050-v71x-CSESECURID history - RSA SecurID Certified Systems Engineer 7.1x Updated: 2023

Agar-Hamilton, J. A. I., The native policy of the voortrekkers, 1836–1858, Cape Town: M. Miller, 1928.

Bhorat, Haroon, et al. (eds.), Fighting poverty: labour markets and inequality in South Africa, Cape Town: University of Cape Town Press, 2001.

Biesheuvel, S., ‘Black industrial labour in South Africa’, SAJE, 42, 1974, 292–311.

Bleloch, William Edwin, The new South Africa, its value and development, London: Heinemann, 1901.

Bromberger, Norman, ‘South African unemployment: a survey of research’, in Simkins, Charles and Desmond, Cosmas (eds.), South African unemployment: a black picture, Pietermaritzburg: University of Natal, Development Studies Research Group, 1978, 3–25.

Chamber of Mines of South Africa, 96th Annual Report, Johannesburg: Chamber of Mines, 1985.

Crankshaw, Owen, Race, class and the changing division of labour under apartheid, London: Routledge, 1997.

Kiewiet, C. W., A history of South Africa, social and economic, London: Oxford University Press, 1941.

Kock, Gerhard, ‘The new South African business cycle and its implications for monetary policy’, SAJE, 48, 1980, 349–58.

Kock, M. H., Selected subjects in the economic history of South Africa, Cape Town: Juta, 1924.

Delius, Peter, The land belongs to us: the Pedi polity, the Boers and the British in the nineteenth-century TransvaalJohannesburg: Ravan Press, 1983.

Development Bank of Southern Africa, South Africa, an inter-regional profile, Midrand: Development Bank of Southern Africa, 1991.

Development Bank of Southern Africa, South Africa's nine provinces, Midrand: Development Bank of Southern Africa, 1994.

du Plessis, J. C., ‘Investment and the balance of payments of South Africa’, SAJE, 35, 1965, 311–40.

Etherington, Norman, The great treks: the transformation of southern Africa, 1815–1854, Harlow: Longman, 2001.

Frankel, S. Herbert, Capital investment in Africa, its course and effects, London: Oxford University Press, 1938.

Frankel, S. Herbert, Investment and the return to equity capital in the South African gold mining industry, Oxford: Blackwell, 1967.

Franzen, D. G., and J. J. D. Willers, ‘Capital accumulation and economic growth in South Africa’, in Goldsmith, R. and Saunders, C. (eds.), The measurement of wealth, Income and Wealth series VIII, London: Bowes & Bowes, 1959, 293–322.

Germond, Robert Charles (ed.), Chronicles of Basutoland, Morija: Morija Sesuto Book Depot, 1967.

Gilbert, Donald Wood, ‘The economic effects of the gold discoveries upon South Africa’, Quarterly Journal of Economics, 47, 1933, 553–97.

Golub, Stephen, and Edwards, Lawrence, ‘South African international cost competitiveness and exports: a sectoral analysis’, Trade and Industry Monitor, 25, 2003, 2–5.

Goodfellow, D. M., A modern economic history of South Africa, London: Routledge, 1931.

Gregory, Theodore, Ernest Oppenheimer and the economic development of southern Africa, Cape Town: Oxford University Press, 1962.

Hamilton, Caroline (ed.), Mfecane aftermath, reconstructive debates in southern African history, Johannesburg: Witwatersrand University Press, 1995.

Hellmann, Ellen (ed.), Handbook on race relations in South Africa, Cape Town: Oxford University Press, 1949.

Hindson, Doug, Pass controls and the urban African proletariat, Johannesburg: Ravan Press, 1987.

Hobart, Houghton D., The South African economy, 4th edn, Cape Town: Oxford University Press, 1976.

Hobart, Houghton D. and Jenny, Dagut (eds.), Source material on the South African economy, 1860–1970, 3 vols., Cape Town: Oxford University Press, 1972.

Hunter, Monica, Reaction to conquest, Cape Town: David Philip, 1979.

Hurwitz, Nathan, and Williams, Owen, The economic framework of South Africa, Pietermaritzburg: Shuter & Shuter, 1962.

Innes, Duncan, Anglo American and the rise of modern South Africa, Johannesburg: Ravan Press, 1984.

Johnstone, Frederick A., Class, race and gold, London: Routlege & Kegan Paul, 1976.

Johnstone, Frederick A., ‘White prosperity and white supremacy in South Africa today’, African Affairs, 69, 1970, 124–40.

Julius, A. B., and Lumby, A. B., ‘Phases I, II and III of the local content programme in the South African motor car manufacturing industry, 1961–1976’, SAJEH, 13, 1998, 17–35.

Karis, Thomas, and Carter, Gwendolen M. (ed.), From protest to challenge, a documentary history of African politics in South Africa, vol.1, Protest and hope, 1882–1934, Stanford, CA: Hoover Institution Press, 1972.

Keegan, Timothy J., Rural transformations in industrializing South Africa: the Southern Highveld to 1914, Broamfontein: Ravan Press, 1986.

Leary, P. M., and Lewis, J. E. S., ‘Some observations on the state of nutrition of infants and toddlers in Sekhukhuniland’, South African Medical Journal, 39, 1965, 1156–8.

Legassick, Martin, ‘Legislation, ideology and economy in post-1948 South Africa’, JSAS, 1, 1974, 5–35.

Legassick, Martin,‘Gold, agriculture, and secondary industry in South Africa, 1885–1970: from periphery to sub-metropole as a forced labour system’, in Palmer, Robin and Parsons, Neil (eds.), The roots of rural poverty, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1977, 175–200.

