SOUTH AFRICA

Well, it is as if time were frozen while I was gone. None of the issues or problems facing South Africa or Africa were resolved. And to be honest, do you blame anyone? These are huge problems.

The National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) took their case to a constitutional court. And they have now got the judges in the constitutional court to overrule the ruling by Judge Nicholson earlier which ordered Zuma’s case be dropped on technicality and that there seemed to be political motivation involved in the case against Zuma. So this Supreme Court reinstated the charges against Zuma allowing, once again, the NPA to go ahead and pursue a case against the presidential candidate. As of now, Zuma is in the strongest position to become the next president. And he would appear in court as president by the time the court case starts. In the U.S., let me say, in such a situation (especially for the length of time that Zuma has been in this situation) the candidate would step down. But Zuma doesn’t want it, and you already know it has been stated in a speech by the ANC Youth League head that “we would kill for Zuma.” Let’s hope it doesn’t get to that point.

The ANC Youth League reminds me of education, and I’m sure you know Oprah’s school is in South Africa. One of my favorite blogs to read is that of Samantha, a Rotary Ambassadorial Scholar in Johannesburg. She finished her scholarship tenure last year along with Haley and others, but she is staying in South Africa to finish her masters thesis as most people take longer than a year (except Haley of course). I actually don’t read blogs, but as I was required to read Haley’s I clicked the link to Samantha’s and enjoyed seeing her perspective as an African-American in an African country. That’s why I like it. She is also a big Oprah supporter (in favor of Oprah’s school), and she actually decided to come back and work as an RA at Oprah’s school while finishing up her thesis. The story about meeting Oprah is near the top of her blog. The actual visit last year (during our 2nd semester or the U.S./European autumn semester) to the school for the first time is about 2/5ths of the way down the page. Please read both of the accounts if you get a chance. She seems a bit infatuated with Oprah, though. Heh heh!


http://sammyjoburg.blogspot.com/

Well, since our academic year falls in line with the calendar year, the high school (secondary school) graduates have their results and if they passed, they’ve been accepted into South African universities or technical schools. So that’s quite great. Out of the entire Western Cape (my “state” or province), the top results come, of course, from Cape Town (we have the best schools). I will probably continue working with Cape Town schools this new year and semester.
But the Western Cape also had a first—Cholera! An incidence of cholera showed up here while I was gone. The situation there has worsened.