ANC Youth League leader Julius Malema has taken a thinly veiled swipe at President Jacob Zuma and the Gupta family, saying the youth must protect the ANC from being used by 'families' to enrich themselves. Speaking at the launch of the ANC's municipal elections manifesto, at the Royal Bafokeng stadium, in Rustenburg, Malema drew huge applause when he said democracy was not for people who exploited the resources of the country to enrich themselves in the name of freedom.

Idasa's submission to February’s National Climate Change Response Green Paper, on behalf of the Electricity Governance Initiative of South Africa (EGI-SA) which it co-ordinates, has pointed out that the challenges of climate change need different approaches to development than in the past, and may require difficult tradeoffs. Idasa stresses the importance of transparent, accountable and inclusive processes to work through such trade-offs.

SECTION27 and the TAC have welcomed the proposed increases in health expenditure outlined in the budget tabled by Minister of Finance Pravin Gordhan on 23 February 2011. 'However, we are concerned that the additional R11 billion available for 2011/12 will not necessarily translate into improvements in the delivery of health care services in the absence of a reasonable plan to address endemic and systemic problems with budgeting and expenditure within health departments at all spheres of government,' said a statement.

Lindiwe Zono is a member of the Phadima Agricultural Association in the Sekhukhune District of Limpopo province, in northwestern South Africa. The association has started a seed bank to preserve and increase their supply of traditional food plants, reports Farm Radio Weekly. Zono says that seed saving was once an almost sacred duty among the Pedi, the largest ethnic group in the province. The seed bank builds on this tradition. It aims to make use of and promote traditional crops such as sorghum, millet, cowpeas, maize, and pumpkin. It began in 2000 and covers seven villages.

'The 2011/12 budget tabled this afternoon by Minister Pravin Gordhan represents continuity in Government’s approach to economic policy to economic development. Great emphasis is placed on "macro-economic stability", fiscal prudence and monetary policy directed to keeping inlation within the 3 – 6 per cent band. Yet, these orthodoxies of economic policy is precisely what has hampered an effective response to the tremendous socio-economic challenges confronting our society and contradict the idea that South Africa has entered a New Growth Path.'

Amandla! TV aims to strengthen the movement for social justice in South Africa through the production of alternative knowledge and facilitating a dialogue giving voice to the poor and marginalized locally and internationally. Visit their Youtube channel to see videos from the recent Conference of the Democratic Left and responses to the South African budget.

A schism about the division of revenues in the world’s oldest customs union threatens to derail the process of regional economic integration in Southern Africa. The internal problems plaguing the Southern African Customs Union (SACU) for the past year have entered a new phase. A concept study looking into revenue sharing from the SACU pool proposes a radical overhaul in which South Africa receives more money, while Botswana, Lesotho, Namibia and Swaziland (BLNS) see their shares drop.

A project in South Africa supports mathematics education in schools using the web, social networking and mobile apps to deliver learning material directly to students’ cell phones. Teachers can also use the content in their classroom lessons. Students can practise mathematics exercises from a cell phone at any time and receive immediate feedback.

Based on comments from presenters and the audience the key priorities emerging from the Institute for Poverty, Land and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS) public debate on rural transformation 'Back to the Plot!' held on 31 January 2011 included land reform; service delivery in rural areas; experimenting with alternative modes of agricultural production, such as smallholder producers and organics; enabling access to food value chains for more producers, especially small producers; addressing the rising cost of farm inputs, including new technologies, fertiliser and petrol; and addressing ecological matters. For more details about presentations at the event, please click on the link provided.

'On 18 and 19 February 2011, the National Steering Committee of the Democratic Left Front (DLF) held its first meeting after the historic DLF’s founding conference held last month at Wits University. This committee meeting was held in eThekwini as part of initiating the launch and growth of the DLF process, campaigns and structures in the province of KwaZulu-Natal. The meeting was held in the immediate aftermath of the people’s revolutions for democracy and wealth redistribution in the countries of the Maghreb and the Arab world, President Jacob Zuma’s State of the Nation Address, the forthcoming municipal elections and the current wave of worker and community protests as we have seen with the recently-ended truck driver’s strike, the Equal Education Campaign’s protest outside parliament concerning the crisis in the Eastern Cape education system, and the community protests in Grahamstown, Ermelo and others bubbling elsewhere.'