Lehfeldt, R. A., The national resources of South Africa, Johannesburg: University of the Witwatersrand Press, 1922.

Lewis, Stephen R., The economics of apartheid, New York: Council of Foreign Relations Press, 1990.

Lipton, Merle, Capitalism and apartheid: South Africa, 1910–1986, London: Gower/Temple Smith, 1985.

Lomard, J., et al., Industrialisation and Growth, Johannesburg: Mercabank, 1985.

Maasdorp, Gavin, ‘Unemployment in South Africa and its implications’, in Schlemmer, Lawrence and Webster, Eddie (eds.), Change, reform and economic growth in South Africa, Johannesburg: Ravan Press, 1978, 139–48.

Macmillan, W. M., The Cape colour question, a historical survey, London: Faber & Gwyer, 1927.

Macmillan, W. M., Bantu, Boer and Briton: the making of the South African native problem, London: Faber & Gwyer, 1929.

Marais, G., ‘Structural changes in manufacturing industry 1916 to 1975’, SAJE, 49, 1981, 26–45.

Marais, J. S., The Cape Coloured people, 1652–1937, Johannesburg: Witwatersrand University Press, 1962.

Matsetela, Ted, ‘The life story of Nkgono-Pooe’, in Marks, S. and Rathbone, R. (eds.), Industrialisation and social change in South Africa, Harlow: Longman, 1982, 212–37.

Mokgatle, Naboth, The autobiography of an unknown South African, London: Hurst & Co., 1971.

Moll, Terence, ‘Did the apartheid economy fail?’, JSAS, 17, 1991, 271–91.

Nattrass, Jill, The South African economy, its growth and change, 2nd edn, Cape Town: Oxford University Press, 1988.

Nattrass, Nicoli, ‘Economic power and profits in postwar manufacturing’, in Nattrass, Nicoli and Ardington, Elisabeth (eds.), The political economy of South Africa, Cape Town: Oxford University Press, 1990, 107–28.

Noble, John, Descriptive handbook of the Cape Colony, Cape Town: Juta, 1875.

Norval, A. J., A quarter of a century of industrial progress in South Africa, Cape Town: Juta, 1962.

O'Meara, Dan, Volkskapitalisme: class, capital and ideology in the development of Afrikaner nationalism, 1934–1948, Johannesburg: Ravan Press, 1983.

Plaatje, Sol T., Native life in South Africa, London: P. S. King & Son, 1916.

Platzky, Laurine, and Walker, Cherryl, The surplus people – forced removals in South Africa, Johannesburg: Ravan Press, 1985.

Ratcliffe, Anne E., ‘Export policy in perspective’, SAJE, 43, 1975, 74–91.

Richards, C. S., The iron and steel industry in South Africa with special reference to ISCOR, Johannesburg: Witwatersrand University Press, 1940.

Richards, C. S., ‘Subsidies, quotas, tariffs and the excess cost of agriculture in South Africa’, SAJE, 3, 1935, 365–403.

Sadie, J. L., A reconstruction and projection of demographic movements in the RSA and TBVC countries, Research Report 148, University of South Africa, Bureau of Market Research, Pretoria, 1988.

Sadie, J. L.,A projection of the South African population, 1991–2011, Research Report 196, University of South Africa, Bureau of Market Research, Pretoria, 1993.

Sadie, J. L.,The South African labour force, 1960–2005, Research Report 178, University of South Africa, Bureau of Market Research, Pretoria, 1991.

Sansom, Basil, ‘Traditional economic systems’ in Hammond-Tooke, W. D. (ed.), The Bantu-speaking peoples of Southern Africa, 2nd edn, London: Routledge, 1974, 135–76.

Schumann, C. G. W., Structural changes and business cycles in South Africa, 1806–1936, London: P. S. King & Son, 1938.

Shell, Robert C.-H., Children of bondage, a social history of the slave society at the Cape of Good Hope, 1652–1838, Hanover, NH: Wesleyan University Press, 1994.

Smith, F. B., Some observations upon the probable effect of the closer union of South Africa upon agriculture, Pretoria: Government Printer, 1908.

Simkins, Charles, ‘Agricultural production in the African reserves of South Africa, 1918–1969’, JSAS, 7, 1981, 256–83.

South African Institute of Race Relations, A survey of race relations in South Africa, annual.

Steenkamp, W. F. J., ‘Labour problems and policies of half a century’, SAJE, 51, 1983, 58–87.

Thirtle, C., H. S. von Bach, and J. van Zyl, Explaining total factor productivity in South African commercial agriculture, 1947–91, Discussion Paper Series G no. 7, University of Reading, Department of Agricultural Economics and Management, 1993.

Trollope, A., South Africa, reprint of 1878 edn, ed. Davidson, J. H., Cape Town: A. A. Balkema, 1973.

van Aardt, C. J., and J. L. van Tonder with J. L. Sadie, A projection of the South African population, 1996–2021, Research Report 270, University of South Africa, Bureau of Market Research, Pretoria, 1999.

Horst, Sheila, Native labour in South Africa, London: Oxford University Press, 1942.

van der Vliet, Virginia, ‘Growing up in traditional society’, in Hammond-Tooke, W. D. (ed.), The Bantu-speaking peoples of Southern Africa, 2nd edn, London: Routledge, 1974, 211–45.

Dijk, Michiel, ‘South African manufacturing performance in international perspective, 1970–99’, SAJE, 71, 2003, 119–42.

van Riebeeck, Jan, Journal of Jan van Riebeeck, ed. Thom, H. B., 3 vols., Cape Town: A. A. Balkema for the Van Riebeeck Society, 1952–8.

