The Eastern Cape Department of Health could once again run short of money and not be able to pay suppliers in the last quarter of the financial year. Other departments will also have to cut back on services, unless money is found in the adjustment budget for them to deal with the historic backlogs in [...]

The Democratic Alliance fully supports the 16 Days of Activism for No Violence against Women and Children Campaign which will be launched in the Eastern Cape today. (subs: wed: 25 Nov) As a result, the DA Women’s Network will on Friday (subs: 27 Nov) be marching to the East London Magistrate’s Court to hand over [...]

No Section 21 schools in the Eastern Cape have received their second tranche allocations from the Department of Education and it remains uncertain if and when the payments will be made. During a recent telephonic conversation the Education Department’s Chief Director: Institutional Management, Development and support, Nosipho Skenyana, she confirmed no payments had been made [...]

The cost to build an RDP house in the Sweetwaters Housing project near King William’s Town is now in excess of R105 000 per unit. In response to a parliamentary question in the Provincial Legislature, it was revealed that 87 partially completed houses in this project near King William’s Town had so far cost R9,15 [...]

With some 8 000 teachers due to retire soon, the Eastern Cape will be facing a serious shortage of educators. It remains an open question whether Education MEC Mahlubandile Qwase will be pro-active and reopen teacher colleges or whether his department will again fail the school community. According to a reply to a parliamentary question [...]

Although media freedom in South Africa is guaranteed in theory in the constitution, in practice media freedom and freedom of speech is under threat in South Africa. The greatest threat to media freedom in South Africa is self imposed censorship. Church leaders, academics and leaders in the business community are largely afraid to speak out [...]

The Department of Local Government’s “Operation Clean Audit”, launched in King William’s Town yesterday (subs: Tue, 13 Oct) will never succeed while the ANC practices the policy of cadre redeployment. What the government says in theory is totally contradicted by what the ANC does as a party in practice. Cadre redeployment is the root of [...]

The DA welcomes the decision by the Bhisho Equality Court yesterday (subs: tues, 13 Oct) that circumcision is unlawful unless done with the full consent of the initiate. The follows the abduction of Bonani Yamani (now 21 years old) who was subjected to violent traditional circumcision on 3 March 2007 after being circumcised at the [...]

More than R123 million was owed to the Nelson Mandela Metro by its powers-that-be in the in the Provincial- and National government as at 31 August 2009. A whopping R4, 7 million of this amount is made up of interest. The real shocker is that the amassed amounts include non-payment for normal day-to-day business such [...]

The dissolving of Ward Committees in the Nelson Mandela Metro last month is suspicious and tightens to noose around the necks of already suffocating ratepayers. All 60 Metro Ward Committees were dissolved, with effect from 11 September 2009, by pulling a Council resolution out of the bag which dates back to 2001. It is alleged [...]