Being blind or visually impaired means many things in life are simply much more difficult than what they are for other people. Some of these things we can do something about, others we can’t. There are two fundamentally different ways for society and governments to respond to this unpleasant reality. The one option is pity and non-integration - the other is to forget about pity and to take practical steps to make things as equal as possible so that blind people can integrate into society.
Marcus Low
Opinion | 18 November 2015
Suspended Police Commissioner Riah Phiyega has had a difficult year. Suspended by President Jacob Zuma following the Farlam Commission report which called for an investigation into her fitness to hold office for among other things tampering with evidence and lying, she now faces significant findings against her from an inquiry by the Minister of Police Nathi Nhleko.
Craig Oosthuizen and Zackie Achmat
Analysis | 13 November 2015
The current wave of student protests in South Africa has been mostly analysed from a national and local perspective.
Achille Mbembe
Opinion | 13 November 2015
Masiphumelele residents who have been promised a new mobile police station will have to wait until the police decide it’s safe to install it.
Thembela Ntongana
News | 12 November 2015
Police used rubber bullets and stun grenades today against waste pickers protesting at a dump site in Pietermaritzburg against plans to stop them collecting on the site.
Ntombi Mbomvu
News | 11 November 2015
No vacant posts in Eastern Cape public hospitals and clinics are to be filled until December, according to a departmental circular. The Rural Health Advocacy Project fears that if such measures continue it could have “catastrophic consequences for health care”, especially in the rural areas.
Ashleigh Furlong
News | 9 November 2015
Democratic Alliance (DA) shadow minister for police, MP Zakhele Mbhele, replies to Murray Hunter's DA's shadow bill misses the key point on the National Key Points Act.
Zakhele Mbhele
News | 9 November 2015
Free higher education for all privileges the rich, argues Nico Cloete of the Centre for Higher Education Trust (CHET).
Nico Cloete
Analysis | 8 November 2015
Students at Iqhayiya Secondary School in Khayelitsha claim that they are subjected to corporal punishment, have to pay school fees when they are a no fee school and are unable to be members of organisations such as Equal Education.
Ashleigh Furlong
News | 6 November 2015
About three hundred people from in and around QQ community, Khayelitsha, gathered at Matthew Goniwe Memorial High School for the memorial service of Zuziwe Ngcibi and her grade 12 daughter, Zikhona, who died in the early hours of 19 October in a fire that hit six homes in the informal settlement. The family could not escape as the blaze came through the only door.
Bernard Chiguvare
News | 6 November 2015
Lead by two of District Six’s oldest surviving evictees, communities from across the Cape Flats marched on the mayor’s offices on Wednesday. They demanded a dignified return to the city for families forcibly removed during apartheid.
Daneel Knoetze
News | 5 November 2015
The $20-million partnership between pharmaceutical giant Pfizer and South Africa's Biovac Institute was “the beginning of the establishment of vaccine manufacturing capabilities on the continent”, science and technology minister Naledi Pandor told GroundUp.
Sarah Wild
News | 4 November 2015
On 5 October, GroundUp reported that the pharmaceutical company Sandoz had stopped supplying an essential medicine for treating tuberculosis (TB) to South Africa.
GroundUp Staff
Brief | 2 November 2015
About 100 people gathered in front of the Grahamstown City Hall to protest against the xenophobic violence that has hit the town and surrounding townships for more than a week.
By Hancu Louw
News | 30 October 2015
The University of Cape Town (UCT) has agreed, in principle, to employ its workers directly, and charges were dropped against 23 protesters. But at Wits, students and reporters were intimidated by protesters. Here are reports of today's protest activities from Cape Town, East London and Johannesburg.
GroundUp staff
News | 28 October 2015
Despite the South African Schools Act prohibiting the use of corporal punishment, caning continues in many schools. Now a Pietermaritzburg mother has had enough, and she's laid a complaint with the police against her son's school principal.
Ntombi Mbomvu
News | 28 October 2015