Van Riebeeck Society, The reports of Chavonnes and his council and of Van Imhoff, on the Cape, Cape Town: Van Riebeeck Society, vol. 1, 1918.

van Wyk, H. de J., Personal disposable income in South Africa by population group, income group and district, 2000, Research Report 279, University of South Africa, Bureau of Market Research, Pretoria, 2000.

Verwoerd, Hendrik Frensch, Verwoerd speaks, speeches 1948–1966, ed. Pelzer, A. N., Johannesburg: APB Publishers, 1966.

Viljoen, S. P., ‘The industrial achievement of South Africa’, SAJE, 51, 1983, 29–57.

Walker, Eric A., Historical atlas of South Africa, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1922.

Walker, Eric A. (ed.), Cambridge history of the British Empire, vol. 8, South Africa, 2nd edn, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1963.

Wilson, Francis, Labour in the South African gold mines, 1911–1969, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1972.

Wilson, Monica, and Thompson, Leonard (ed.), The Oxford history of South Africa, vols. 1 and 2, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1969, 1971.

Witwatersrand Chamber of Mines, Industrial Commission of Enquiry, Evidence and Report, Johannesburg: Witwatersrand Chamber of Mines, 1897.

Wolpe, Harold, ‘Capitalism and cheap labour power in South Africa: from segregation to apartheid,’ in Wolpe, Harold (ed.), The articulation of modes of production, London: Routledge, 1980, 289–320.

Wolseley, Garnet, The South African journal of Sir Garnet Wolseley, ed. Preston, Adrian, 1879–1880, Cape Town: A. A. Balkema, 1973.

Worden, Nigel, Heyningen, Elizabeth, and Bickford-Smith, Vivian, Cape Town, the making of a city, Cape Town: David Philip, 1998.

World Bank, South African agriculture, Discussion Paper 6, Washington, DC: World Bank, 1994.

In this feature, Spoor & Fisher partner Lance Abramson expands on the trends he has witnessed in the South African IP sector to date and predictions for how the patent scene will develop from summer 2023 onwards.

South African patent law is a most exciting area of law to be practising in during 2023, with a number of dynamic changes lying in the road ahead.

As a starting point and to set the scene: in order to obtain patent protection for an invention in South Africa, the invention needs to be globally new and inventive, which is a requirement for patents in all countries around the world. In legal terms, ‘new’ means that the invention cannot have been made available to the public anywhere in the world and in any way. This includes a public disclosure by written or oral description or use of the invention.

‘Inventive’, in short, means that the difference between the current invention and what is globally available cannot be an obvious difference. Put another way, the invention needs to be not just different but inventively different from what is currently globally available.

In addition to the new and inventive requirement, South African patent law has some exclusions on what can be patented which is also in line with other countries around the world. For example, business methods, mathematical methods and scientific theories are some of the categories that cannot be patented.

A South African patent is obtained by filing a patent application at the South African Patent Office which needs to meet the legal requirements set out in the South African Patent Act and Regulations, some of which are mentioned above.

There is, however, one crucial difference between South African patent applications and patent applications filed in other countries, in that South African patent applications are not examined at the time of filing. As long as all the formalities are completed and the correct fees paid the application will proceed to grant as filed. Only if the granted patent is later challenged or an attempt is made to enforce the granted patent will the courts at that point investigate if the granted patent is valid.

South African patent law is a most exciting area of law to be practising in during 2023, with a number of dynamic changes lying in the road ahead.

This is in contrast to other countries, which have an examination system in which an examiner is assigned to each patent application after filing. The examiner will review the patent application to confirm that the subject matter is appropriate for a patent and that all regulatory requirements have been met, and will then conduct a search and issue an opinion as to whether the described invention is new and inventive or not.

However, the position in South Africa is changing! On 23 May 2018, the South African Cabinet approved the Intellectual Property (IP) Policy of South Africa which proposes, inter alia, the introduction of Substantive Search and Examination (SSE) of patent applications in South Africa. Under this new system, the Patent Office (CIPC) will examine patent applications to determine whether the applications meet the formal and substantive patentability requirements.

In preparation for the proposed patent regime, the Patent Office has already recruited patent examiners who were trained on search and examination by representatives of the European Patent Office (EPO).

The next step of the training started in 2021, which is an experiential learning component in the form of an unofficial search and examination trial period. During this trial period, substantive search and examination of patent applications is carried out and these are sent to patent attorneys who review and respond to the findings. During this phase, the reports will not be legally binding and will not form part of the official application files.

SSE can only officially be implemented once the current South African Patents Act and its regulations are amended to allow for the legislative framework to introduce SSE. The draft of the amendments has not yet been published for public comment, and we do not have any indication as to when the draft will be published. Furthermore, the process of passing a bill, and signing it into law by the South African president, is a lengthy process. However, change is certainly in the air!

Another interesting area of change of course relates to the rapid development of AI and its impact on practising patent law. One example of this has already occurred where a patent application was filed in a number of countries around the world for an invention autonomously generated by an artificial intelligence, referred to as Dabus (Device for the Autonomous Bootstrapping of Unified Sentience). The challenge has been to determine who should be cited as the inventor (Dabus or its creator) and who owns the invention.

Most patent offices have decided that AI systems cannot be cited as inventors. In South Africa, as there is no examination, as discussed above, the patent application filed here proceeded to grant as South African patent no 2021/03242. It remains to be seen what our courts would hold if this patent was ever challenged or an attempt is made to enforce the granted patent. It is likely, in our view, that the courts would find Dabus was incorrectly cited.

