Who Will Pay for South Africa's New Electricity Plan?

Picture: Pibmak Saliem Fakir - Two weeks ago Cabinet approved the new 20-year electricity plan also called the Integrated Resource Plan (IRP 2010-2030). Without getting into too much detail about the new plan, simply put - coal is down, while nuclear and renewables are up. The IRP, like all plans, is changeable subject to the vagaries of our political economy and the availability of public finances to pay for the new fleet of power plants envisaged by the plan. The unsaid, though, is who’s going to pay and how for...

Cornel West and the Fight against Injustice in America

Video President Barack Obama came to the White House on a wave of popular discontent with the way the country was being run. His election cry "change we can believe in," inspired millions of Americans to head to the polls. Now after two years in power much of that initial optimism and euphoria has dissipated. America remains largely an unequal society socially, economically and racially. The rich have got richer and the number of poor has steadily climbed. The country remains at war in...

There's No Business like War Business

Picture: Ammar Abd Rabbo Pepe Escobar - Lies, hypocrisy and hidden agendas. This is what United States President Barack Obama did not dwell on when explaining his Libya doctrine to America and the world. The mind boggles with so many black holes engulfing this splendid little war that is not a war (a "time-limited, scope-limited military action", as per the White House) - compounded with the inability of progressive thinking to condemn, at the same time, the ruthlessness of the Muammar Gaddafi regime and the...

Intervention in Soweto Education Crisis Could Chart Way For National Solution

Picture: Phil @ Delfryn Design Ebrahim-Khalil Hassen - Every so often, while on the way to the office, I would stop at the department of education’s district office, which covers Lenasia, Soweto and surrounds to ask the assembled workers why they were protesting.  I would quiz the workers about their demands. To be clear, there are times when ‘wild cat’ strikes are needed and obviously there were deeper issues under the surface that needed to be addressed. However, I always left with a deep sense of disappointment that...

Only Protected on Paper

Picture: theredroom.org Richard Pithouse - It’s now almost three months since David Kato, a former teacher and a leading Ugandan gay rights activist, was beaten to death in Mukono Town in Uganda.  Kato was living in Johannesburg in the salad days of our new democracy and, inspired by the progress made here in recognising the legal right of gay people to an equal humanity, he became a key figure in the Ugandan movement when he returned home in 1998.  Homosexuality was first criminalised in Uganda in the 19th century...

'This is Economic Treason': 500,000 March in London Protesting Public Spending Cuts and Corporate Tax Dodgers

Video As many as 500,000 protesters marched in London on Saturday to protest Britain’s deepest cuts to public spending since World War II. The protests come after U.K. officials estimated corporate taxes would be reduced even as it tackles a $235 billion deficit and plans to cut more than 300,000 public sector jobs. Meanwhile, in the United States protesters gathered in 40 cities on Saturday to oppose tax cuts for the wealthy amid budget cuts to public services. Democracy Now broadcasts a...