Innholdsfortegnelse for 2021-09-12 i Sunday Independent

The rise of online misinformation fighters in SA Wesley Diphoko wesley@fastcompany.co.za When social media and some online tools were introduced to society, they were hailed as tools that would connect people, enable freedom of speech and facilitate better access to information. Although some good things are achieved through online tools, we are also witnessing the spread of misinformation. Many will remember Bell Pottinger and how it used social media to spread misinformation. Currently, we are witnessing the spread of misinformation around vaccines. We are also likely to see more misinformation as South Africa enters the election season. These factors have given rise to online misinformation fighters. Earlier this month, Phumzile van Damme, a former member of Parliament and member of the DA, together with other organisations, kick-started a…

An Expert Opinion on Why Businesses Fail – Part One Ben Bierman FIVE OUT OF seven South African businesses fail within the first year. In fact, South Africa is one of the most challenging environments in which to start a business. The average age of South African entrepreneurs is 45, which is conventionally the age at which people have an established family life with children or other significant personal relationships. However, maintaining these relationships while driving a business forward in uncertain times can be a major challenge. At Business Partners Limited, our data on why businesses fail shows that there is a direct correlation between the deterioration of personal relationships such as divorce, and the failure of businesses. In other words, developing a good attitude towards nurturing a healthy family…

It was quite tragic and sad that even elderly women – the pillars of our black society – found themselves having to go out and loot for essentials, including medicines. This was the stark truth during the recent riots and destruction that took place in July, mainly in Gauteng and KwaZulu Natal. Traditionally and culturally, our mothers are the ones who bring sanity, discipline and hope in many of our female-headed households, where there is a dire shortage of fathers or male leadership in black communities. Throughout the ages, elderly women have been cherished and respected for their tenacity, wisdom and leadership skills, both within the family and the community whenever the menfolk were either in apartheid jails or working to eke out a living. Examples of such women are…

Robin Adams robin.adams@inl.co.za THE SUPPLY of medical oxygen and oxygen-related equipment has become a lucrative business and a profitable side-hustle for some paramedics. Medical oxygen has become a precious commodity during the Covid-19 pandemic and a boon for smaller businesses that have identified a niche market to supply oxygen for people who are recovering at home. In Cape Town, where the numbers are still high, the demand for oxygen has increased recently and the spokesperson for Afrox, the country’s largest supplier of medical grade oxygen, Nolundi Rawana, confirmed the company had increased supplies to Western Cape hospitals in the last two weeks in response to the number of hospital admissions. “It is equivalent to the number of people being hospitalised.” Nimrod Visagie, owner of Executive Safety Services in…

From Page 1 Mzoxolo Magidiwana, who is the spokesperson for the Marikana survivors, also deposed an affidavit to the court demanding that Judge Lamont recuse himself because he “will not reasonably be able to bring an impartial mind to bear in adjudicating the exception application”. Speaking to The Sunday Independent yesterday, Magidiwana said they believe that Judge Lamont was carefully selected to preside over this case in order to save his company’s interests. “As a shareholder, Sibanye Stillwater is his company and we are suing it for over a billion rands and he is chosen to protect his company interests and not serving the interest of justice. It is a shame that we have to go to court to force a judge to recuse himself instead of him, as…

Don Makatile don.makatile@inl.co.za That the camera never lies is perhaps best captured in the works of a Soweto maverick who has photographed anyone and everything newsworthy. Veteran photojournalist Jacob Mawela speaks with the same passion about pictures as a poet dedicated to prose and love. A Bohemian of some sort and a nonconformist free thinker, Mawela once described his art as a lifestyle, not a job. He is also scholarly and a raconteur. Now working freelance, the Pimville, Soweto, lensman will host a solo photographic exhibition at the City of Ekurhuleni’s Benoni Museum, from Heritage Day, September 24, running until early next year. Thereafter, it will move on to the City of Johannesburg’s Workers Museum for a March 27, 2022, opening, and then on to the City of Tshwane’s…

