The Daily Discourse

For a few months since the lockdown we have been receiving videos, text and audio messages from those in jail about the harsh conditions they are facing. They complain about overcrowding and prison officials not taking care of them. They’ve also sent pictures of injures prisoners painting a very gloomy picture. Also calling on officials to allow visitations from family members. Let’s hear now from...

Veteran South African Actress, Mary Twala- Mhlongo, has been described as a legend - someone who was good at her craft, with a great sense of humour. Twala- Mhlongo - who was 80 - passed away at the Park Lane Hospital in Johannesburg on Saturday. She had an extensive career in film and TV, and was recently awarded The Order of Ikhamanga in Silver by President Cyril Ramaphosa. Pearl Magubane filed...

The Fair-Trade Independent Tobacco Association is continuing its fight through the courts to force government to lift the ban on the sale of cigarettes. They have applied for leave to appeal the ruling of the Pretoria High Court. Last month the court dismissed the association's application to have the ban on the sale of cigarettes and tobacco products during the lockdown period lifted. The other p...

The incident of Bulalani Qolani, the man who was thrown out of his shack naked got many people angry. The footage was widely circulated on social media and on news bulletins. The City of Cape Town felt justified as they say that piece of land is earmarked for a water project. This incident makes us question the practice of evictions under the lockdown. Was the city correct or should they have wait...

Basic Education Minister, Angie Motshekga has acknowledged that since the Grade seven and 12 learners went back to school last month - there have been some unfortunate instances where learners, teachers and non-teaching staff have died of Covid-19 related illnesses. Eleven teachers, four non-teaching staff and three learners have died as a result of Covid-19. Motshekga was conducting an online med...

So many of us are feeling down and worried about developments taking place around us. People are losing jobs while the Covid-19 cases continue to rise. Politicians on the other hand are not making the situation better. How then are we expected to remain positive and hopeful? How does one channel your mind to see things differently? Well let’s pose this question to someone who deals with this subje...

So many people these days are buying gadgets for their children and all of them have their own reasons why they do that. Children then use these gadgets to access the internet. The scary thing is that 39% of South African parents don’t have an idea of their children are doing on the net. This is according to a Responsible Digital Parenting survey. Guest: Andrey Sidenko – Lead web content analyst a...

The Media24 Book Awards has been criticized severely for a lack of diversity. This after 2020 awards went to white authors. The breakdown is that the awards went to six white males and one white female. The 18 judges were made up of only two blacks. Why are we seeing this still 26 years into our democracy? Guest: Fred Khumalo – Journalist and judge at the 2020 Media24 Book Awards Guest: Pauli van...

LINK: Let’s speak now to someone who has also recovered to get an understanding of what it’s like to go through such an experience. Her name is Morongwa Mokwena, someone who is said to be health conscious and exercises regularly. She is based at the SABC’s Cape Town office…. Guest: Morongwa Mokwena – SABC TV News Archivist based in Cape Town

As you’ve hear about the appointment of Nuclear physicist Professor Zeblon Vilakazi to the position of vice-chancellor and principal of Wits University with effect from January 1 2021, we thought to invite him for a chat on his appointment and the direction he will be steering the institution into. He is taking over from Prof Adam Habib who is leaving the university to head the School of Oriental...

Often when we hear about retrenchments and the unemployment stats, we look at the issue as a number and never put a face to it. Well this morning we hear directly from an affected employee about what it’s like to lose your job and the kind of mental battle one has to deal with Guest: Kgalalelo – SAA employee

The township economy is often mentioned in political speeches during election time. Politicians talk so much about improving township economy with no real results. Well let’s talk now about an initiative by the Youth Employment Service called Masks4All. It is sold as a way that could show the way for township businesses to improve their quality and competitiveness to the point that they can tap no...

Yesterday the ANC’s Secretary-General Ace Magashule announced that the ANC is supporting the call to merge the country's national, provincial and local government elections. He was briefing the media on the outcomes of the NEC meeting held over the weekend. Magashule says that they will be engaging other parties on the issue. Let’s listen to what he had to say…. Guest: Terry Tselane - Executive Ch...

