plan for a campaign to scuttle the South African government's draft intellectual property policy was about to proceed, despite a denial by the pharmaceutical industry that it had approved the campaign.
GroundUp Staff
News | 21 January 2014
Sick mine workers neglected - time to compensate them
Far from the bustling streets of downtown Johannesburg, much of it built by the bounty of South Africa’s gold mines, thousands of former mineworkers suffer from painful diseases contracted on the job. These men labour to breathe, their lungs degraded by the occupational diseases of silicosis and tuberculosis.
Ryan Boyko, Seyward Darby, and Rose Goldberg
News | 20 January 2014
Mshengu toilets down again
Mshengu’s blue chemical toilets have once again toppled over in Khayelitsha’s BM Section causing residents to defecate in the bushes.
Mary-Anne Gontsana
News | 15 January 2014
Gay-rights activist’s trial nears final stages
On 20 February 2014, a preliminary ruling will be made in the case of The People v Kasonkomona in the Lusaka Magistrates Court. The ruling will determine if Paul Kasonkomona needs to defend himself against the state’s case or if the case should be dismissed and Kasonkomona acquitted.
Jonathan Dockney
News | 15 January 2014
Phillipi settlement battle highlights housing problems
On 7 and 8 January, the City of Cape Town’s Anti-Land Invasion Unit demolished more than 40 homes at the Marikana settlement in Philippi East. There has been ongoing conflict between the City and the residents who have settled on this plot of privately owned land just off Symphony Way.
Sibusiso Tshabalala
Feature | 15 January 2014
Court orders access to Stellenbosch’s deadly initiation school
Seven boys were admitted to Stellenbosch Hospital on the evenings of 25 and 26 November. Two were dead on arrival. One had sjambok marks on his body. They were about 20 years old. They were the victims of an initiation school.
Jonathan Dockney
News | 9 January 2014
Rent a crowd protest - an attack on media freedom
Cape Times editor Alide Dasnois was fired by Iqbal Surve, executive chairperson of the Sekunjalo Consortium, the day after Mandela’s death.
Shireen Mukadam
Opinion | 18 December 2013
Cape Times demo: plot thickens
It now appears that it was the fairly recently ordained pastor and political changeling, Wesley Douglas, who was one of the organisers of the group that gatecrashed a Right to Know (R2K) protest in Cape Town yesterday.
Terry Bell
News | 18 December 2013
Goons attempt to disrupt protest for press freedom
The saga of the Cape Times and South Africa’s Independent Newspapers (INL) group plumbed new depths of farce this afternoon (December 17) when a rent-a-crowd arrived in the city to support the putative new owner, Iqbal Survé.
Terry Bell
News | 17 December 2013