Cees Bruggemans, Consulting Economist at Bruggemans & Associates, sees hope and a brighter future for South Africa… BREAK IN THE CLOUDS by Cees Bruggemans It must be difficult to believe, with Eskom an ever bigger albatross around our necks, an imploding post office, and so from one scandal to the next. But there are breaks […]

Check out the photos below and see if you can figure out which picture is from which city – Johannesburg or Los Angeles? Scroll down and count how many images are of LA. (Hint: your answer should be somewhere between 6 and 13). The answers are beneath each pic. Just click on the picture number to […]

When it comes to languages, South Africa – the land of 11 official languages – truly is in shift. As the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) News channel said it would be axing Afrikaans and several other-language bulletins from its 24-hour news service, the government announced that Mandarin has been approved as an optional subject at […]

The reaction to Trevor Noah’s appointment as the successor to the haloed and revered Jon Stewart on his satiric ‘The Daily Show’ has quickly drawn extremes of reaction across the United States. On Twitter, there were plenty of questions. “Who?” “ Wait, who?” The South African comedian himself tweeted, “No-one can replace Jon Stewart. But together […]

Everyone knows about Table Mountain and the Waterfront, but what about the hidden secrets waiting to be discovered in Cape Town? For all the out-of-towners and overseas visitors, here’s  the lowdown from locals on where to go and what to do next time you’re in the Mother City. 1. Drive to Constantia Nek Stop at the […]

Jenna Lowe’s mom Gabi has posted a message to her daughter’s #GetMetTo21 Facebook page asking everyone to “please keep her in your thoughts and prayers” as the 20-year-old has unfortunately suffered some health set backs in the past few weeks since receiving her new set of lungs in December 2014. The Western Cape youngster became a […]

South African cricket captain AB de Villiers and coach Russell Domingo will arrive home in South Africa, after their awesome performance at the Cricket World Cup 2015, in the early hours of this morning. Their flight – SA 281 from Perth – will land at 04h40 and the two will address the media at a […]

From 6 April, anyone on a South African passport going to live in the UK for longer than six months will need to pay a ‘health surcharge’ in order to gain access to the UK’s National Health Service (NHS). The new ruling – announced this month by the British Home Office – will affect all temporary, non-European […]

The South African Post Office (SAPO) has responded to the photos that have been doing the rounds on social media depicting so-called chaos at the PO’s International Mailing Hub at OR Tambo International Airport in Johannesburg. The photos by Facebook user Werner Leonard (which have since been removed) sparked rumours of “mayhem” at the PO’s international […]

Former tennis great Bob Hewitt has been found guilty in a Johannesburg court of raping several underage girls he was meant to be coaching in the 1980s and ’90s. Australian-born Hewitt, a former Grand Slam doubles champion, had been accused of rape by two women and of sexual assault by a third. Suellen Sheehan, who […]

The auction of South African art at Bonhams in London last week might have been slightly less record-setting than in other years, but two art legends once again came out on top – Irma Stern and Jacob Hendrik Pierneef – with their paintings fetching millions. Stern’s “Fisherman, Madeira” sold for £338,500 (R6.1 million) making it the highest […]

A man from Hanover Park in Cape Town is inspiring young students with his long and dedicated journey to education. Eric van der Byl spent four years walking 34 km every day to get to university and home again. His long walk ended with his graduation this week. And already he is employed and teaching the next generation […]

The daughter of missing South African yachtsman Reginald ‘Reg’ Robertson has issued another plea today – on her dad’s birthday – for people around the world to please help in the search for the lost catamaran on which her father and two other South African men are sailing. All contact with the yacht , a Leopard 44 […]

1. Some people seem to believe that Johannesburg is a beautiful place. 2. They make ridiculous claims about it being the largest man-made forest in the world. 3. But this makes no sense. 4. Because in reality the place is a practically a desert. 5. Nothing exciting ever happens there. 6. There is literally nowhere […]

As protests calling for the removal of the Cecil John Rhodes statue at the University of Cape Town (UCT) make headlines around the world, Capetonian Alastair During – who has walked past that statue many times as a UCT student – shares his reactions and realisations about  the protest. A Statue by Any Other Name…by Ali During When […]

Kirstenbosch National Botanical Garden has done it again. The diverse Cape floral kingdom has been awarded top position in the  2015 International Garden Tourism Awards. This comes just a couple of weeks after Kirstenbosch’s suspended walkway, the Boomslang, was declared Most Beautiful Object in South Africa at Design Indaba Expo 2015. These awards highlight the significant role that Kirstenbosch […]

South African dentist Jaco Marx from Bethlehem, Free State, has today been named the winner of the South Africa National Award, part of the prestigious 2015 Sony World Photography Awards. Marx captured his winning image during a rare sighting of a Brown hyena in Namibia. The image, named ‘Strandwolf’, was selected as the single best photograph taken […]

A humble car guard made newspaper headlines in Durban on Friday thanks to both his integrity and that of those who benefitted from his principles. This story is republished here with kind permission of journalist Mariclair Smit and the Northglen News in uMhlanga: Residents Surprise Selfless uMhlanga Car Guard by Mariclair Smit It has often been said, […]

If you haven’t heard the name Michael Andrew, stay tuned. He could be the next Michael in swimming after Michael Phelps, except this Michael has roots in South Africa. In fact, the 15-year-old swimming sensation has been on a three-month trip to South Africa visiting family, but also taking part in several competitions, such as […]

The thing with solar-powered cars is that you can only drive them during the day. It’s a problem solved by Nigerian student Segun Oyeyiola, who added a wind turbine to his Beetle. Now he can drive all night, too. It cost the Nigerian man more than R70 000 to fight his personal battle against global warming […]

Congratulations to writer and editor Ivan Vladislavić who has won the prestigious Yale University Windham-Campbell Prize for fiction.  Vladislavić says he has been “in a bit of a daze” since hearing the news, and that he will use the $150 000 (almost R1.8-million) cash prize “to pursue my own work in a way that’s never been possible […]

The KwaZulu-Natal Provincial Government has allocated R12.060 billion to spend on various infrastructure projects in the province during 2015/16 financial year.   “The province is budgeting to spend R12.060 billion in 2015/16, R11.804 billion in 2016/17 and R12.196 billion in 2017/18 on various infrastructure projects. This equates to R36.060 billion over the 2015/16 MTEF,” said […]

With their long trunks, elephants have a remarkable sense of smell. Now, a South African is training a group of the pachyderms to smell out explosives and narcotics. The US army hopes to understand the biology and turn it into science. You’ve heard of sniffer dogs and rats trained to detect landmines; now get ready […]

We just love these photos of South Africa that Derrick Watterson has taken during his trips back home to Durban. Like so many others who’ve left South Africa’s shores, there’s no greater appreciation of the uniqueness of SA than when you no longer live here. Derrick, who moved to the UK 14 years ago, takes regular trips back to South […]

Last month the Department of Home Affairs announced plans about the rollout of its new Smartcard IDs and passports. It also said that in order to alleviate queues at its offices – which many have been complaining about – it had come to an agreement with several banks to have kiosks at their branches (and also […]