Tony Leon: On The Record with Adriaan Basson
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZmzCE6ZhYIQ
Suzman wouldn’t have deplatformed Imitiaz Sooliman, but she would have called him out
On Tuesday, Adriaan Basson, editor in chief of News 24, expressed "renewed gratitude that in South Africa the ‘rights of journalists, authors and artists to write, say and sing what they like’ is an established right in 'our maturing democracy'." Basson is correct, too, that we should "never ever take our open democratic spaces and [...]
Shades of ’80s SA in this mysterious modern Star Chamber
The reason we use a 19th century remedy - washing our hands - for a novel 21st century virus is that the outer shell of the coronavirus is weak. The "lipid envelope" is easily destroyed by soap and water. I read this virological fact in an article by master novelist Ian McEwan, who also, via [...]
Looking backwards to go forward is hardly the way to make progress
Fear of being on the wrong side of history shows up again at celebrations around Helen Suzman’s centenary One of the many features of SA today is a fascination with looking in the rear-view mirror, almost to the exclusion of the road ahead. But often, the view backwards is distorted. Tuesday November 7 provided seminal [...]
Helen Suzman Was An Intensely Human Politician And Not A Saint
We should learn the right lessons and draw the correct conclusions from the extraordinary and well-lived life of Helen Suzman. Exactly 10 years ago, on 7 November 2007, I telephoned Helen Suzman in Johannesburg from Cambridge, Massachusetts, where I was a resident Fellow at its famous university. I called to congratulate her on her 90th [...]