A similar question arises as to who owns the copyright in the work produced by, for example, ChatGPT, and much has already been written about this question in law which has not yet been resolved. There are three possibilities: that the copyright vests in the AI, in the programmer of the AI or in the person that uses the AI to generate the work.

AI tools will most certainly profoundly impact the legal profession. AI tools are already being used to automate drafting tasks currently done by attorneys. This provides efficiency benefits to attorneys and their clients. In the field of patent law, there are already AI tools which can assist a patent attorney to draft and file patent applications, although these tools are not yet ubiquitous.

It is certainly not far away that AI tools will be available to assist patent examiners with the patent examination process described above. Indeed, there are potential opportunities and challenges that AI presents and will present for inventors, patent attorneys and other stakeholders in the patent system.

Most patent offices have decided that AI systems cannot be cited as inventors.

A further area of interesting and rapid development is the digitally immersive world known as the metaverse and its ramifications for IP – including patents. There has been an enormous growth of patent applications which relate to virtual reality technologies in the past five years. These patents relate, for example, to systems for generating and interacting with a virtual reality environment, systems for managing ephemeral locations in a virtual universe and other virtual reality and augmented reality technologies.

Another interesting angle to consider at the intersection of the metaverse and patents is the use of NFTs (non-fungible tokens) to represents patents in the metaverse. For example, the ownership of the patent can be captured and certified in an NFT, which would certify not only who the current owner of the patent is but would also capture, in a way that could not be tampered with, the historical chain of ownership of the patent, for example. This could lead to a huge cost reduction when recording assignments of patents at various patent offices around the world, which is a tedious and costly exercise. Already, IBM and IPwe have teamed up to create the infrastructure for an NFT-based patent marketplace.

For a South African patent attorney, 2023 represents an exciting time to be practising law – the introduction of patent examination, the rise of AI and the metaverse will mean our world in the months and years ahead will be vastly different from what lies behind us. As with all things, this dynamic change brings opportunity to those who are willing to adapt and leverage. At over 100 years old, the law firm Spoor & Fisher clearly have adaptation as part of our DNA and look forward to harnessing all of these changes for the better of our team and clients!

Lance Abramson, Partner

Spoor & Fisher

11 Byls Bridge Boulevard, Building No. 14, Highveld Ext 73, Centurion, Pretoria, 0046, South Africa

Tel: +27 11 994 5111

E: l.abramson@spoor.com

Lance Abramson is a patent attorney and an Attorney of the High Court of South Africa. With more than two decades of experience, Lance brings expertise in the filing of applications in the electric, electronic, software and nanotechnology fields and related litigation. His practice focuses primarily on domestic and international patent and design matters.

Spoor & Fisher is a pan-African IP law firm with over 100 years of history that prides itself on its ability to handle the intricacies involved in registering and enforcing IP in every African country. Its teams comprise certified in trade marks, patents, copyright, anti-counterfeiting, registered designs, commercial IP, IP audits and all other aspects of IP law.

To some of his former students, Professor Barry Dwolatzky was the “Grand Geek” – a name of which he was very proud. But Barry, who passed away in Johannesburg, South Africa on 16 May 2023, was much more than a computer geek. He was also a leader and a visionary in the field of software engineering in South Africa.

At the time of his passing he was 71 years old. He was by then retired from academia and held the title of Emeritus Professor at the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits), where he spent much of his career.

ALSO READ: German software giant SAP to cut 3,000 jobs

ALSO READ: Reasons Why You Should Start Using A Manufacturing ERP Software

But he didn’t really slow down: he remained the director of the Joburg Centre for Software Engineering (JCSE), a role he’d held since 2007. During the COVID lockdown in 2020, he started a podcast called Optimizing – Leading Africa’s Digital Future and produced eight episodes. He also wrote an autobiography called Coded History – My Life of New Beginnings, which was launched in November 2022.

A pioneer in programming

An alumnus of the School of Electrical and Information Engineering at Wits University, Barry graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering in 1975. He then started a master’s degree, which he converted to a PhD. After obtaining his PhD in 1979, he did post-doctoral research at the University of Manchester’s Institute of Science and Technology and at Imperial College in London. Thereafter, he worked as a senior research associate at the GEC-Marconi Centre in the UK.

I first met Barry in 1989 when he returned to South Africa as a senior lecturer in the School of Electrical Engineering at Wits. I was an undergraduate in his class that year. When I returned to Wits in 1998, he was my MSc supervisor and, when I was appointed as a lecturer in the School of Electrical Engineering, we were colleagues and friends.

ALSO READ: ALX: Earn your Software Engineering certification and equip yourself for a world of opportunity

ALSO READ: Monolith AI software wins ‘Crash Test Innovation of the Year’ award

When he joined the School, there was only one programming course, Engineering Applied Computing, taught to second-year electrical, civil and mechanical engineering students. Barry identified the growing importance of programming and information technology in engineering fields before anyone else in South Africa really had. Today, the School of Electrical & Information Engineering’s curriculum contains two second-year programming courses and a third-year course that is compulsory for all electrical and information engineering students. Barry was instrumental in introducing all these courses.

He was also the driving force behind the school’s name change: “Information Engineering” was added in the year 2000 with the introduction of a software stream that would be distinct from the electrical engineering stream.

The idea didn’t come from the blue. Talking to people in various companies, Barry realised that most of the school’s graduates went into the information and communications technology (ICT) sector rather than into the classical electrical engineering fields like electrical generation, transmission and distribution, high voltage engineering and control engineering.