Auditor-General Kimi Makwetu has blamed municipalities’ failure to adhere to prescribed regulations for the increase in irregular and wasteful spending to 32 billion rand in the 2018/2019 financial year. This as an increase of 7-billion rand from the previous financial year. Only 20 of the country's 257 municipalities received clean audits, most of them in the Western Cape and Gauteng. Apart from...

****CLIP OF BOB MARLEY, PETER TOSH AND LUCKY DUBE** Focus: Today is International Reggae Day, something very big to those who appreciate the genre. As you’ve heard just now from Bob Marley, Peter Tosh and our own Lucky Dube as to how they describe the genre. UNESCO, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, has added reggae to its list of cultural institutions worthy of...

On our health feature today, we talk all things about the ear. Many people suffer from ear infections which we don’t really take seriously. We expose our ears to so much, from dust, earphones, loud music and so on. How many of us really pay attention to how we should treat our ears? Things like infections, how seriously do we take them? GUEST: Dr Makhosonke Maseko – Ear, Nose and Throat Specialist...

Agriculture is one of those very important sectors in the world because it talks to food security. But now with the Covid-19 upon us, experts are worried about the sector and the sort of impact this may have. What should we be worried about the most? Guest: Rodney Managa – Researcher at Africa Institute of South Africa research programme in the Human Sciences Research Council (He is currently comp...

Today (Wed 1st July 2020), the Protection of Personal Information Act kicks in. This brings to an end the sale of personal information and warning to transgressors as those guilty face very heavy fines of up to R10-million. What is it we should know about this? GUEST: Sizwe Snail kaMtuze- Attorney and part-time member of the Information Regulator

Judge Dennis Davis yesterday (Tuesday) criticised SAA’s business rescue practitioners for what he called “faffing around” for six months. This he said during an appeal against a labour court ruling in May ordering them to halt planned retrenchments at the airline. Earlier in the week the Department of Public Enterprises withdrew from the forum that was supposed to develop a new business plan for t...

Today being Tuesday, we continue bringing you the UIF representative to field your questions and deal with your problems. Please remember to keep your questions very brief and listen on the radio for answers. GUEST: Tshiamo Molema – Manager for Monitoring and Evaluation in the Commissioner’s Office

Malawi's new President Lazarus Chakwera has officially been sworn-in as the new President. He took his oath of office following victory in the rerun election on Tuesday, that's being seen as a democratic first in Sub-Saharan Africa. He defeated incumbent, Peter Mutharika with just over 58-percent of the vote. Regional electoral observer bodies from the African continent and beyond did not deploy t...

Today being the last Tuesday of the month Bryan devotes it to answering questions that have been submitted to him during the month. He picks out all those questions of a similar nature and deal with them. Next week we will carry on with part 3 of the cornerstone of the financial plan. Part 1 and 2, namely estate planning, is available on podcast. GUEST : Bryan Hirsch, Chairperson of Bryan Hirsch,...

Transport Minister Fikile Mbalula addressed the media yesterday (Monday) on easing regulations for the aviation industry. He then made interesting comments saying flights could operate at 100% capacity – inviting as many passengers as possible on board – due to the fact that the filtration system on-board every aircraft has the capacity to “eat the virus”. Guest: Lobang Thabantso – Acting senior M...

Pressure continues to mount on the healthcare system in the Eastern Cape. This is due to the ever-rising number of positive Coronavirus cases in the province. Its healthcare system is under immense pressure as the number of high-care and ICU beds are increasingly in demand. The Eastern Cape has the second highest number of positive COVID-19 cases which stands at 23-thousand-658, with 384 fatalitie...

We get reaction now from creative sector about President Cyril Ramaphosa’s decision to refer the Copyright Amendment Bill back to Parliament. The industry says that this move by the president could dash the future education and employment prospects of millions more young South Africans. What exactly are they worried about and what impact will it have on them? Guest: Jack Devnarain – Chair of the S...