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Keywords: South Africa

  • INTERNATIONAL

    South Africa shows compassion to Zimbabwean refugees

    • David Holdcroft
    • 05 November 2010
    9 Comments

    Zimbabweans have been coming to South Africa for reasons such as political violence, displacement due to land reform, and the collapse of the economy. After initially turning them back at the border, South Africa moved towards a pragmatic 'special dispensation' that was more compassionate, even if the future of the country's refugee rules now remains uncertain.

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  • INTERNATIONAL

    Empathy for the buried as Chilean miners emerge

    • Catherine Marshall
    • 13 October 2010
    3 Comments

    Raw earth passed by, centimetres from my eyes. Light seeped away, and all that was left was the sound of my breathing. Then a beam of light from a miner's hat reached towards me. A voice greeted me and a hand helped me to climb out. I did an interview, there in the dark, with the faceless person before me.

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  • INTERNATIONAL

    World Cup a triumph, now South Africa must keep its head

    • David Holdcroft
    • 14 July 2010
    1 Comment

    Like many emerging societies, South Africa is a long way from being truly inclusive. The World Cup experience brought it much closer to that goal. Now it needs to ensure this progress is not undermined.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Football and my father's ghost

    • Adrian Phoon
    • 23 June 2010
    6 Comments

    When Switzerland scored with a crazy goal against the heavily favoured Spain, I could almost hear my father leaping from the couch and cheering. Before he died, he was a football fanatic. I have learned to love it. It's my way of communing with him.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Planet Football's alternative world order

    • Michael Visontay
    • 11 June 2010
    3 Comments

    In the Olympics, the countries with the biggest populations win the most medals. Not in the World Cup. The United States' underdog status is one of the unifying pleasures of football fans around the world.

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  • INTERNATIONAL

    Messiah Mandela's miracle moment

    • Catherine Marshall
    • 11 February 2010
    4 Comments

    I clearly remember what I was doing the day Nelson Mandela walked free from prison. The behemoth apartheid state shifted so thoroughly and so smoothly that even the erratic events of the past 20 years have done little to diminish South Africa's reputation as a miracle nation.

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    Selling short Nelson Mandela and rugby

    • Tim Kroenert
    • 28 January 2010

    Are we to accept that the inspiration of sporting victory is alone sufficient to solve conflict and soothe the way to redemption and rebirth for a divided nation? If so, it must be said that Eastwood's film is history rendered as a fairytale.

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  • INTERNATIONAL

    South Africa's black and white minstrels

    • David Holdcroft
    • 10 December 2009
    3 Comments

    The performers, in white-face make-up and baggy trousers, have two minutes to catch a driver's attention and elicit a few rands. Their skill is as remarkable as the cultural and racial ironies of their performance.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    The humiliation of Caster Semenya

    • Catherine Marshall
    • 31 August 2009
    8 Comments

    The issue is not whether South African athlete Caster Semenya is male, hyper-androgynous, or, as she claims, 'entirely female'. More burdensome is the ferocious public response to a predicament that clearly called for maturity and restraint.

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  • INTERNATIONAL

    Refugees and other aliens

    • Catherine Marshall
    • 18 August 2009
    5 Comments

    One night 11 years ago I joined members of a local police commando to report on a mission to intercept Mozambique refugees travelling into South Africa. It is easier to 'tolerate the intolerance' in under-resourced, refugee-deluged South Africa than in Australia.

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    South Africa's lesson for post-apartheid Australia

    • Tim Kroenert
    • 18 June 2009
    10 Comments

    Despite the best wishes of many, we are yet to resolve the injustices that have resulted from White Australia's brand of apartheid. As Disgrace reveals, reconciliation is more than words. There is much fear and anger to overcome.

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  • INTERNATIONAL

    Letter from Zimbabwe

    • Oskar Wermter
    • 30 January 2009

    A young man, well educated, with several diplomas in his pocket, pestered me about getting funds to do a course in South Africa. Not because he needs that course, but merely to get out of Zimbabwe. The rats are leaving the ship.

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