That’s what prompted the development and introduction of the software stream. At that time, computers were becoming more common in many industries and the mobile phone sector was starting to take off.

Software to drive development

In the late 1980s, the then CEO of Eskom, South Africa’s national electricity utility, announced a mass roll-out of electrification called Electricity for All. Between 1990 and 2000, about 2.5 million houses were connected to the national grid. At that time, Barry started working on a software programme that would assist engineers in planning the electrification of townships, historically black urban residential areas.

A number of postgraduate students under his supervision worked on aspects of this software. He called the program CART (Computer-Aided Reticulation of Townships). In 1997, he took a year-long sabbatical and worked full time on CART, developing it into a viable commercial product that was used to aid in the design of the electrification of many townships.

In 2005, Barry launched the Joburg Centre for Software Engineering. He became its director in 2007. It was the work he did through the centre that established him as an important thought leader in the software and IT space. Among other things, the centre hosted masterclasses with world renowned software experts.

ALSO READ: ICYMI: Tesla recalls over a million vehicles to update software

ALSO READ: Tesla recalling over a million vehicles to update software

Innovation champion in software engineering

In 2012, Barry identified some old buildings owned by Wits University in Braamfontein, a high-rise downtown area of Johannesburg, as an ideal site for an innovation hub. Many people speak fondly of how Barry took them into a derelict disco with only the light from his mobile phone and enthusiastically explained how this was going to be a tech co-working space. He raised funding and transformed the rundown buildings into the innovation hub that is today one of the university’s flagship projects.

It is called the Tshimologong Digital Innovation Precinct. Tshimologong (a seTswana word for “place of new beginnings”) provides a space for digital start-ups, as well as training in digital technologies, and is used as a co-working space. Barry was Tshimologong’s first director and was honoured for this visionary project with the Vice Chancellor’s Award for Research and Teaching in 2016.

ALSO READ: Free secondary education: is it the best policy in African countries?

ALSO READ: Software for SA prepaid electricity meters expires in 2024 – here’s how to update in Cape Town

Even after retiring, Barry remained committed to and driven by the idea of innovation. He worked alongside Wits University’s deputy vice-chancellor, Professor Lynn Morris, to establish the Wits Innovation Centre. It was launched on 17 April 2023.

Estelle Trengove Associate professor in electrical engineering, University of the Witwatersrand

Article by This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Common licence. Read the original article.

CLICK HERE TO READ MORE ARTICLES BY THE CONVERSATION

Despite her charming name, the ship known as the Lady R could leave U.S.-South African relations unmoored.

The diplomatic meltdown between the two allies follows allegations by U.S. Ambassador to South Africa Reuben Brigety that South Africa sent weapons to Russia aboard the cargo vessel, which had left the South African naval base of Simon’s Town last December, headed back toward Russia.

Unfortunately, instead of providing any leadership, President Cyril Ramaphosa did what his citizens are now used to getting from him domestically, whenever he is faced with a crisis: outsourcing the problem to “an independent inquiry” to be headed by a retired judge. Ramaphosa has become infamous for avoiding tough decisions, despite his executive powers and constitutional duties as the country’s president.

At best, instituting a judicial commission of inquiry shows that the state is clueless about what was on Lady R, and at worst, shows that it is buying time to deal with potentially irreparable damage to the country’s image if, in fact, South Africa was helping Russian President Vladimir Putin’s regime kill innocent Ukrainians. U.S. sanctions against Russia could lead the United States to punish violators of those sanctions, including allies—a move that could devastate the South African economy.

South Africa’s economy—currently growing at less than 1 percent, facing unemployment levels above 30 percent and inflation around 7 percent—could not absorb the consequences of potential economic sanctions from the United States, including the curtailment of preferential access to certain U.S. markets under the African Growth and Opportunity Act, which faces a congressional debate over renewal in 2025.

South Africa could lose up to 60 billion rand ($3 billion) per year in exports, and sectors such as the automobile industry would instantly see major further job losses that would have dire social and political consequences domestically. The stakes are very high for South Africa, making the spineless leadership from Ramaphosa even more costly for the country.

Since the beginning of the war in Ukraine, South Africa has proudly brandished its nonaligned status, abstaining from U.N. votes condemning Russia while insisting on its neutrality even as it stages naval exercises with Russia and China, sends top defense officials to Moscow, and welcomes mysterious Russian ships and aircraft at its ports and airports.

Pretoria’s poorly articulated public statements about South Africa’s posture of nonalignment, given these geopolitical and economic stakes, makes the government’s actions even more inexplicable and incoherent. Nonalignment does make sense sometimes, but not in this case.

Despite being a key member of the Western alliance, France did not support its close allies’ military invasion of Iraq in 2003. It supported a call for further inspections to determine whether or not the country actually had weapons of mass destruction. At the time, the French government also faced overwhelming negative public sentiment toward the invasion of Iraq, being the European country with the largest Muslim population and knowing it had serious economic interests in the country’s oil fields.

Although France’s objections were couched in moral terms in a memorable speech by then-Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin, this was also a case of nonalignment based on rational self-interest.

Today, nothing in South Africa’s vagueness about its Russia-Ukraine policy helps the world understand what motivates it, apart from a hostility to U.S. imperialism and a historical affinity for Moscow—one that conveniently forgets that many African National Congress (ANC) leaders trained in the Soviet Union were actually trained on Ukrainian soil. But being displeased with the United States’ place in the world does not logically entail supporting an illegal war started by Russia. A truly nonaligned country can critique both the United States and Russia.

