By CHRIS TOTOBELA On Saturday night, Makhanda’s pride Mzoxolo ‘Black Tiger’ Ndwayana overcame the streetfighting tactics of the DRC’s Katemba Kuvesa of DRC in their non-title WBO international welterweight bout. Ndwayana came to this fight with an impressive record of 26 fights,18 wins (16 KOs), six losses and two draws. In the first round, both boxers tried to figure out their opponent’s strategies. In the second round, Ndwayana caught Kuvesa with a very sharp left hook that caused him to lose his balance and kiss the canvas. Kuvesa came back strongly in the third round, and his clumsy and casual…
Author: Rod Amner
The final voter registration weekend is here! Check that you are registered in the correct place and encourage any first-time voters to register. You can register online: https://registertovote.elections.org.za/voter-on-line-registration/overview and can check your registration: https://www.elections.org.za/pw/voter/voter-information Local elections are scheduled for Monday 1st November 2021.
By ROD AMNER Local business owners arrived at work on Wednesday, 15 September, to find their street-facing security cameras stolen. One business owner, Andre McLean, immediately called Hi-Tec and provided them with footage of someone with their face uncovered, reaching to remove the one camera at 9 pm on Tuesday 14 September. The cameras record to a hard drive where footage can later be retrieved, such as in this case. In total, three cameras were stolen, one off the building at Mac’s Auto and two from the building further up the road on the corner of High Street and Cuyler.…
Last week, Grocott’s Mail reported on a landmark court order upheld by the high court on behalf of the Ezihagweni Street Committee and Mary Water High School, compelling the Makana Municipality to eradicate illegal dumpsites in the city. The municipality agreed to the court order, which requires it to clean up seven illegal dumpsites in the city’s poorer areas by the end of next week. The court order also ruled that the municipality work with communities identify all other illegal dumpsites within 30 days and then clear all illegal dumpsites within 120 days. The municipality must also provide three plastic bags…
By SUE MACLENNAN Makhanda vets in private practice are joining forces with the State Veterinarian in a campaign to vaccinate the town’s dogs against rabies. This comes as outbreaks are reported in Nelson Mandela Bay and Buffalo City Metro municipalities. According to local vets, no rabies cases have been reported among domestic animals in Makhanda for several years; however, three cases in surrounding areas were reported in 2020 – two wildlife and one domestic. “In Makhanda itself this year, there have been no positive rabies cases,” said Grahamstown State Veterinarian Sivuyile Tabankulu. The last positive case in a domestic animal…
Dozens of soup kitchens have sprung up in Makhanda, providing a nutritional and psychosocial lifeline to thousands in our depressed economy. LOYISO DYONGMAN visited two of them. Lulama Maseti, 34, is a mother of two from Extension 8 who runs her Masibambisane Soup Kitchen from home. She is unemployed and lives with her two kids and mom. She said they depend on her mother’s pension and Child Support grants to buy food. But a slice of that money goes to groceries for the soup kitchen. “I started this soup kitchen after noticing how many breadwinners in my community had lost…
By CHRIS TOTOBELA A few years back, the Onceya sisters – Phumza and Blondie – noticed a disturbing decline in youth participation in sport. Shebeens and taverns were packed to the rafters while the playing fields stood empty. This spurred them into action. They mobilised young girls in Tantyi and started the Misoyethu Netball club in June 2019. The team has since grown in leaps and bounds with enthusiastic support from the surrounding community. Misoyethu has a U13 team and a U18 team that regularly plays friendly matches, and the club recently won a tournament – a huge morale booster…
By FRANCES BAILEY During a recent Daily Maverick webinar, associate editor Marianne Thamm led a conversation with English historian Michael Burleigh, who has just launched his latest tome, The Day of the Assassins: A History of Political Murder. Burleigh strays from the archetypal depiction of the assassin as a lone gunman who stalks the shadows and aims at unsuspecting victims. Instead, he paints a picture of history that shows how the assassin is entwined with political and day-to-day life and captures our imaginations as we speculate on what went on behind some of history’s most infamous hits. Beginning with the murder…
By KIRAN MOLLOY A creative vision for the National Arts Festival (NAF) in 2030 has been curated in the form of a 360-degree virtual collage of images, poems, letters, videos, voice notes and sound recordings by past festival participants and attendees. The participants were asked to write letters to themselves from the future with the prompt: What will the festival look like in ten years’ time? Covid-19 has severely affected many arts, culture, music, literary, art and comedy festivals celebrated throughout the country, including our own. In response, and in collaboration with Future Festivals, Rhodes University, King’s College London, the…
By KEITH GOTTSCHALK, Political Scientist, University of the Western Cape The popularity of the African National Congress (ANC), which has governed South Africa since the end of apartheid in 1994, has slipped in successive elections from its high of over 60%. Nonetheless, the official opposition, the Democratic Alliance (DA), shows no sign of benefiting from the ANC’s slack – hardly reaching even 30% of the votes cast. Instead, the ANC’s numbers have been absorbed by small, mostly new parties. Inevitably, South Africa is in for many decades of coalitions. This is the central theme of a new book, Marriages of Inconvenience: The Politics of Coalitions in…