‘Apartheid lives on despite the appearance of change’ Lekgantshi Console Tleane One of the central arguments that philosophy scholar Professor Mogobe Ramose often makes is that the 1994 political settlement did not lead to state succession. Instead, what we experienced was government succession, meaning that the architecture and operations of the apartheid state were left intact. Consequently, the post-1994 government has been engaged in reforms, trying to alter the legacy of apartheid, instead of radically changing the state of affairs. While writing on a different subject, which was the failure of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission to expose and deal with the full extent of the apartheid government’s murderous reign, Terry Bell and Dumisa Ntsebeza wondered in their book, Unfinished Business: South Africa, Apartheid and Truth (2003), how…

This year marks the 44th anniversary of the brutal murder of Steve Biko in police custody. Heroes like Looksmart Ngudle, Peter Nchabeleng, Neil Agget, Mapetla Mohapi, Ahmed Timol, Sipho Mutsi, Stanza Bopape and Alpheus Bodibe and many other gallant compatriots also died at the hands of the notorious apartheid security forces. They did not die in vain, and their memories will be cherished for many generations. Steve Biko was 3 months from his 31st birthday when he died when he died, and he had lived in obscurity, silenced from public utterance by banning orders and restricted to a remote area. He was forbidden to make speeches, forbidden to speak with more than one person at a time, forbidden to be quoted, forbidden to participate in political activities. His death convulsed…

The imposition of a deadly airborne pandemic has demonstrated its capacity for the total disruption of all normal human interactions. Staying at home and away from others if you’re ill raises few concerns when somewhat randomly distributed throughout society. But it becomes a matter of serious public concern when everyone must isolate or behave cautiously together. Everything then stops. The problem is, despite the pandemic, many normal societal functions must continue regardless. Economic activity is not a question of profit over risk. It puts food on the table, keeps services functioning, pays for the government, educates children and adults and maintains social stability. These are not nice-to-haves. The only option any reasonable government has in the face of Covid-19 is to prevent and treat with as little damage as possible…

Chad Williams chad.williams@africannewsagency.com Mark Mwongela is the brains behind the Kenyan fintech company that is making waves in East Africa. Mwongela co-founded the payment gateway service Pesapal in 2009. He has been serving as its chief operating officer since 2018. Through his leadership, the company has grown to a 190-member team. Before becoming the chief operating officer, Mwongela served as Pesapal technical director, overseeing the firm’s product development efforts, and before that, he was the managing director of Variant Technology Management Consultancy, according to African Tech Round-up. He holds a Bachelor’s degree in computer science from the Jomo Kenyatta University of Science and Technology in Nairobi. He has also recently completed his MBA at Strathmore University in Nairobi. Mwongela co-founded Pesapal, which is a payment system that allows customers to…

Former Mozambique finance minister Manuel Chang remains detained in South Africa since December 2018, and is awaiting extradition to either the US or Mozambique. As finance minister under then president Armando Guebuza, it was Chang’s task to find the money for an ambitious maritime security programme and other armament requirements proposed by UAE company Privinvest. In a country that does not have the skills levels to manufacture wheel barrows, complex integrated weapons and electronic surveillance systems were supposed to support ultra-fast naval strike craft for a budget exceeding E2 billion (about R33.5bn). Chang engineered the Mozambique Hidden Debts. Two billion euro sovereign loans were not submitted to Parliament and were paid out to private banking accounts, outside the of the Mozambique National Bank’s accounting channels. In May last year, the…

Wesley Diphoko wesley.diphoko@inl.co.za The University of Johannesburg under the leadership of Professor Tshilidzi Marwala is forging ahead with its efforts to bring the 4th Industrial Revolution to South Africa. This time around it has purchased a robot dog for more than R 1 million, although this is not confirmed by the university. According to the manufacturer's website, Boston Dynamics sells the dogs for $74,500. The university is planning to use the dog for navigation, research and inspection. During a press briefing about the robot dog the university indicated that it may lease the dog at a fee to industries, such as mining where it may be useful. The dog has been used in some parts of the world for various use cases. Over the last year, the robot…

