As much as those who identify themselves as social progressives would like to believe otherwise, writes Dale McKinley, ‘the reality is that South Africa is a bastion of social conservatism'. One of the most glaring contradictions of South Africa’s post-apartheid ‘transition’, says McKinley, ‘is that the widely acknowledged – and regularly celebrated – social progressiveness of the country’s constitution is, in large part, at fundamental odds with the beliefs and views of the majority of South Africans themselves'.

Mphutlane wa Bofelo mourns a South Africa in which critical thinking, thoughtful strategy and creative minds are marginalised. What is reified instead, he argues, is thoughtless action, the dismissal of theory and analysis and ‘the racist, sexist, violent-peddling hate-talk of Julius Malema’. Wa Bofelo holds that the lionisation of rash and unthinking youths in the past has led to a culture of crime and violence, disrespect for life and intolerance for dissent in South Africa. The media and academia, he states, have played a large role in this: They have always placed spectacle well above cautious and calculated action. Wa Bofelo believes that the youth of South Africa is not ‘the lost generation’, but ‘the generation in search of role models’. He concludes that ‘glorifying mediocrity, recklessness, violence and idiocy today is investing in the doom and damnation of the future… Malema’s is [as such] a serious act of injustice against the youth and posterity.’

While excitement around South Africa's forthcoming World Cup continues to build, South Africa's poor are seeing none of the supposed economic benefits associated with hosting the tournament, argue Azad Essa and Oliver Meth.

Delays in registering antiretroviral (ARV) medication may keep cheaper, more patient-friendly drugs out of reach as South Africa prepares to launch the world's largest tender for medicines. In a letter to Dr Aaron Motsoaledi, the Minister of Health, the South African HIV Clinicians Society called on the country's drug registration body, the Medicines Control Council (MCC), to fast-track the approval of certain ARVs, the generic versions of others, and fixed-dose ARV combinations that combine multiple ARVs into a single pill.

E-government will be renewed and handled with more vigour, because of its future importance to service delivery, says deputy public service and administration minister Roy Padayachie.

The notorious Mike Sutcliffe has banned another Abahlali baseMjondolo march. We have, as always, scrupulously followed the laws that govern protest and we have informed the City in good time that we intend to march on Jacob Zuma on 22 March 2010. Yesterday the march convenor, Troy Morrow from the Hillary AbM branch, was verbally informed that permission to march has been denied. The excuse that has been given this time is that the City does not have enough police officers to be able to ensure security at our march.

With the 15th-year review of the 1995 Beijing World Conference on Women taking place at the ongoing Commission on the Status of Women in New York, South African teachers and education experts say they fear that a special focus on the advancement of girls is getting lost amidst the growing levels of poverty in the country.

Oukasie, Sharpville, Orange Farm, Siyathemba: images of violent protest action against poor service delivery have dominated the news in the past few weeks, signalling growing frustration with the Jacob Zuma administration’s failure to address the implosion of services in parts of South Africa. But all too often, media coverage does not help us to understand the complex forces that gave rise to such protests, writes Jane Duncan.

South African President Jacob Zuma is expected in Zimbabwe next week amid reports that Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai's MDC has written to his office saying they want a deadlock to be declared.

The chairperson of the ANC's biggest and most influential region in KwaZulu-Natal, John Mchunu, has been awarded tenders worth at least R40-million by the eThekwini municipality. Mchunu recently made headlines for allegedly vetoing the completion of a R1.5m elephant sculpture project for the new Warwick Avenue interchange, apparently because it was the symbol of the IFP.

The press conference celebrating 100 days before the World Cup kick-off left the big question unanswered, argues Azad Essa: How will South Africans benefit from the World Cup? For Essa ‘only the dim-witted, government or FIFA communication officers walked away feeling that the World Cup was really about anything more than ending Afro-pessimism and stroking a couple of shiny suits'.

Informal traders in central Mitchells Plain have clashed with police over permits. Chaos erupted in the town centre yesterday morning when nearly 100 traders reacted angrily to the arrival of metro police who said they had been instructed by city officials to remove any structures which blocked the walkways.Many traders were unsure why they were being moved, and started swearing at police as they tried desperately to hold on to their goods and belongings.

About 27 students, suspended from UMthwalume high school, on suspicion that they are homosexuals, have been allowed back in school. This was a result of a meeting between parents of suspended learners, the school governing body and the Department of Education of Ugu Municipality in KwaZulu-Natal

The opening of an exhibition by young, black women artists at Constitution Hill turned sour when Arts and Culture Minister Lulu Xingwana stormed out of the exhibition, calling the work "immoral". Xingwana, whose department gave R300,000 to the Innovative Women exhibition, which was launched in Johannesburg to coincide with Women's Day last August, left before she was due to speak at the opening.

HIV stakeholders are calling on the Medicines Control Council (MCC) to speed up the registration of critical anti-HIV medication or face legal action. The Southern African HIV Clinicians Society has sent an appeal to the health minister to intervene and address the MCC registration process which they describe as the single biggest obstacle to getting affordable access to medicines.

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown has insisted that Zimbabwe’s unity government needs to make more progress before targeted sanctions against the Mugabe regime are lifted, resisting pressure from South African President Jacob Zuma.

The South African authorities must investigate the delayed police response to last month's attacks against refugees and migrants and their property in Siyathemba Township, 80km south east of Johannesburg. The authorities must also ensure that those responsible for the attacks are held accountable.

Women are yet to make significant inroads into the media 15 years after the Beijing Platform of Action recognised its centrality in advancing women’s rights. Preliminary findings of the 2010 Global Media Monitoring Project conducted by the World Association for Christian Communication (WACC) suggests that women constitute less than a quarter of those interviewed, heard, seen or read about in mainstream broadcast and print news.

Sitting in my office in Johannesburg reading the daily newspaper published for the Beijing+15 Review at the Conference on the Status of Women in New York, I feel a sense of discomfort, a sense of a world going wrong. First, I read the article ‘Playing it safe or losing ground?’ where we find out that the Secretary General of the UN, Ban Ki-moon, is not present at the meeting. Second, the governments' have agreed to come out with a Declaration after the Review, not an outcomes document.

Food security and economic growth are being undermined by the collapse of more than 90% of the farms that the government bought for restitution or redistribution to victims of apartheid. Minister of Rural Development and Land Affairs Gugile Nkwinti also warned that, while the government would invest heavily to rescue these failing farms, it would also crack down soon on foreigners buying up South African land.