Latest news:

New policy for street people

by

The City is developing a new strategy to reduce homelessness, and help people living on the street, but lack of data is a drawback

In its new policy on homelessness currently being developed, the City of Cape Town acknowledges a lack of accurate data on the number of homeless people in the city.… Read more

Strandfontein development could push butterfly into extinction

by

The only colony of one of the world’s most endangered butterflies is within sight of an ambitious new urban coastal node

A large, multi-storey development proposed at Strandfontein could put one of the rarest butterflies in the world at even greater risk of extinction, and decrease endangered biodiversity for which Cape Town is famous.… Read more

President orders task team for housing on public land

by

The State Land Disposal Act allows the President to fast track the use of public land

By Matthew Hirsch/GroundUp

President Cyril Ramaphosa has instructed the ministers of Human Settlements and Public Works to investigate demands by housing activists for land to be redistributed to communities, says Presidency spokesperson Vincent Magwenya.… Read more

Khayelitsha Music Academy hopes to change lives

by

Two township musicians have dedicated themselves to teaching children to play and read music

By Ashraf Hendricks/GroundUp

The Khayelitsha Music Academy started in 2006 in a shack near the beach, with just one student receiving guitar lessons. Today the school has 19 students and teaches several instruments and music theory.… Read more

Foot’s Othello reroutes the question of barbarity

by

Othello is in essence a soap opera. It lacks the regicide, fratricide, witchery, and mysticism of many of his other works. What we do have, though, is uxoricide, horrifyingly common in South Africa. The Tragedy of Othello, the Moor of Venice,is also arguably racist in its stereotype of the black man easily manipulated by the Machivellian European, Iago, although there are counter-arguments.… Read more

Danger on the way to school

by
School children on a pedestrian bridge

City school children face a choice between being mugged or crossing the freeway as criminals haunt pedestrian bridges

By Matthew Hirsch/GroundUp

The death of a primary school child on the way to school in Walmer Estate, Cape Town, on 11 April has highlighted the choice young children face: risk getting mugged on a pedestrian bridge, or dodge rush-hour traffic. … Read more

Cape Town lawyer pleads not guilty to race attack

by

“Neighbour slashed my tyres because I’m black, then ran away from the police”, states complainant in criminal case

Sandiso Phaliso/GroundUp

A former Green Point resident who has charged a local attorney with malicious damage to property, believed the reason he slashed her car’s tyres was simply because she is black, and was defenceless. … Read more