Pretoria has said that it only supports the “peaceful resolution” of conflict around the world. It has recently volunteered, with a group of five other African countries, to visit both Moscow and Kyiv on what Ramaphosa has described as a “peace mission.” When quizzed about the expected outcomes and on the details of how this would be achieved, he was unable to explain what would count as success, and vague on the details of the trip. He also continues to ignore the well-known fact that Russia violated international law by invading Ukraine, and so it is the undisputed aggressor.

South Africa has consistently failed to explain, in any substantive way, what exactly its doctrine of nonalignment is. One can only infer from the refusal of diplomats to vote in support of United Nations resolutions condemning Russia for invading Ukraine without just cause that South Africa’s de facto idea of nonalignment is to choose silence without ever properly arguing for this position, even when the available facts enable it to adopt a clear, evidence-based stance. This sloppy usage of the word “nonaligned” does the idea of neutrality or nonalignment a massive disservice.

But South Africa’s fantastical idea of playing agnostic referee or peace envoy does not apply to a situation in which one side invaded the other side unprovoked, and in flagrant violation of international law. It has also marked the country out as scandalously indifferent to the fate of an entire nation when that nation is being oppressed by a regional hegemon with superior military might.

Indeed, the Ramaphosa government’s incoherence is made worse when one considers how the liberation movement benefited from the world’s moral clarity on the question of condemning apartheid—a history the country’s leaders seem to have forgotten when confronted with Russia’s aggression against the people of Ukraine.

The international community was not always consistent in its condemnation of the apartheid regime in South Africa. This includes the United States and the United Kingdom, where different governments at different times had different views about how to engage or not engage Pretoria. But the anti-apartheid movement globally was morally unambiguous in insisting that no one should legitimize the apartheid government in South Africa.

Liberation movements, especially the one led by the African National Congress, benefited from the moral clarity demanded by anti-apartheid activists and organizations around the globe. Apartheid was rightly declared a crime against humanity, and no one could be neutral in their attitude toward apartheid unless they were moral cowards.

It is unimaginable that Ramaphosa or any ANC leader in the 1980s would condone a country saying it would “not take sides” in the internal oppression of Black people in South Africa on the part of a brutal, white-minority regime. Neutrality was not a live option when it came to apartheid. States had to take a stand, and the morally correct position was to condemn it unambiguously.

Put simply, nonalignment on the part of outsiders or bystanders is not justifiable if one party to a conflict is the clear aggressor, behaves unlawfully, has no moral basis for the use of force, or has massively disproportionate amounts of force that it can use to obliterate or oppress the other side—as Russia is attempting in Ukraine and the white minority regime sought to do in South Africa.

In 1994, democratic South Africa announced its arrival on the world stage with Nelson Mandela’s famous declaration that “never, never and never again shall it be that this beautiful land will again experience the oppression of one by another.” That commitment found expression in a fairly expansive and liberal constitution that codified not only civil and political rights, but also socioeconomic rights and rights to a safe environment.

Yet, nothing in Ramaphosa’s indifference to the suffering of Ukrainians due to Russia’s illegal war suggests a serious and demonstrable commitment to Mandela’s famous words. It would seem, sadly, that contemporary South Africa is committed to human rights jurisprudentially but not in foreign policy.

South Africa’s position on Russia is a projection of vagueness, incoherence, and sloppiness onto the world stage. Ultimately, Ramaphosa’s ruling ANC is behaving as a moral coward, despite being a historic beneficiary of moral clarity in the fight against apartheid.

Namibian president Hage Geingob used his recent state visit to South Africa to also address a meeting of the national executive committee of the governing party, the African National Congress (ANC). This underscored the ANC’s historic ties to Namibia’s governing party, South West Africa People’s Organisation (Swapo).

According to President Cyril Ramaphosa, who also heads the ANC, the party had a “wonderful engagement” with Geingob, who posted on Facebook:

As former liberation movements, we learn from one another, a manifestation of the deep bonds of solidarity formed during our struggle against oppression.

As political scientists and sociologists, we both followed individually and jointly the performance of the two organisations since the days of the liberation struggles. We have continuously analysed and commented on trends in their governance of the countries.

In our view, the nostalgic reminiscences of the parties’ days as liberation movements serve as a heroic patriotic history turned into a form of populism. Such romanticism uses the merits of the past to cover failures in the present. It also is a potential threat to the achievements of constitutionalism.

Geingob’s visit came at a time when both governments under the former liberation movements, Swapo and the ANC, face an erosion of their political legitimacy. With elections in 2024 in both countries, their challenges are similar.

Both face tough choices about how best to handle the challenges when entering the election year. They have, since moving into office, disappointed expectations, not least in their failures to fight corruption. Voters in South Africa and Namibia will in 2024 pass their verdict at the ballot boxes.

How they perform will shape the future of democracy in both countries.

History with lasting bonds

South African-Namibian relations have a special history.

After the first world war, the Treaty of Versailles officially ended the war between Germany and the Allied powers. It turned the German colony South West Africa into a C-mandate of the new League of Nations. Its administration was delegated to South Africa. It effectively annexed the territory and entrenched apartheid.

This led the national liberation movement Swapo to take up arms. Recognised by the UN General Assembly as the “sole and authentic representative of the Namibian people”, Swapo and the ANC, which had likewise launched an armed struggle, became close allies. Both received wide international support.

