The Daily Discourse

  As part of our broadcast, we explore the opportunities available to expand astrotourism in South Africa. For those of you who are unfamiliar with the term, Astrotourism is a global term for witnessing stargazing and celestial events in nature. Often, these destinations are found in smaller communities away from the pollution of the cities. This provides an opportunity for less traditional touris...

Guest: Shamila 

For our Municipal Watch feature today we turn our focus on the state of municipalities in the Free State. Some of them have not been able to file their financial statements to the Auditor General. On the other hand, a lack of water provision and electricity is still a major problem as resident do call into this show on a weekly basis to talk about their experiences. We invited the MEC for Corporat...

Earlier this month, we received a couple of calls from entrepreneurs complaining about the devastating impact of late payments from the government to their business. We reached out to the Department of Treasury in Kwa-Zulu Natal to give them the opportunity to respond to the challenges they are facing the provincial budget and how they will find ways to pay SMMEs on time so they can continue to re...

Millions of South Africans are struggling to get home financing to afford an entry level home (R300 000) and few can get acces to home financing. Furthermore, there is a backlog of over 2 million homes on the RDP programme list. Some experts and civil society organizations believe that Social Housing should be considered as an intervention that may be able to help bridge the gap for first-time hom...

The 23rd of September marks the African New Year which is referred to as Inzalo yeLanga said to be the world's oldest stone calendar. According to some African historians, the best way to mark it was through the dry season, which comes after winter, then followed by the rainy season. Communities would then start preparing their fields in anticipation of the rain, this also marking the start of the...

Keeping with the theme of Heritage Month, we turn our attention one of the country's legendary warrior, King Mzilikazi kaMashobane. The book uncovers the life of King Mzilikazi through first-hand accounts from his descendants while capturing the journey through Southern Africa. The book's author now joins us in studio to talk about why he decided to bring us the story of King Mzilikazi out of so m...

Yesterday (Sunday 22 Sep) marked 100 days since the Government of National Unity came into effect. There has been mixed reactions to far with some commentators saying it will not last while others believing that it should be given a chance. The recent signing of the BELA Bill was test case that saw a public spat between the ANC and the DA while the SACP and COSATU calling on the ruling party to no...

Our next guest hails from the streets of Klerksdorp in the North West. We first met on our TV screens back in 2017 as part of the top 16 in South African Idol. Since the first breakthrough, she has worked alongside heavyweights in house such as MasterKG, Makhadzi, Nkosazana the Daughter, Ntokzin, Azana and Prince KB.   She has recently won a Basadi Women in Music Award alongside DJ Zinhle with the...

In this hour, we want to reflect on heritage in South Africa and how we have not built collective heritage in the post-democratic era. There may be some segments of our society that define heritage through culture and historical events. Other segments of society have used the day for braais. The broader conversation we are trying to hold considers how a nation builds heritage and what we consider...

Miyelani Holeni joins us today to discuss the practicalities of public private partnerships at municipal level. In a country like ours where politics is everything in a municipality, how can the private sector be ropes in? Some suggestions were made to run municipalities like a business which could perhaps help in changing the way municipalities are run, but with so much happening not forgetting t...

Tomorrow (Friday) marks the last day of National Wills Week and we bring you another perspective, this time from the Justice Department. Over the years many families were split by the discovery that they were left out of the Will, mostly by men who either did not tell their wives that they have another family or in a polygamous marriage. There's just so many incidents of this nature in our country...

As we continue to track the year of elections, we take amoment to reflect on the latest developments in one of thelargest election processes this year: the United States of America. The nation has seen a change in presidential nomination and two assassination attempts on a presidentialnomination. Two conventions have set the stage for presidential candidates Donald Trump (R) and Kamala Harris (D)...

Guest: Sello Chipu - Head of Human Settlements at the City of Tshwane Guest: Joseph Bracken - Journalist at Ground Up ( Did extensive investigation in KZN on the issue Guest:   Ciaran Ryan -  Johannesburg based freelance writer (Wrote an article for MoneyWeb) HE will leave at 10:30 Yesterday (Tuesday) we received a call from one of our listeners by the name Happy from Centurion in Pretoria. He spo...

Guest (Studio):  Mr Deven Chinappan - Chief Director: Human Capital Management and Organizational Design at the Department of a Social Development Social Development Minister Sisisi Tolashe stressed the need for the employment of more social workers to deal with the social ills faced by the country. She was addressing her department’s two-day workshop under the theme: ‘enhancing collaboration with...

This morning, Bryan revisits the importance of having a Will. This is because we are marking National Wills week. He will also answer the questions from last week’s show about how do insurance companies deal with members smoking Marijuana.  Guest: Bryan Hirsch, Chairperson of Bryan Hirsch, Colley & Associates (Pty) Limited

We speak now to Youth Capital about a very important issue they have been following on the status of thousands of teaching assistants across the country. The organization wrote to the Acting Director General of the Department of Employment and Labour (DEL) and the Commissioner of the Unemployment Insurance Fund (UIF) on the disbursement of funding to the Basic Education Employment Initiative. The...

Focus:  As political parties threaten each other over the BELA Bill, another matter that may fall through the cracks is that thousands of teachers stand to lose their jobs. This follows reports of provincial budget cuts. The Western Cape is one of the provinces that have already been notified, while other provinces are holding talks between MECs and unions. To try and understand what is really goi...

Last year we spoke to the Tshiamiso Trust,  which was setup to payout compensation funds to former  mineworkers who contracted silicosis and tuberculosis  while working for some of the mines in the country. So far it has paid out R1.5-billion since it started processing claims in 2021. These funds are not only for South African mine workers, but also those based in other countries, but work here....

On Monday we received a couple of calls from entrepreneurs complaining about the devastating impact of late payments from the government to their business. A very worrying report by the National Treasury has revealed that in 2023/24 national and provincial departments failed to pay R35bn to suppliers within 30 days, as required by law.  Guest : Mr Cameron Jacobs - Chief Director: Governance Monito...

This morning, we try something new. We venture into classical music and more specifically - Opera. This genre is in full bloom in South Africa as many talented performers have made a breakthrough on international stages around the world: Pretty Yende, Zanne Stapelberg, Phumeza Matshikiza, Golda Schultz and many more. Our next guest is renowned in his own right and is building a new generation of p...

Last year on the 19th of May, we spoke to representatives from the Matatiele Local Municipality after a video showing young children crossing a river where there was no bridge. The bridge was swept away by a storm. They came on the show promising to fix that bridge and other infrastructure. They also promised to come back on the show to give feedback, but since then, they kept on postponing the di...

September being Heritage Month, we speak to Prof Nogwaja Zulu from the University of KwaZulu-Natal about the cross-language usage in some South African languages. He gives examples of common words in English, Afrikaans, isiZulu, Sesotho and other South African languages. He goes on to say that this happened when European languages came into contact with third-world countries during the period of m...

The story of the rise in cases of extortions around the country has been dominating the headlines for about a month now. Four provinces make up 73% of crimes related to extortion: Kwa-Zulu Natal, Eastern Cape, Gauteng & Western Cape. Extortion has been linked to basic services, businesses, infrastructure, transport system and Nightlife. Last week on our Citizens Corner, we spoke to some of the...

Mozambican are heading to the polls on the 9th of October this year. Voters will cast ballots for President, parliament and regional authorities an election, in which the current 69-year-old President Filipe Nyusi cannot stand for another term. The country has been led by the ruling FRELIMO since independence. So today we are looking at the political dynamics at play and whether new players stand...