Dineo Faku dineo.faku@inl.co.za THE Department of Fisheries Forestry and Environmental (DFFE) has raised hope for investor confidence after releasing the timelines for the allocation of fishing rights after a year-long delay. The DFFE finally announced timelines for the Fishing Rights Allocation Process (Frap) last week indicating it was in a position to allocate fishing rights and meet the set deadline of the end of December, with appeals to be finalised in early 2022. Government delayed the renewal of new commercial rights which were set to expire in December last year amid concerns that fishing communities were excluded in previous allocations. The timelines will see the gazetting of final policies and the opening of the application process next month. The department said it remained…

Pathologists have a saying: “The dead teach the living.” Pity these professionals are never accorded a role in the body politic that extends way beyond their forensic expertise. It was forensic pathology that revealed the manner of Stephen Bantu Biko’s death, 44 years today, was no accident but a callous murder. Whichever way one chooses to look at his biography, Biko’s life and death remain an enduring piquant lesson for us, the mortals that have so far survived him. Naked and shackled to the back of a police bakkie that transported him to his death in Pretoria on this day from a brain hemorrhage, Biko was unwavering, telling his jailers: “I’m going to be me as I am, and you can beat me or jail me or even kill me,…

Mzilikazi Wa Afrika mzeetheicon@gmail.com THE National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) is working on a fresh bid to have former president Jacob Zuma arrested again for walking out of the Commission of Inquiry into Allegations of State Capture without the permission of its chairperson, Deputy Chief Justice Raymond Zondo. Zuma walked out of the Zondo commission in November last year. The Sunday Independent can today exclusively reveal that the investigative officer in the case has been tasked “to obtain a warning statement from the suspect as he is no longer in the custody of the Department of Correctional Services”. An internal NPA document, seen by The Sunday Independent, also reveals that the investigative officer is currently on leave but “once he resumes his duties, he will make alternative arrangements” to obtain…

From P1 gen tanks which he rents to Covid-19 patients in his area for between R350 and R1 000. Clients have used the tanks until they run out. “It is a lucrative business, but it is also up and down.” Michaels gets his oxygen supply from vendor Brian Fortune who supplies a private ambulance service. “I get my stock from Air Liquide and I also have two agents working for me.” Oxygen concentrators are also in high demand. A concentrator is a device which plugs into a wall socket. It extracts nitrogen from a room and gives a purer concentration of oxygen. Entry-level concentrators come with a R6 000 price tag. Some go for as much as R25 000. Paramedic Nolan Balie rents out oxygen concentrators for R650 a week.…

Don Makatile don.makatile@inl.co.za If we all deal with grief differently, it cannot be fair that other people handle adversity so admirably, and to good effect. Maite Makgatho lost her son in 2014 and started hitting the gym just to cope with her devastating loss. In no time she was a gym bunny with little else to do to occupy her time. Today she’s an Instagram sensation with hordes of followers drooling at her physique which, as the cliché goes, is a body to die for! She posts videos of herself going through her paces and her account, Maite Makgatho Fitness draws even the conservative types to steal a glance. The Polokwane-born lass says she’s an entrepreneur, a personal trainer, sports nutritionist, sports psychologist, social media manager, pageant director – all…

Russian president Vladimir Putin hit the nail on the head when he remarked during this week’s 13th BRICS Summit 2021that the West, led by the US, created and left a mess in Afghanistan and fled like the house was on fire. Now, in the aftermath of their spectacular withdrawal from a country under their invasion for the past 20 years at a cost of $3.7 trillion (more than R50 trillion), messy remnants of their invasion are now a matter for the entire international community to deal with, complained President Putin. He was spot-on. I’ve previously argued that America’s cantankerous foreign policy that is premised on undermining anyone with a dissenting view is a recipe for global disorder. In the milieu, the US together with Nato and the EU flagrantly undermines…

