The government's legal advisers have suggested that the investigation into the country's controversial multi-billion rand arms deal be reopened, the SABC reported on Tuesday night.

A child rights culture and programme should reflect the administrative implications of the Constitution, notably Section 28 (2) which states that: “A child's best interests are of paramount importance in every matter concerning the child." The imperative is that the state has to “get behind” parents and communities in whatever way enhances the child and ensures its overall development. The state is on shaky constitutional and developmental grounds with regard to both children and poverty. The opportunity exists to back parents and adults, acting in community, as good parents and as local investors and economic agents.

Is South Africa’s post-apartheid commitment to gender rights incompatible with the recognition given to unelected hereditary authorities? Who makes decisions about land allocation and use in the overcrowded former ‘bantustans’ (ex-homelands)? What is the impact on female-headed households? Can the aborted move towards gender equity and land reform be put back on track? A paper ‘Gender, traditional authority and the politics of rural reform in South Africa’ by the Universities of Monash and Nottingham Trent shows the ways in which constitutional contradictions block progress on land reform in the black homelands where three-quarters of South Africa’s poor households are found.

The government has rejected the Mail & Guardian report implicating it in an irregular oil deal with Nigeria, saying the allegations are "ridiculous as they are devoid of any truth". "There is nothing sinister about the deal because it was done as part of building bilateral economic relations between South Africa and Nigeria," the Government Communication and Information Systems (GCIS) said on Saturday.

Standard methods of poverty measurement assume that an individual is poor if he or she lives in a family whose income or consumption lies below an appropriate poverty line. Such methods can provide only limited insight into male and female poverty separately. It is also possible to link family expenditure patterns to the gender composition of the household, which this paper, produced by the World Bank Poverty Reduction and Economic Management Network, illustrates using data from India and South Africa.

The Telkom Foundation, together with IT companies, have equipped four more schools with PCs, software and Internet access. In one project, Microsoft, Anglo Platinum, Comparex Africa and Telkom Foundation partnered through the Kopano Joint Venture to equip three Rustenburg schools with technology.

The Daily Dispatch reports that the European Union (EU) has made available R40mn for poverty relief projects in the Eastern Cape. The Mvula Trust will administer the programme that will target 100 projects in 50 communities. Depending on the successful implementation of the programme, a second phase is on the cards, which will increase total funding to R100 million. The programme will focus on several designated district municipalities, and projects will be aligned with local government integrated development plans (IDPs).

According to Business Day, the small, medium and micro enterprise (SMME) sector has received a shot in the arm from the Swedish International Development Agency (SIDA) and the Department of Trade and Industry. They have put in seed funding for the sector to the tune of R32 million and R5 million respectively. The initiative is part of the Swedish-SA Business Partnership Fund and its strategy to provide access to finance for SMMEs.

Are you sometimes baffled by funding and fundraising jargon? No more! Thusanang: the Southern African Funding Facility (a SANGONeT Information Services project) has just launched a Glossary of Funding and Fundraising Terms, developed by one of the most renowned and experienced fundraisers in South Africa, Jill Ritchie.

Built on the sweat of black migrant workers, Johannesburg is synonymous with social fragmentation, environmental degradation, violent crime and rampant consumerism alongside grinding poverty. How is the city reinventing itself in post-apartheid South Africa? What can it teach other divided cities similarly struggling to promote political, economic and social justice?

Cost Recovery and the Crisis of Service Delivery in South Africa is a groundbreaking publication, providing a theoretical and empirical review of the dramatic shift from welfare municipalism to a neoliberal vision of balanced budgets and fiscal restraint. Centred largely on case studies in a number of South African municipalities, this volume critically examines ‘cost recovery’, the heart of this new municipal vision. The authors contend that cost recovery has far-reaching implications for access to services, affordability and privatisation. At a theoretical level, the book explores ways of reversing the insidious effects of commodification, the role of the market in shaping service delivery, and the way we ‘value’ essential goods such as water. These issues are of increasing importance internationally as governments around the world move more aggressively toward full cost recovery measures.

The Freedom of Expression Institute (FXI) has warned of the serious consequences that the proposed Anti-Terrorism Bill (ATB) will have on media freedom in South Africa. In an opinion piece titled "Media must wake up over terror bill", carried in one of the country's newspapers, the "Sowetan Sunday World", the FXI has argued that one cannot fail to notice that in the on-going public debate about the ATB, the manner in which the proposed legislation will affect the media in South Africa appears to have been conveniently ignored.

Wrangling over legal aid delayed the Pretoria High Court treason trial of 22 alleged Boeremag members on Monday to June 9. Judge Eben Jordaan granted a postponement after the Legal Aid Board undertook to reconsider applications for assistance from the accused.

An estimated 11-million children younger than 18 were living in poverty last year, according to a study by the Children's Institute of the University of Cape Town. The university said in a statement released on Monday, the beginning of Child Protection Week, that poverty, child abuse and violence and HIV/Aids were the major challenges facing children in South Africa.

Two South African lobby groups this week picketed a biotechnology conference in Johannesburg over the controversial issue of genetically modified (GM) food. A small group of protesters from the Environmental Justice Networking Forum and the South African Freeze Alliance on Genetic Engineering held up placards with slogans like "Say Yes to Organic Agriculture" and "Warning: GM foods can damage your health". Sister Angelica Loub, one of the protesters, said she had environmental, social and economic concerns about genetically modified foods.

Educators and learners from The Queenstown Private High School were locked out of the school building recently because rent on the premises had not been paid.

After performing for Nelson Mandela, the Queen and the Royalty party; concerts in New Zealand, Ireland, Paris and so on, they are coming to ekasie Diepkloof. This Soweto violin group is called Buskuid. It was and is not the case of charity where the Goddess (Nalden- the group instructor) will flap her golden wings from her country to uncover talents from Soweto gutters.

In South Africa, where an estimated five million people are HIV-positive and 500,000 children have been orphaned because one or both of their parents have died of AIDS-related causes, "child-headed household" is an official census category, although no one knows how many such households exist. Without "radical changes," the number of AIDS orphans is expected to quadruple by 2015. Carol Dyantyi, who runs the Soweto-based Ikageng Itireleng AIDS Ministry, and a group of 15 volunteers care for more than 100 AIDS orphans who live in the sprawling township. The group, which operates on a monthly budget of less than $1,000, pays the children's electricity and telephone bills, provides them with money to attend school, gives them clothes and brings food to them when their shelves are bare, reports the Los Angelos Times.

Leader of the opposition, Tony Leon, called on President Thabo Mbeki last Friday to "take responsibility as the arms deal unravels". In his weekly column in the Democratic Alliance's (DA) on-line publication, SA Today, he said it was becoming increasingly apparent the public did not know the full extent of the scandal and where it would lead.

Goodwill ambassador Miriam Makeba launched a women's skills exchange project between South African and West African women on Thursday. Makeba said the project was aimed at allowing women from different backgrounds to share their work experiences and challenges facing them in their respective countries.