A study has found that about 55 per cent of HIV patients in South Africa who are not eligible for treatment at the time of diagnosis will disappear from clinics within a year of initial monitoring, leaving a serious gap in HIV care and prevention, say researchers. Most patients in South Africa must have a CD4 count - a measure of the immune system’s strength - of 200 or less to be eligible for antiretrovirals (ARVs), but previous research has shown that about two-thirds of people will not meet ARV treatment criteria at diagnosis.

'Since the beginning of this year, we have been aware of several online ‘corrective rape’ petitions and campaigns. We have made a deliberate decision not to sign or endorse these petitions. Our position and core concerns regarding these campaigns are as follows. The public exposure of bruised and battered faces and bodies of survivors is unethical and sensationalist. Many seem to assume that these petitions have been driven at least in part by survivors themselves. If you read carefully through the online petitions and the articles associated with these campaigns, you will find that the voices of survivors are largely absent. Once again black women in Africa are being cast as voiceless victims, as voiceless faces. No consideration seems to be given to the wide-ranging emotional and social impact that this kind of global and local exposure might have on survivors. The harm that this kind of sensationalist exposure is likely to have on survivors, their families and extended networks seems to have been overlooked.'

The ANC is a 'complete mess' and its young cadres have no interest in history, but simply want access to jobs and personal enrichment, according to a United States embassy cable obtained by City Press through the whistleblower website WikiLeaks. According to the cable, the ANC's Gauteng spokesperson Dumisa Ntuli told a US diplomat that crippling divisions were plaguing the ruling party.

Closing arguments in a civil case initiated by foreign nationals seeking compensation from the state for damages suffered during the May 2008 xenophobic attacks were heard in the Western Cape High Court last Thursday. A group of 11 Somali, Ethiopian and Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) nationals are suing the Safety and Security Ministry, claiming police did not protect them during the 2008 attacks.

Painting the country as both a contributor to and potential victim of global climate change, South Africa’s green paper ‘seems to fit within an all too predictable Pretoria formula’, writes Patrick Bond. It's up to civil society to demand genuine solutions.

The South African National Editors' Forum and the Press Gallery Association have condemned the DA's decision to take Sowetan reporter Anna Majavu off their mailing list in protest against her reporting. 'The move by the DA against reporter Anna Majavu flies in the face of the DA’s founding liberal values, including commitment to press freedom,' Sanef chairman Mondli Makhanya, who is also editor in chief of Avusa, said in a statement.

The Parliamentary Communication Services has issued a statement condemning the Right2Know’s behaviour as 'particularly unseemly' and threatening to apply the 'full might of the law' against our supporters. This is in response to an incident on Tuesday, when five Right2Know supporters silently donned masks depicting Minister of State Security Siyabonga Cwele during a sitting of the parliamentary committee dealing with the Protection of Information Bill (the Secrecy Bill).

The SA Transport and Allied Workers' Union (Satawu) would be meeting with members to decide whether to accept an industry wage deal. The union had agreed to the revised offer in principle for its freight worker members on Sunday. The offer included a nine percent increase across the board for 2011 and 8.5 per cent for the second year.

In a venture aimed at getting tomorrow's leaders tested today, Innovative Medicines of South Africa (Imsa) has launched a university-based HIV counselling and testing (HCT) campaign called First Things First. 'First Things First aims to help South African students, as future leaders, to be responsible, get tested for HIV, know their status and commit to behaviour that will benefit themselves and their peers,' said Minister of Health Aaron Motsoaledi.

'The rebellion of the poor has been spreading from town to town, from squatter camp to squatter camp, since 2004. Last week it arrived in Grahamstown. There is no third force, political party or communist academic behind our struggle. It is oppression at the hands of the African National Congress that has driven us into the rebellion of the poor. We are in rebellion because we are being forced to live without dignity, safety or hope.'