150 Stellenbosch University workers were dismissed at the end 2015 after demonstrations at that university calling for the insourcing of all workers under the #EndOutSourcing banner. 88 of the 150 dismissed workers were contracted by G4S Secure Solutions. Most of the dismissed workers had been involved in landscaping and as private security staff. Following that the university placed a moratorium on outsourcing. During the Stellenbosch shack demonstrations, in an attempt to justify its inaction in resolving the matter, the university cited that it was not within its legal parameters to intervene in the matter as it was an issue between the outsourcing company and the workers, this is despite the fact that these workers contributed to the daily running of the university and logically it would be in the best interests of the university to resolve the matter amicably, this is truly astounding logic for a university that prides itself in academic excellence yet fails to exercise even the most basic intellecual exercise of logical thinking, but to expect logic and sense from the bastion of Afrikaner Nationalism would be to burden ourselves with false hope! In addition to the dismissal of the Stellenbosch Workers, 188 UWC outsourced workers contracted to the security services company, Securitas, have been dismissed. Since students of UWC waged the fight for free decolonized education and an end to outsourcing, service providers and University Managements have sought to suppress the movement by taking protesting workers to Labour courts with allegations of absconding from work. Initially, the workers had successfully won the case. Their legal team presented the undisputed truth that workers did not abscond from work but in fact stayed away because the campus was on shutdown due to reason being that the UWC refused to engage students in an honest and genuine manner. Securitas, the service provider, soon after the Court ruling embarked on a bias and illegal internal hearing chaired by a person(s) favourable to them. In this bogus hearing, charges were mischievously replaced from the originally defeated in court claims which alleged absconding to manufactured charges now of hostage. On Friday of the 13th January 2017 over 180 workers were found guilty of this false charge and were immediately dismissed. Most of the workers dismissed are bread winners to largely poor families. They have children to feed, buy uniform and schools stationary. This dismissal means that our black parents might see their children being expelled from schools due to being unable to afford registration fees. The University of the Western Cape under the leadership of Tyrone is anti-black and they have declared a war against all the black bodies which do not subscribe to their mediocre and dictatorship leading style which advances capitalist agenda. The Fees Must Fall Western Cape movement stands firm against all forms of victimisation and extends its warning to the University of the Western and the University of Stellenbosch that failure to re-instate unfairly dismissed workers will result in aggravated protests that will hinder the full functioning of both Universities. It simply cannot be that over 300 black families are displaced outside of the economy by frivolous and maliciously applied labour laws by University bureacrats in tandem with private companies. We therefore call upon all those who stand in solidarity with the student-worker aliance to put their signature in support of the reinstatement of our parents. 'We are all connected. When one arm or foot is poisoned, the whole body becomes infected.' -Suzy Kassem #BringBackTheWorkers

It's not the first time we've said "Asinamali". Many of our brothers and sisters haven't registered till today. Some where on Nsfas last year and some applied for it last year but till today they haven't received any confirmation or rejection of funding. With most Institutions closing their registration doors this week many are left stranded. We all want a bright future and help out at home, so let's help one another to go back to school this year. Sign this petition, let's circulate it and let our voices be heard.

Just recently, the body of 22-year-old LGBTQ activist Noluvo Swelindawo was found near the N2 highway in Driftsands, a community near Khayelitsha. She had been shot in an alleged hate crime. It is in this light this, and many other cases of ongoing hate crimes against the LGBTI community that we welcome Cabinet’s approval to publish the Prevention and Combating of Hate Crimes and Hate Speech Bill for public comment. The Bill tackles a number of highly complex issues that require consultation with those most affected by the changes - if it is to achieve its stated aims to prevent and combat deaths like Noluvo's - and a proper consultation process takes time. We have waited for many years for the public release of the bill, and it is of utmost importance that the public consultation period allows civil society and the public in general to thoroughly and meaningfully engage with the bill and its potentially far-reaching provisions. After it has taken government nearly four years to draft the Bill, it is alarming that the public has been given a mere five weeks (until 1 December 2016) with a short extension over the holiday season (to 31 January 2017) to comment thereon. If the purpose is to craft an effective bill, the state needs to commit to coordinate robust public engagement and undertake in a process of deep reflection to ensure that the bill that is passed is the best bill possible. The current timeline does allow us to attempt to reach this ideal. As such, we are calling on the Department of Justice (DoJ) to extend the deadline for public comment to the 30 June 2017. We further request clear and detailed information on DoJ’s plan for convening extensive public consultations with representatives from civil society, non-governmental and community-based organisations and interested individuals on the draft bill.

