Economic heartland hit by rise in infections driven by Delta variant and faltering vaccination campaign
Authorities in South Africa appeared set to impose new restrictions on Sunday in a belated attempt to stem a rise in Covid-19 that is ravaging the country’s economic heartland.
The wave of infections has been driven by the spread of the more transmissible Delta variant, weak countermeasures and public fatigue with existing restrictions.
Continue reading...More than 12 years have passed since xenophobic violence swept unexpectedly through South Africa’s townships, leaving more than 60 people dead, hundreds injured and tens of thousands displaced from their homes. Photojournalists James Oatway and Alon Skuy document the unrest in a new book, [BR]OTHER
In May 2008, a series of xenophobic attacks accompanied by widespread looting and vandalism left at least 62 people dead, 1,700 injured and 100,000 displaced in South Africa. The violence began in Alexandra in Johannesburg after a local community meeting at which migrants were blamed for crime and for “stealing” jobs. Within days the attacks had spread around the country, with Ramaphosa settlement on the East Rand becoming one of the areas that witnessed inhumanity on an unthinkable level.
Continue reading...Cyril Ramaphosa’s government has been criticised for its slow reaction and faltering vaccination programme
Governments across Africa are scrambling to reinforce health systems and accelerate vaccine drives as a third wave of Covid-19 infections threatens to overwhelm hospitals and kill tens of thousands of people.
South Africa, the worst-hit country in the continent, has reported a doubling of new daily cases over the past two weeks, with no sign of the rise slowing.
Continue reading...The president of Zambia from 1964 to 1991, Kenneth Kaunda, who has died aged 97, stood out as one of the most humane and idealistic African leaders in the post-independence age. A man of great presence and charm, he played a notable role as a leader of the “frontline states” in the long confrontation between independent black Africa and the white-dominated south of the continent, which came to an end only in 1994 with the election of Nelson Mandela as president of South Africa.
He was a consummate politician and spent much of his time shuffling his top party figures around in a chess game to balance ethnic groups and their claims to power-sharing; he also possessed a ruthless streak which he deployed towards opponents, although his abhorrence of violence was a rarity in that era.
Continue reading...Remains were discovered near disused mine shafts in the South African financial capital
Police in South Africa have discovered the bodies of 20 suspected illegal miners near an abandoned goldmine shaft south-west of Johannesburg.
Police said in a statement they were investigating the cause of the deaths, adding that the men’s bodies “were found wrapped in white plastic bags” and bore “severe body burns”.
Continue reading...Analysis: the failings of the Covax programme, logistical issues and governments’ own inadequacies are making a bad situation worse
Only 1% of the 1.3 billion vaccines injected around the world have been administered in Africa – and that comparative percentage has been declining in recent weeks. It is a stark figure that underlines just how serious a problem global vaccine inequity has become. But the answer for the developing world is not as simple as delivering more vaccines.
From Africa to Latin America, Asia and the Caribbean, the same issues have been replicated. On top of finding enough doses, there have been logistical difficulties with delivery, problems over healthcare infrastructure and, in some countries, public hesitancy towards vaccines.
Continue reading...Honest examination of French colonial record in Africa and responsibilty in Rwanda key to new strategy, though critics say little has changed
With the golden winter sun slanting across the palm trees and yellow sandstone, the scene was perfect. Emmanuel Macron and his host, Cyril Ramaphosa of South Africa, walked down the red carpet of the Union buildings in Pretoria as the Marseillaise resonated through the clean, crisp air.
The historic setting was apt. Since taking power in 2017, the French president has sought a broad reset of national strategy, relations and intervention in Africa. He has chosen a very contemporary way to do this: by re-examining the past.
Continue reading...Zuma accuses lawyers of working ‘to bolster a narrative’ as trial begins over $2.5bn arms deal
Jacob Zuma, the former president of South Africa, accused prosecutors of seeking to malign a political leader rather than find the truth as he denied charges of corruption at the first major hearing of his trial on Wednesday.
Zuma, 79, faces charges of bribery, fraud, racketeering and money laundering relate to a $2.5bn (£1.98bn) deal to buy European military hardware to upgrade South Africa’s armed forces in 1999 when he was deputy president.
Continue reading...Data reveals Nepal, Iran and South Africa among 19 countries most at risk of running out as surging Covid cases push supplies to limit
Dozens of countries are facing severe oxygen shortages because of surging Covid-19 cases, threatening the “total collapse” of health systems.
The Bureau of Investigative Journalism analysed data provided by the Every Breath Counts Coalition, the NGO Path and the Clinton Health Access Initiative (CHAI) to find the countries most at risk of running out of oxygen. It also studied data on global vaccination rates.
Continue reading...The comparison rankles supporters of Israel but the growing Palestinian Boycott, Disinvestment and Sanctions movement draws on the struggle to isolate racist South Africa
Ask an older generation of white South Africans when they first felt the bite of anti-apartheid sanctions, and some point to the moment in 1968 when their prime minister, BJ Vorster, banned a tour by the England cricket team because it included a mixed-race player, Basil D’Oliveira.
After that, South Africa was excluded from international cricket until Nelson Mandela walked free from prison 22 years later. The D’Oliveira affair, as it became known, proved a watershed in drumming up popular support for the sporting boycott that eventually saw the country excluded from most international competition including rugby, the great passion of the white Afrikaners who were the base of the ruling Nationalist party and who bitterly resented being cast out.