From liberation movements to governments

Under UN supervised elections in November 1989, Swapo obtained an absolute majority (58%). Independence was proclaimed on 21 March 1990. The date was chosen by the elected Constituent Assembly in recognition of the Sharpeville massacre in 1961 – when apartheid police murdered 69 unarmed black people protesting against being forced to carry identity documents controlling their movement. Released only weeks earlier from prison, Nelson Mandela attended the ceremony as the celebrated guest of honour.

Apartheid in South Africa came officially to an end through the result of the first democratic elections in 1994. Like Swapo, the ANC emerged as the majority party (62.7%). It indicated the success of the democratic settlements in both countries that Swapo and the ANC led processes leading to the drawing up of final constitutions. These embedded accepted democratic principles: free and regular elections, independent judiciaries, bills of fundamental human rights, and the separation of powers of the three branches of government.

Since then, both countries have continued to rank among the top African democracies. Regular elections were largely free and fair. Judiciaries have remained independent and have served as a check on executive power. Both parties initially increased their majorities. Crucially, however, the parliaments dominated by Swapo and the ANC have failed to hold governments to account on major issues.

Popularity in decline

Support for the ANC peaked at nearly 70% in the third democratic election in 2009, but by the 5th election in 2019, it had fallen to 57.5%. Even this was regarded as a triumph, put down to the personal popularity of its latest leader, Cyril Ramaphosa.

In the run-up to the elections in 2024, surveys predict the ANC will lose its absolute majority, and be forced to form a coalition to remain in power. It is also anticipated that it will lose its majority in several provinces. It may even lose Gauteng, the country’s economic hub, and KwaZulu-Natal. It has long lost control of the Western Cape to the opposition Democratic Alliance.

In Namibia, Swapo has fared comparatively better. By 2014, it had consolidated its political dominance into a whopping 80% of votes for the National Assembly, and 86% of votes for its directly elected presidential candidate Hage Geingob. But the National Assembly and presidential elections in 2019 marked a turning point. With 65.5% the party lost its two-third majority.

For both, ANC and Swapo, the loss of control over the regional, provincial and local levels of government has turned politics into a matter of alliances, with shifting coalitions. Politics has become a negotiated commodity.

Principles are regularly traded for power, eroding the trust which citizens place in politicians and democracy. For all that they continue to dominate central government. But, their dominance is being steadily eroded by their lacklustre performance in power and failures in delivery of basic services. State capture has become a form of governance.

2024 and the limits to liberation

It is too early for any reliable predictions regarding the 2024 election results. While many assume that the ANC will lose its absolute majority, it has an uncanny ability to defy expectations. But even if it squeaks home, its credibility is likely to be further damaged. Unless he is shuffled aside by the ANC (a possibility whispered quietly in dark corners as the brightness of his image dims), Ramaphosa is likely to remain in office as South Africa’s president. But he could be compelled to lead a coalition government.

Swapo’s electoral prospects seem less bleak, even though it is thought that the opposition will make gains. Geingob’s two terms as state president ends. Netumbo Nandi-Ndaitwah Swapo’s first female candidate, might become the head of state. But in both countries, those holding office will face an uphill battle.

Numerous analyses have explored how former liberation movements in southern Africa have failed the ideals of the liberation struggle when in power, even becoming undemocratic and increasingly corrupt. They have transited from dominance to decline. In many ways, this was to be expected.

Few parties can retain power for decades without losing their popularity. Yet in southern Africa, liberation movements’ loss of popularity is combined with accusations that they have betrayed the promises of freedom. They have displayed a democratic deficit. By dismissing accountability for the lack of delivery they have squandered their trust and support.

How Swapo and the ANC respond to any further decline will define the future of democracy. Opposition parties are expected to play an increasing role. But the former liberation movements might benefit from their fragmentation and dilemma. After all, opposition parties have so far offered little if any credible alternatives which promise more well-being for the ordinary people.

To some of his former students, Professor Barry Dwolatzky was the “Grand Geek” – a name of which he was very proud. But Barry, who passed away in Johannesburg, South Africa on 16 May 2023, was much more than a computer geek. He was also a leader and a visionary in the field of software engineering in South Africa.

At the time of his passing he was 71 years old. He was by then retired from academia and held the title of Emeritus Professor at the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits), where he spent much of his career.

ALSO READ: German software giant SAP to cut 3,000 jobs

ALSO READ: This R43 million Sandton house is the crown jewel of JHB

But he didn’t really slow down: he remained the director of the Joburg Centre for Software Engineering (JCSE), a role he’d held since 2007. During the COVID lockdown in 2020, he started a podcast called Optimizing – Leading Africa’s Digital Future and produced eight episodes. He also wrote an autobiography called Coded History – My Life of New Beginnings, which was launched in November 2022.

A PIONEER IN PROGRAMMING

An alumnus of the School of Electrical and Information Engineering at Wits University, Barry graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering in 1975. He then started a master’s degree, which he converted to a PhD. After obtaining his PhD in 1979, he did post-doctoral research at the University of Manchester’s Institute of Science and Technology and at Imperial College in London. Thereafter, he worked as a senior research associate at the GEC-Marconi Centre in the UK.

I first met Barry in 1989 when he returned to South Africa as a senior lecturer in the School of Electrical Engineering at Wits. I was an undergraduate in his class that year. When I returned to Wits in 1998, he was my MSc supervisor and, when I was appointed as a lecturer in the School of Electrical Engineering, we were colleagues and friends.

