Climbing Jacob’s Ladder

Richard Pithouse

by RICHARD PITHOUSE, CounterPunch

Durban, South Africa.

Christmas in Durban is all glorious blue skies, litchis, mangoes, fish curry, white beaches and the shimmering ocean. Of course the ocean, beautiful and inviting as it is, is full of shit because shack dwellers are denied sanitation. And this Christmas two of the shack settlements up in the hills burnt because shack dwellers are denied electricity and decent housing. Its the holidays though and there’s celebration everywhere, meat and beer everywhere, and down on the promenade along the beach, the city’s only really inclusive public space, it feels like we’re all in this together.

Jay Naidoo: Fighting for Justice

The most remarkable days of my life

a review by Nalini Naidoo, The Witness

PIETERMARITZBURG looms large in Jay Naidoo’s autobiography Fighting for Justice. Cosatu’s first secretary-general and a cabinet minister in Nelson Mandela’s government, he spent a good part of the eighties in the city.

Reading his book you realise that this is where he cut his teeth as a trade union organiser. He fought some of his toughest battles at factories in and around the midlands and won many minor victories, which in retrospect were huge, as workers were generally scared in those days and bosses were tough.