Over the past few weeks, as the South African government has sought to show that it has a handle on the surge in xenophobic activities and issues relating to immigration, it has drawn attention to its record in the deportation of undocumented foreigners, as well as its efforts in repatriation programmes. Refugee Digest 101 – […]
Substance abuse among the youth in South Africa is a severe and growing public health crisis, with the country having some of the highest alcohol and drug consumption rates in the Southern African region. The Minister in the Presidency responsible for Women, Youth and Persons with Disabilities, Sindisiwe Chikunga, cautioned young people against the growing […]
The 16th of June 2026 marked 50 years since the Soweto uprising, when thousands of school children took to the streets to protest the imposition of Afrikaans as a compulsory medium of instruction under the apartheid government’s system of Bantu Education, and were met with bullets. The deep-seated cause was the Bantu Education Act of […]
Amidst the ongoing xenophobic actions, the strengthening of exclusionary and populist narratives, and the heartrending realities of repatriation, a recent judgement of the Constitutional Court1 provides a step forward in securing a measure of justice around the vexed question of the exclusion of asylum seekers from accessing documentation necessary for them to stay in the […]
Gender Based Violence (GBV) has been declared a disaster and a pandemic which casts a long shadow of violence and suffering across our society intergenerationally. Gendered norms are not independent of the social, economic and cultural conditions in which they are shaped. Tandi Nzimande, the Chief Executive Officer at the GBVF Response Fund, emphasizes that […]
“Since 2008 – when 62 people, including 21 South Africans, 11 Mozambicans, 5 Zimbabweans and 3 Somalis, were killed – South Africa has been grappling with intermittent but widespread xenophobic harassment and violence against African and Asian foreign nationals living in the country, whether refugees, asylum seekers, or both documented and undocumented migrants”.1 BP 652 […]
The various marches on June 30th against the presence of African foreigners in South Africa seemed to go off without the degree of chaos, violence and destruction that many people were afraid of. Among the many lessons that can be drawn from the day, and from the campaign preceding it, at least three concern issues […]
The Congo Basin is one of the most strategically important ecological areas on the planet. As a true pillar of global climate balance, this vast forested region plays a crucial role in climate regulation, the preservation of biodiversity, and the survival of millions of people who depend on its natural resources. BP 651 – An […]
The notion of the deep state has become common in recent decades. It refers to the existence, real or imagined, of an unelected and permanent coterie of state officials, often including members of the security services, who conspire to run a country independently of, and even contrary to, the intentions of the duly elected governing […]
The Sanitary Dignity Programme (SDP) is a national initiative launched in 2019 to mitigate period poverty by providing free sanitary products to vulnerable learners in non-fee-paying schools (quintiles 1, 2, and 3), farm schools, and special-needs schools. It is led by the Department of Women, Youth and Persons with Disabilities (DWYPD) in collaboration with the […]