Sugary drinks are one of the most significant contributors to health problems such as diabetes, obesity, heart diseases, certain cancers and dental decay in the world and in South Africa. Last year, the Minister of Finance announced a plan to tax sugary drinks such as soft drinks, energy drinks, fruit drinks and sweetened milks by April 2017. (Pure fruit juice and milk will be excluded from the tax.) The Parliamentary committees discussing this issue are under pressure to drop this proposal, lower the tax rate, and exempt more products. Beverage companies and retail groups are flooding Parliament with comments to prevent this policy, urging exemptions and weaker regulation. That’s why Parliament needs to hear from YOU to make sure the final policy is strong and effective in lowering the consumption of harmful sugars in beverages. South Africa is already ranked the most obese country in sub-Saharan Africa. Excess sugar consumption is a major cause of obesity and its related diseases, as excessive sugar intake causes increased risk of diabetes, liver and kidney damage, heart disease, some cancers and dental caries. The World Health Organisation (WHO) and the World Cancer Research Fund recommend that people should consume no more than 10% of total calories from sugar. Sugary drink consumption is also linked to under-nutrition. In many African countries, including South Africa, babies are given sugary drinks as a weaning food or even as a substitute for infant formula, which increases under-nutrition and stunting. Stunted infants have a much greater risk of becoming obese and diabetic.

The art exhibition Our Lady, currently on show at the Iziko South African National Gallery in Cape Town (and intended to be shown until June 2017) was conceived, according to the gallery, to “interrupt the typical traditional moral attitudes and male dominated stereotypes that surrounds imagery of the female form”. It contained works from the gallery’s public collection and also from the private collection of The New Church Museum. However, as soon as the exhibition opened it was met with outrage. Despite three (white) women having co-curated Our Lady, it is impossible to overlook the fact that 75% of the artists on show are men (the majority of which represent women through the staid conventional lens of patriarchy and are dead white men). South Africa has no shortage of artists who critically reflect on gender in their practice. Instead, the perspectives of women, trans and non-binary artists are heinously under-represented. Of the 27 artists on show, a mere seven are women. Considerably more shocking is the fact that only three black women were represented. Given the history and present of our country, we cannot accept how disastrously short the exhibition falls, particularly in terms of creating space for artistic statements from a wider and richer range of identities that reflects the lived reality of South Africa. Furthermore, many are outraged by the curators’ decision to include the work of Zwelethu Mthethwa, who is currently being tried for the violent murder of Nokuphila Kumalo. Though he will remain innocent until proven guilty, the worth and memory of Ms Kumalo are brutally undermined by the curators’ decision to showcase a work by her alleged murderer. Adding insult, the chosen work by Mthethwa is a portrait of a black woman, who the artist chooses to treat as anonymous. The inclusion of a photograph of an unnamed black woman by Mthethwa reiterates a dominant tendency in our culture; that is, the propensity to view the most precarious in our society – including black sex workers such as Ms Kumalo – as faceless, nameless and disposable nonentities. It tacitly participates in the broader erasure of the voices of black women from our national narrative – and in our national gallery at that. The impassive attitude that this exhibition expresses towards Ms Kumalo (as well as towards those who loved her and continue to mourn her), mirrors the tragically low esteem in which black women have been – and continue to be – held in South Africa today. For all of these reasons, we stand in solidarity with SWEAT – the Sex Worker Education and Advocacy Taskforce – who have strongly condemned the gallery for its decision to include Mthethwa’s artwork. As Ishtar Lakhani of SWEAT has said, “The irony of promoting the work of a man accused of murdering a woman as part of an exhibition aimed at empowering women, is not wasted on us.” Just ahead of a public meeting about these issues The New Church Museum withdrew all of its work from the show, without offering an explanation. We believe that the public has a right to understand why a private collection has elected to silently withdraw a series of loaned works that had been committed to an exhibition in a national institution until June 2017. Public institutions should not be playgrounds for private interests. Many strong voices resonated during the intense public meeting that was hosted at the gallery on 15 December 2016. In addition to public statements made by representatives of the gallery and the New Church Museum, an open letter that was signed by all of the (living) women artists represented on Our Lady was read aloud. This collective letter demanded that all works made by its signatories be immediately withdrawn from Our Lady, as a gesture of protest against the exhibition. We were heartened by the hasty response of the National Gallery, in the form of a media statement that acknowledges that it is crucial for public institutions to remain flexible and responsive to their constituencies. The statement articulates the National Gallery’s commitment to continuing the important conversation around Our Lady, and its sincere intention to reconfigure the exhibition in the early days of January 2017. We embrace this positive momentum and continue to believe that it is possible to radically transform Our Lady to address the rampant violence that is directed against women and others who are marginalised in our culture can be compellingly communicated. However, the gallery has not clearly indicated in the exhibition space why there are so many white walls missing work and why there has been a public outcry around the show’s curation and the inclusion of work by Mthethwa. A powerful debate languishes at the skirts of Our Lady. Due to the current state of the exhibition, this debate remains inaccessible to most museum visitors. As the National Gallery decides on the curatorial steps that it will take in order to render the ongoing debate accessible to the broader public, we ask the institution to make bold decisions that will allow the voices of the protesting artists and activists to resonate accessibly and meaningfully in the public space that the exhibition occupies. We view the Iziko South African National Gallery as an ally and a partner, but also as an institution that is charged with the weighty responsibility of attending to and redressing the radical social inequity that continues to characterise South African society. In memory of Nokuphila Kumalo, for women artists, and for all women who have been and continue to be nonchalantly erased from taking a rightful seat at the table, we ask the National Gallery to move swiftly to radically reconfigure Our Lady so as to bring the ongoing debate that it has unleashed to voice.