Continue reading...Efforts in Africa and elsewhere hit by decision not to export AstraZeneca jab until end of year
Vaccine programmes across Africa and much of the developing world will suffer big delays after the world’s biggest producer said it would not be exporting the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine until the end of the year.
“We continue to scale up manufacturing and prioritise India … We also hope to start delivering to Covax and other countries by the end of this year,” Adar Poonawalla, chief executive of the Serum Institute of India (SII), said in a statement on Tuesday.
Continue reading...Amnesty International says private military firm in Cabo Delgado abandoned others to their fate
Survivors of a recent attack by Islamist insurgents in Mozambique have told Amnesty International that private military contractors prioritised white workers for evacuation as the extremists closed in during days of confused fighting.
An estimated 220 civilians sought refuge in the Amarula hotel in Palma, in the northern province of Cabo Delgado, during the attack in late March.
Continue reading...Queen only assumed role a month ago after death of her husband King Goodwill Zwelithini
Queen Shiyiwe Mantfombi Dlamini Zulu, the traditional ruler of South Africa’s Zulu nation, has died aged 65, only a month after she took the role following the death of her husband, King Goodwill Zwelithini.
“It is with deepest shock and distress that the royal family announces the unexpected passing of Her Majesty Queen Shiyiwe Mantfombi Dlamini Zulu, regent of the Zulu nation,” Prince Mangosuthu Buthelezi, the founder of the Inkatha Freedom party and traditional prime minister to the Zulu monarch, said in a statement.
Continue reading...The new administration has signalled a sharp break in foreign policy from the Trump era – but how is that playing globally?
At the opening of Joe Biden’s online climate summit last week, Europe’s relief was was palpable: “It is so good,” gushed the European commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, “to have the US back on our side.”
Continue reading...Wildfires on Table Mountain spread to historic university library and force evacuation of students
Police in Cape Town have arrested a man on suspicion of starting one of the wildfires raging on the slopes of Table Mountain.
Over the weekend one fire spread to the University of Cape Town (UCT), burning the historic campus library and forcing the evacuation of 4,000 students. Other fires broke out around Devil’s Peak, a spur of the mountain.
Continue reading...Fear of third wave and new variants as sub-Saharan vaccine distribution is dogged by supply disruption
Millions of healthcare workers in sub-Saharan Africa continue to risk their lives to fight Covid-19 as authorities across the continent struggle to obtain and distribute vaccines to frontline medical staff.
Though hundreds of millions of people in western nations are now protected from the virus, doctors, nurses and others on the frontline of the fight against Covid in Africa will have to wait months, or even years, for a vaccine.
Continue reading...The emergence of South Africa into an era of majority rule in 1994 was accompanied by a constitution that enshrined a wide range of equalities – not just racial equality, but gender equality and recognition of diverse sexual orientations. It was highly modern in its range, but all the same enshrined the position of traditional monarchs. Thus King Goodwill Zwelithini of the Zulu nation, who has died aged 72, was made part of a modern South Africa, while representing an old lineage and old practice.
The recognition in particular of the Zulu king was important in that the four years of negotiation, from Nelson Mandela’s release to the achievement of elections under universal franchise, were marked not just by black/white racial unease, but by Zulu/ANC communal violence in the province of KwaZulu-Natal, on South Africa’s Indian Ocean coast. Pogroms and slaughters by Zulu militants, and the reprisal attacks that followed, marked the unease of a process in which traditionally powerful communities sought not to be marginalised in the new dispensation. Recognition of the Zulu king, and the inclusion at a high level of Jacob Zuma, a Zulu himself, in the ANC cabinet – Thabo Mbeki appointed him deputy president in 1999 – helped to assuage these fears.
Continue reading...Apartheid-era South African president calls for justice for female victims of violence in Guardian article but some say his own record needs scrutiny
South Africans don’t give much thought to FW de Klerk these days. Like Mikhail Gorbachev, his fellow Nobel peace laureate, the last apartheid president is more highly regarded outside his own country than in it.
But some South Africans were taken aback to see De Klerk putting himself forward in a Guardian article on 10 March as an advocate of protecting women from violence and asserting that “holding perpetrators accountable, irrespective of how long ago the crime was committed, is essential to stamping out impunity and preventing future atrocities”.
Continue reading...London housing block residents choose location-led name, having rejected option to reflect black historical figures
Cecil Rhodes House, which overlooks St Pancras rail station in London, is to be renamed after decades of unsuccessful attempts to rid the property of its association with the Victorian imperialist.
But to the disappointment of some local historians, residents rejected renaming the building after a black historical figure, opting instead for Park View House.
Continue reading...The streaming giant has come knocking, but a lack of infrastructure and government support continues to hinder the continent telling its own stories
It was the sight of donkeys carrying camera equipment that reminded Lemohang Jeremiah Mosese he was shooting in Lesotho. The director was filming This Is Not a Burial, It Is a Resurrection in a remote part of his tiny home nation, which has no cinemas and – unsurprisingly – zero film infrastructure. “It’s a bit daring to take a crew there and shoot because there’s no electricity,” Mosese says from his home in Berlin. “Especially when we go to the mountains – we had to rely on the donkeys because at some point we just couldn’t carry the equipment.”
The shoot ran on petrol-powered generators. Villagers pitched in as ad-hoc crew members. Many fingers were crossed. “We had to build everything from scratch,” he says. That approach didn’t harm the film. Critically lauded, the stylish mood piece about grief, community and egregious land development has been entered in the Oscars as the country’s 2021 candidate.
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