In the media
|
19 May 2013
The Sunday Argus
The Arms deal commission has been accused of intimidating witnesses by demanding to know how they obtained their documents.
The commission warned witnesses it would not accept unlawfully obtained evidence and that they must state whether their information was classified.
The commission – which was set up by President Jacob Zuma to probe the controversial multibillion-rand arms procurement deal – is still reluctant to subpoena the ANC or its officials.
|
16 May 2013
Pretoria News
Laywers for Human Rights are set on paving the way for future land reform and creating a precedent on how displaced communities will settle with support from the government in future.
|
|
16 May 2013
IRIN News
When Jean Baptiste*, a medical student from Lubumbashi, in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), arrived in South Africa in September 2012, he headed straight for Cape Town, where he knew he would be able to stay with his brother. No one at the border told him that it was no longer possible to apply for asylum in Cape Town.
He has since approached the city’s Refugee Reception Office (RRO) 18 times to try to secure an asylum seeker permit and become documented, but he has never made it past the security guards outside.
|
1 May 2013
Beeld
’n Hofbeslissing dat kinders wat onwettig in die land is in openbare skole opgeneem móét word, gaan groot druk op ’n reeds oorlaaide openbare onderwysstelsel plaas.
Dit is die reaksie van onderwysorganisasies op die uitspraak vandeesweek in die Pretoriase hooggeregshof.
Ingevolge die beslissing moet skole kinders inneem wat van hul ouers of wettige voogde geskei is en net deur ’n volwasse familielid vergesel word. Dit verwys ook na kinders wat die departement van binnelandse sake nie as asielsoekers registreer nie.
|
|
30 April 2013
IRIN News
South Africa's flawed asylum system
South Africa attracts the largest number of asylum seekers in the world, but grants refugee status to very few of them, ranking only thirty-sixth in the world for the size of its refugee population, which the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) puts at about 58,000.
The Department of Home Affairs, the government ministry tasked with managing the asylum system, approved just 15.5 percent of the applications it processed in 2011, less than half the global average recognition rate of 38 percent, according to UNHCR.
|
30 April 2013
Pretoria News
Lawyers for Human Rights has scored a first-round victory for the rights of eight children seeking asylum in South Africa, but who have been separated from their parents for various reasons. The children – aged from six to 16 – may now for the first time enter South Africa’s education system.
|
|
29 April 2013
Pretoria News
When a decision to eradicate hostels around Tshwane was taken, the “good news” was welcomed by those who lived in the hostels and the community alike.
These included hostel dwellers in Mamelodi, Atteridegville and Soshanguve townships.
|
29 April 2013
Pretoria News
The Tshwane municipality and the Gauteng Department of Housing and Human Settlements have spent millions of rand of ratepayers’ money on a block of apartments that do not meet building requirements fit for people to live in.
In one of the most glaring examples of how corruption and mismanagement in the city affects people desperate for housing, the municipality and the province paid more than R85 million for 104 units that are less than 50m2 each.
|
|
29 April 2013
Business Day
The Supreme Court of Appeal will on Thursday hear an appeal against a judgment by the Land Claims Court over the Baphiring community in North West, which is seeking to regain title to what it says are its ancestral lands.
This comes at a time when the government has spent R69bn on land reform since 1994, with only about 8% of the targeted land redistributed. The government had initially planned to redistribute 30% of the land by next year, a target which it has since abandoned.
|
25 April 2013
Mail & Guardian Online
Three rights groups are taking two state departments and DRD Gold to court to reveal information about the firm's re-mining operation in Riverlea.
The community was forcibly moved to the area in the 1960s, occupying land around the abandoned mine dump that towers above their houses. On a previous visit, the residents told the Mail & Guardian that the mine had been a minor problem in the past. But then mining company DRD Gold came and started digging into the dump to find gold.
|