WITH a long-running Islamist insurgency and elections delayed for months, Somalia is no stranger to instability, but the country faces the risk of renewed violence because of an increasingly bitter stand-off between its president and prime minister. Here is a look at why relations between Prime Minister Mohamed Hussein Roble and President Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed deteriorated so quickly and what lies ahead for the volatile Horn of Africa nation. Was their relationship always difficult? Not quite. A Swedish-trained civil engineer, Roble was plucked out of political obscurity by the president, fondly known as Farmajo, who appointed him premier last September. The technocrat generally took a back seat to the politically savvy Farmajo, who worked in the Foreign Ministry and served as premier himself before becoming president. After the head of…

A multimillion-dollar centre for genomic surveillance that is expected to be launched in South Africa, would help scale up sequencing and bioinformatics on the continent for Covid-19. The World Health Organization (WHO) said Africa was lagging behind the rest of the world when it came to sequencing, accounting for only 1% of over 3 million Covid-19 sequences conducted world-wide. This was as the pandemic’s third wave in Africa had taken a downward slide with a 23% decrease in new cases last week.…

ASHFAK MOHAMED THE Bulls are the kings of South African rugby once again! The only way the Sharks would have had a chance of causing an upset was to stop the juggernaut Bulls pack, and it was not to be for the Durbanites as they were bashed into submission in a 44-10 Currie Cup final defeat at Loftus Versfeld last night. Jake White’s team became the very first side to clinch the title twice in the same year, following their triumph in the 2020 edition last January, to record the 25th Currie Cup success for the Bulls. The last time a team won it back-to-back in outright fashion was in 2004, when the Bulls pulled off three in a row from 2002 to 2004. The Free State Cheetahs nearly emulated…

Clinton Moodley Working from home has afforded people the opportunity to work in some beautiful destinations. Sue Garrett, the general manager of supply, pricing and marketing at the Flight Centre Travel Group, said that South Africans have plenty of travel options if they are seeking long-stay visas. “Various countries have picked up on the digital nomadism trend and are striving to capitalise on it, introducing special long-stay visas aimed specifically at this market. “The even better news is that South Africans have not been excluded from applying for such visas, as long as they satisfy the basic criteria and Covid-19 requirements,” she said. Be mindful of the travel restrictions at these destinations and consult with a travel agent for more clarity. Here are some options: Dubai South Africans can get…

Mayhem in July a threat to South Africa’s democracy Pali Lehohla AFTER almost a decade of sterling work on poverty and human development and Summer School programmes, the Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative (Ophi) has raised the bar by introducing Executive Education Ophi ExEd for Multidimensional Poverty Indicators as a potent development planning tool. Ophi tools have been deployed successfully in Latin America and Asia. They have translated into action what Amartya Sen said: “Human lives are battered and diminished in all kinds of different ways, and the first task … is to acknowledge that deprivations of very different kinds have to be accommodated within a general overarching framework”. Last month the maiden programme of ExEd was launched and senior officials from the public and NGO sector were treated…

| Morgan Phaahla Ekhurhuleni The DA appears opposed to equal participation in a multiparty democracy What the coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic has laid bare in society are the hallmarks of white privilege, which make beneficiaries to be harbingers of colonial imposition. Hence, knowledge monopoly tendencies within the DA enable some to dictate speculative opinions fraught with deceit of human wisdom. Of note is a ruse on the credibility of the Electoral Commission of South Africa (IEC). Whatever its merits or faults, the IEC pulled out all the stops to deliver free and fair by-elections across the country in a harsh environment of unfamiliar contexts. The success of the elections can be attributed to the agility of the IEC to serve the nation with distinction. It’s against this backdrop that…

MANYANE MANYANE manyane.manyane@inl.co.za Action SA and the IFP are concerned that the decision of the Electoral Commission of South Africa (IEC) to reopen candidates registration, which notably benefits the ANC, will discredit the electoral system and probably undermine the credibility of the upcoming local government elections. The two parties expressed a view that the decision also compromises the integrity of the IEC. On Monday, the IEC announced that voter and candidate registration would be reopened after the Constitutional Court dismissed its application to postpone the local government elections to next year. The decision would allow the ANC to complete and register the outstanding candidates in 93 municipalities across the country after the party failed to file registration on time, citing IT glitches in the commission’s system. Last month, the ANC…

