Concerns about possible legal action resulted in the SABC's decision not to air a documentary about President Thabo Mbeki, according to Communications Minister Ivy Matsepe-Casaburri, writes Wendy Jasson da Costa in The Star, as posted on In a written response to questions by DA MP Dene Smuts, the minister denied that the SABC board or any of its members had stopped the "production" of the documentary.

The Cape Town Book Fair (CTBF) opens its doors from June 17-20 for a series of workshops and discussions on topics relevant to writers, publishers and book-related industries. Taking place at the Cape Town International Convention Centre, the event consists of book launches, readings and poetry sessions. Awards up for grabs include the Alan Paton Award for non-fiction, the Sunday Times Fiction Award and the Noma Award. Under the theme "Celebrate Africa" panel debates about the importance of publishing books in indigenous languages, poetry readings and various seminars will take place.

Programme activities include:
- Author discussion panel on "Making Poverty History in South Africa" with Alan Hirsch (Author: "Season of Hope: Economic reform under Mandela and Mbeki"), Sampie Terreblanche (Author: "A history of Inequality in SA") and Adam Habib (Editor: "Voices of Protest: Social Movements in SA").
- "Portraits of African Writers" with George Hallett and Gavin Jantjies. - Zakes Mda, author of the "Whale Caller", talks about life of writing, and his work.
- Poetry reading by Mphutlane wa Bofelo, poet and social activist.
- "Accumulating and disseminating knowledge in African Studies: The case of the Nordic Africa Institute" with Helena Olsson, (Marketing Manager), Birgitte Jansen, (Librarian) and Dr Henning Melber, (Research Director).
- Contemporary Nigerian Literature 20 years after Africa won its first Nobel prize for Literature - discussion between Harry Garuba, Toyin Akinosho and Muktar Bakare.
- Women's voices - Doreen Baingana on women writing in Africa.

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We are seeking a dynamic and committed Advocacy Project Co-ordinator to play a vital and demanding role in co-ordinating all project partners to work together to achieve objectives.

A workshop on the World Social Forum ahead of the Nairobi hosting of the WSF in January 2007 will debate how this annual gathering of progressives best generates collective, global-scale, national and local social change.

The Centre for Public Participation (CPP) would like to invite you to a public dialogue to discuss issues around: Regional Governance and public participation. In the context of South Africa's peer review process in terms of the African Peer Review Mechanism (APRM), and the preparation of the final report due to be presented in July 2006, the public dialogue will attempt to critically discuss the nature of civil society participation in the review process.

CIVICUS is undertaking the CIVICUS Civil Society Index (CSI). The CSI is a an international action-research initiative providing civil society stakeholders with a diagnostic tool for assessing the current state of civil society on a country level and creating a basis for dialogue, joint reflection and action. For the second half of 2006, CIVICUS is offering internship positions to work with the CSI project.

The teacher shortage in SA will reach crisis point by 2008 unless drastic steps are taken to increase the number entering the profession. By 2008, SA will be short of 15,090 educators, according to a study by the Human Sciences Research Council (HSRC). That is with the current learner-to-educator ratios of 40:1 for primary and 35:1 for secondary schools.
Related Link:
* South African Human Rights Commission report on the Right to Basic Education

They have suffered 350 years of shame and degradation, but, at last, the descendants of the first people to meet southern Africa's white settlers may be able to return to the land that was once theirs. Later this month, the South African government is set to announce a multi-billion rand compensation deal and the return of land to the nomadic Khoekhoen, the South African courts have deemed was stolen under racist mineral-rights laws in the 1920s.

Applications are invited from suitably qualified students to study full-time at Rhodes University in 2007.

This study explores the phenomena of education decline and the reasons why educators may be leaving the profession in South Africa. The report integrates the findings of seven reports presented to Education Labour Relations Council (ELRC) concerning education, published as part of the multi-study project focusing on the Factors Determining Educator Supply and Demand in South African Public Schools. The aim of this report is to integrate all these findings and give a more comprehensive picture of the determinants of supply and demand for educators in public schools.

The Pebble Bed Modular Reactor (PBMR) offers an efficient and economical method of providing power to South Africa's coastal towns and cities, Public Enterprises Minister Alec Erwin said. Opening debate on his R683,4-million budget vote in the National Assembly, he noted that global warming had seen nuclear power re-emerge internationally as an attractive alternative form of energy generation.

The Program Officer will be responsible for developing, monitoring and evaluating the Foundation's activities in the field of Sexuality and Reproductive Health (SRH) in Southern Africa (South Africa, Namibia, Mozambique and Zimbabwe) with a particular emphasis on HIV/AIDS as it affects and is addressed by local communities in the region.

APC is seeking a manager for our Strategic Use and Capacity Building Programme (SU&CB) and its projects. The SU&CB manager will have excellent people and project management skills, experience of working in networks, managing relationships and partnerships and a sophisticated understanding of the concept of strategic use of technology as it applies to development and social justice.

The decision of the South African Constitutional Court in "Government of the Republic of South Africa v. Grootboom" is one of the leading examples involving judicial enforcement of socio-economic rights known to comparative constitutional lawyers. At the time of the decision, many praised the court's decision, as pragmatic and a democracy-sensitive approach to the enforcement of socio-economic rights by the judiciary, which provided important evidence of the possibility of judicial enforcement of these rights.

The cabinet has dismissed claims that SA was "sliding towards dictatorship", as it moved to defend President Thabo Mbeki from increasingly strident criticism from his left-wing allies. Last week the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) warned against a "slide towards dictatorship" and the use of "state resources to settle political contradictions".

"The sad reality [is] that those, within the alliance, who purport to have the interests of the working class at heart, while being at the forefront of the 'Zuma for presidency' campaign have been, ironically, absent from militant working class struggles for better living conditions and affordable basic services." writes Percy Ngonyama, a social-movement activist based in Durban in discussing the furore over the succession struggle in South Africa.

"In South Africa the issue of grand corruption under apartheid has been the source of comparatively little public debate," says a new report, 'Apartheid Grand Corruption: Assessing the scale of crimes of profit in South Africa from 1976 to 1994', which attempts to document and describe instances of corruption that took place during apartheid and in particular, during the period 1976–1994. "Since the advent of democratic rule scant attention has been paid to the possibility that leading apartheid-era functionaries (in government and business) may have used the cover of authoritarian rule to illegally acquire vast sums of wealth in defiance even of the legal 'norms' of that time," the report says.

This is South Africa's premier site dedicated to serving Non Profit Organisations in the broadest possible way. If you are in any way connected to/involved in the development sector in South Africa - this site can assist you.

Every week in SA, police target black people whom they perceive to be foreigners for harassment. The practice has become so prevalent that it has become the subject of a number of studies by various human rights bodies.

"The FXI is deeply disturbed about recent reports regarding the SABC's decision not to flight a documentary on Thabo Mbeki scheduled for last week Wednesday. We have also just learnt that another documentary, this time on Irvin Khoza, was altered by removing the most controversial part from the film."