ALSO READ: ALX: Earn your Software Engineering certification and equip yourself for a world of opportunity

ALSO READ: Independent candidates can participate in SA’s 2024 elections

When he joined the School, there was only one programming course, Engineering Applied Computing, taught to second-year electrical, civil and mechanical engineering students. Barry identified the growing importance of programming and information technology in engineering fields before anyone else in South Africa really had. Today, the School of Electrical & Information Engineering’s curriculum contains two second-year programming courses and a third-year course that is compulsory for all electrical and information engineering students. Barry was instrumental in introducing all these courses.

He was also the driving force behind the school’s name change: “Information Engineering” was added in the year 2000 with the introduction of a software stream that would be distinct from the electrical engineering stream.

The idea didn’t come from the blue. Talking to people in various companies, Barry realised that most of the school’s graduates went into the information and communications technology (ICT) sector rather than into the classical electrical engineering fields like electrical generation, transmission and distribution, high voltage engineering and control engineering.

That’s what prompted the development and introduction of the software stream. At that time, computers were becoming more common in many industries and the mobile phone sector was starting to take off.

SOFTWARE TO DRIVE DEVELOPMENT

In the late 1980s, the then CEO of Eskom, South Africa’s national electricity utility, announced a mass roll-out of electrification called Electricity for All. Between 1990 and 2000, about 2.5 million houses were connected to the national grid. At that time, Barry started working on a software programme that would assist engineers in planning the electrification of townships, historically black urban residential areas.

A number of postgraduate students under his supervision worked on aspects of this software. He called the program CART (Computer-Aided Reticulation of Townships). In 1997, he took a year-long sabbatical and worked full time on CART, developing it into a viable commercial product that was used to aid in the design of the electrification of many townships.

In 2005, Barry launched the Joburg Centre for Software Engineering. He became its director in 2007. It was the work he did through the centre that established him as an important thought leader in the software and IT space. Among other things, the centre hosted masterclasses with world renowned software experts.

INNOVATION CHAMPION IN SOFTWARE ENGINEERING

In 2012, Barry identified some old buildings owned by Wits University in Braamfontein, a high-rise downtown area of Johannesburg, as an ideal site for an innovation hub. Many people speak fondly of how Barry took them into a derelict disco with only the light from his mobile phone and enthusiastically explained how this was going to be a tech co-working space. He raised funding and transformed the rundown buildings into the innovation hub that is today one of the university’s flagship projects.

It is called the Tshimologong Digital Innovation Precinct. Tshimologong (a seTswana word for “place of new beginnings”) provides a space for digital start-ups, as well as training in digital technologies, and is used as a co-working space. Barry was Tshimologong’s first director and was honoured for this visionary project with the Vice Chancellor’s Award for Research and Teaching in 2016.

ALSO READ: Free secondary education: is it the best policy in African countries?

ALSO READ: Rand reaches record low amid SA-Russia concerns

Even after retiring, Barry remained committed to and driven by the idea of innovation. He worked alongside Wits University’s deputy vice-chancellor, Professor Lynn Morris, to establish the Wits Innovation Centre. It was launched on 17 April 2023.

Estelle Trengove Associate professor in electrical engineering, University of the Witwatersrand

Article by This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Common licence. Read the original article.

CLICK HERE TO READ MORE ARTICLES BY THE CONVERSATION

The South African-set “all stars” edition of I’m a Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here! is here.

ITV’s brand new show sees the return of some of the most memorable campmates from previous seasons.

The series began on Monday 24 April and will come to a close on Friday 12 May.

Instead of the usual Australian outback setting, this show takes place in “the harsher and more unforgiving” environment of South Africa, with the contestants facing challenges “even bigger and tougher” than before.

The first group of stars taking part in the show were announced live on air during an episode of Saturday Night Takeaway in March.

Find the rolling list of contestants and their respective seasons below (to be updated as and when new stars are announced)...

Amir Khan – boxing champion (season 17)

Jordan Banjo – Diversity dancer & DJ (season 16)

Helen Flanagan – Coronation Street star (season 12)

Carol Vorderman – TV presenter (season 16)

Fatima Whitbread – Olympic athlete (season 11)

Paul Burrell – Former royal butler (season four)

Phil Tuffnell – ex-England cricketer (season two)

Janice Dickinson – Supermodel (season seven)

Shaun Ryder – Music legend (season 10)

Gillian McKeith - TV personality (season 10)

Georgia Toffolo - Reality TV star (season 17)

Andy Whyment - Actor (season 19)

Myleene Klass - Presenter (season 6)

Dean Gaffney - Actor (season 6)

Joe Swash - Actor (season 8)

In November, Jill Scott was crowned the winner of last year’s I’m a Celebrity. The ex-England footballer beat out fellow finalists disgraced Tory MP Matt Hancock and actor Owen Warner.

As the final result was announced, Scott and Warner hugged before Warner shared how “gassed” he was for his friend’s success. Scott was crowned by Mike Tindall.

Over 12 million votes were cast and with odds of 2/9, Scott had been the strong favourite to emerge victorious from Sunday’s final, with Hancock less likely at 5/1. Warner, meanwhile, was a relative long shot at 10/1.

Last year’s season was embroiled in some controversy over the participation of Hancock who was announced as a surprise contestant shortly before the series aired.

He joined a roster of contestants that also included DJ Chris Moyles, Culture Club singer Boy George, and broadcaster Charlene White.

I’m a Celebrity South Africa airs on weeknights at 9pm.

This website is using a security service to protect itself from online attacks. The action you just performed triggered the security solution. There are several actions that could trigger this block including submitting a certain word or phrase, a SQL command or malformed data.

To ensure this doesn’t happen in the future, please enable Javascript and cookies in your browser.

If you have an ad-blocker enabled you may be blocked from proceeding. Please disable your ad-blocker and refresh.