Lesego Makgatho lesego.makgatho@inl.co.za The Special Investigating Unit (SIU) and the National Health Laboratory Services (NHLS) were this week granted an order by the Special Tribunal to freeze luxury properties and a trust account to the value of R42 million that belong to entities linked to controversial businessman Hamilton Ndlovu. The SIU is investigating corruption allegations that involve eight companies linked to Ndlovu. In 2020, the eight companies owned by Ndlovu and his associates received personal protective equipment (PPE) contracts worth a total of R172m from the NHLS. The SIU was in terms of Proclamation R.23 of 2020, directed by President Cyril Ramaphosa to investigate allegations of corruption, malpractice, maladministration and irregularities in the procurement of goods and services during the Covid-19 state of disaster. “On 31 August 2021, the SIU…

The decision by the parole board to release former president Jacob Zuma from jail on medical grounds has been met with different reactions across the spectrum. There are those who interpret this development from a political point of view. Then there are some who interpret this decision from a compassionate point of view and fully embrace it. Those who are in the legal fraternity interpret the decision from a legal pers- pective. Zuma’s political adversaries interpret this decision with disdain. Before we get carried away by this decision, it is important to interpret this development in a dispassionate and objective manner. First, medical parole is not a new policy decision that has been made particularly for Zuma. Conversely, it has been part of legal procedures for some time. Second,…

THE global commitment to reach the Sustainable Development Goals by 2030 include providing high- quality promotive, preventive, curative, rehabilitative and palliative health services to all communities. However, a recent joint global report by the World Health Organization (WHO), the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, and the World Bank Group, found that quality of care, particularly in low- and middle-income countries, is suboptimal and that, in several African countries, accurate diagnoses are made in some cases, as little as a third of the time, and clinical guidelines for common conditions are adhered to less than 45% of the time. With an average of just one doctor to every 10 000 people in Africa, the lack of human resources contributes significantly to the challenges in delivering quality care to patients.…

Shannon Ebrahim shannon.ebrahim@inl.co.za THE first expansion of the BRICS bank to now include the UAE, Bangladesh and Uruguay sets the bank on a growth trajectory that will give the developing world more choices in terms of financing. The New Development Bank (NDB) was always intended to offer an alternative to the Western-led development banks, specifically the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF). The objective was to mobilise resources for infrastructure and sustainable development projects for emerging economies and developing countries. The NDB’s strategy is to be positioned as the premier development institution for emerging economies. For decades, developing countries were becoming increasingly frustrated with the conditionalities imposed on them by the Western international financial institutions, which were viewed as dictating access to development aid, monitoring the world’s economies,…

MIKE GREENAWAY THE Springboks have a golden chance to turn around their fortunes in Australia when they play the Wallabies in a Rugby Championship match today on Queensland’s Gold Coast at noon . The Boks have been in Australia for almost three weeks now preparing for the match – they had to get there early because of Covid isolation protocols – and that means jet lag and acclimatisation have long been a thing of the past, as are injuries and niggles picked up in the two matches played against Argentina. And the Boks have had plenty of time to ponder their poor record on Aussie soil — they have won there just won five times since readmission in 1992, and they last won there eight years ago. Since Rassie Erasmus…

Clinton Moodley clinton.moodley@inl.co.za ON SEPTEMBER 11, 2001, al-Qaeda hijacked four planes and crashed into the World Trade Center towers, the Pentagon and a field in Pennsylvania in the US. As many as 3 000 people died and thousands more were injured. Dubbed among the “most lethal terrorist attacks in history”, 9/11 changed the travel landscape forever, and for some, not in a good way. Sean O’Keefe, a professor at Syracuse University, told CNN that the incident “flipped the switch right away from almost non-existent security to unbelievable, in-your-face, all the time (security)”. Fears of similar attacks prompted then US president George W Bush to sign the Aviation and Transportation Security Act in November 2001, which introduced the Transportation Security Administration. The seamless boarding procedures coupled with the allure of air…