On Monday the 2nd of January 2017, a number of areas including the Qweqwe, Payne, Zimbane, Maqhinebeni, VIdgiesville, Mqanduli and the surrounding areas were hit by a severe hailstorm which left many desitute and homeless [1]. Homes, schools and churches were severely damaged and a number of people were rushed to hospital with injuries. During this time of the year this kind of weather uis expected and it is deeply worrying that everytime our Municipality is caught off guard with no contingency plan. We know that it is norm for Disaster Management to delay responding to these disasters even though they have a set budget for such. This is evident even in this case, there has not been any statement issued to declare or any information to give guidance to the affected communities like a toll free number or contact offices/persons We however, commend the Department of Health for being visible and issuing a media statement going as far as offering assistance to those injured. [1] Lightining strikes Seven people in Mthatha, Jenni Evans, News24

If our parents are robbed of their hard earned, blood sweat contribution to this administrators, then most children will loose their inheritance for education and livelihood. Remember this is not a grant but monies contributed by this employees, it is a day robbery of everything they would ever have to change the economy of their lives.

We can improve service delivery and fight corruption in our Municipality by ensuring all Service Delivery Agreements (SDAs) are public and easily accessible to all. Some politicians, officials and businesses are scared about transparency, but if they aren't doing anything wrong, what have they got to hide. * This campaign by amandla.mobi is supported by Heinrich Böll Stiftung.

This is a violation of human rights and reminiscent of the apartheid government's issuing of dompasses. The Saldanha Bay Municipality should be working to make public spaces more accessible to poor and low-income families, not reinforcing spacial divisions along racial and class lines.

We can improve service delivery and fight corruption in our Municipality by ensuring all Service Delivery Agreements (SDAs) are public and easily accessible to all. Some politicians, officials and businesses are scared about transparency, but if they aren't doing anything wrong, what have they got to hide.

We can improve service delivery and fight corruption in our Municipality by ensuring all Service Delivery Agreements (SDAs) are public and easily accessible to all. Some politicians, officials and businesses are scared about transparency, but if they aren't doing anything wrong, what have they got to hide. * This campaign by amandla.mobi is supported by Heinrich Böll Stiftung.

We can improve service delivery and fight corruption in our Municipality by ensuring all Service Delivery Agreements (SDAs) are public and easily accessible to all. Some politicians, officials and businesses are scared about transparency, but if they aren't doing anything wrong, what have they got to hide. * This campaign by amandla.mobi is supported by Heinrich Böll Stiftung.