#Witwatersrand

[lightsensitivematerial]

Mine dump city, Johannesburg, 2022

[trolledu]

[nickysfacts]

The Cradle of Humankind is both a natural and man made wonder of the world!

☠️🇿🇦☠️

[afrotumble]

Wits Digitisation Centre restores history with cutting-edge digitisation...

[smadzadzalyte]

[queerasfact]

Black History Month: Simon Nkoli

“I am black, and I am gay. I cannot separate the two parts of me into secondary and primary struggle. They will all be one struggle.”

Simon Nkoli was born in the late 1950s in the Black township of Soweto in South Africa. He grew up under apartheid, and first became involved with anti-apartheid activism as a student, despite negative reactions within the movement to his homosexuality.

In 1984, Simon was arrested along with 21 other men while protesting rent increases in the township of Delmas, a group which became known as the Delmas 22. While in prison awaiting trial, Simon was outed, and faced backlash from the rest of the group, many who feared that pulic knowledge of his sexuality would negatively impact the outcome of the trial. To the surprise of his co-accused, Simon received an outpouring of support from the international queer community, which in turn led to greater international support for the Delmas 22 and anti-apartheid work.

Simon was ultimately acquitted, and began work as a founding member of a new group, GLOW - the Gay and Lesbian Organisation of Witwatersrand - fighting for the rights of queer people in Johannesburg’s Black townships. Simon was diagnosed with HIV while in prison, and focussed especially on HIV/AIDS activism in Black communities. With GLOW, Simon went on to organise Johannesburg’s first Pride march in 1990.

In 1994, Nelson Mandela became South Africa’s president, marking the end of apartheid. Simon met and negotiated with government officials to ensure the rights of gay and lesbian people would be enshrined in the country’s new constitution - the first country in the world to do so.

Learn more

Image: Simon wearing a shirt with a pink triangle which reads “No liberation without gay-lesbian liberation”, and a pin reading ��Silence=Death”

[probablyasocialecologist]

Half the land earmarked for regeneration by the 34-country African Forest Landscape Restoration Initiative (AFR100) is in savannah or other non-woodland areas, says a paper published in Science on Thursday.

[...]

“There is a vast area of non-forest across Africa that is earmarked for restoration, principally through tree planting,” said Catherine Parr, a co-author of the paper and an ecologist at Liverpool, Pretoria and Witwatersrand universities. “The focus solely on forests and trees is highly problematic for these non-forest systems.” The AFR100 project seeks to restore at least 100mn hectares of degraded land — an area the size of Egypt — in Africa by 2030, with big plans in countries including Cameroon, Ethiopia, Mali and Sudan. The initiative’s backers include the German government, the World Bank and the non-profit World Resources Institute. But about half of the approximately 130mn hectares that African countries have committed to restore through AFR100 is earmarked for non-forest ecosystems, principally savannahs and grasslands, according to the paper.

[...]

The dispute over the research highlights growing friction over pledges by philanthropists and corporate leaders to plant a trillion trees worldwide. These ambitious plans face obstacles including potential shortages of available land suitable for planting. Other questions concern how effective newly planted trees are at locking in significant amounts of carbon dioxide — and how vulnerable they are to risks such as forest fires. “There’s such a big focus at international level on deforestation, but the level of sophistication and understanding about ecosystems writ large is really low,” said Alex Reid, a policy adviser on nature and finance at Global Witness, a non-profit group.  Some scientists and conservationists argue that it is better to focus on preventing deforestation, by creating incentives to retain woodland areas. Greenhouse gases released by deforestation make up about 11 per cent of global emissions, according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. 

[mindblowingscience]

Giant African land snails (Achatinidae) were systematically brought to the Border Cave site in eastern South Africa, roasted and consumed, starting from 170,000 years ago, in a practice that continued for 100,000 years.

The Border Cave site is located on a cliff with an amazing view and is home to some of the oldest fossils found of anatomically modern humans. Intermittent human habitation of the cave from before 227,000 years ago to as recently as 600 years ago provides a unique window into the past across timeframes. Archaeologists have found some of the earliest evidence of symbolism here, as well as beads, tools, burials and the construction of grass beds.

The current study, published in Quaternary Science Reviews and titled "Evidence for large land snail cooking and consumption at Border Cave c. 170–70 ka ago. Implications for the evolution of human diet and social behaviour," offers a detailed examination of diet from fragments of land snail shells found across most of the history of the cave.

Continue Reading

[beardedmrbean]

The man who had been chief engineer at South Africa’s state-owned passenger rail company has been sentenced to 15 years in prison for faking his qualifications.

Once hailed for his successful career, Daniel Mthimkhulu was head of engineering at the Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa (Prasa) for five years - earning an annual salary of about 2.8m rand ($156,000; £119,000).

On his CV, the 49-year-old claimed to have had several mechanical engineering qualifications, including a degree from South Africa’s respected Witwatersrand University as well as a doctorate from a German university.

However, the court in Johannesburg heard that he had only completed his high-school education.

“The sentence sends a strong message that the perpetrators of white-collar crime will not go unpunished," said Phindi Mjonondwane, spokesperson for the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA).

Damning report exposes rampant SA corruption

Load-shedding, poor management, corruption and sabotage

Mthimkhulu was arrested in July 2015 shortly after his web of lies began to unravel.

He had started working at Prasa 15 years earlier, shooting up the ranks to become chief engineer, thanks to his fake qualifications.

The court also heard how he had forged a job offer letter from a German company, which encouraged Prasa to increase his salary so the agency would not lose him.

He was also at the forefront of a 600m rand deal to buy dozens of new trains from Spain, but they could not be used in South Africa as they were too high.

“The court took into account the seriousness and prevalence of fraud, the significant financial loss to Prasa and Mthimkhulu’s betrayal of his employer’s trust," Ms Mjonondwane said.

In an interview from 2019 with local broadcaster eNCA, Mthimkhulu admitted that he did not have a PhD.

"I failed to correct the perception that I have it. I just became comfortable with the title. I did not foresee any damages as a result of this,” he said.

Lt-Gen Seswantsho Godfrey Lebeya, the head of South Africa’s elite Hawks police unit that helped bring the prosecution, also welcomed the sentence.

“This should serve as a lesson to would be fraudsters that crime doesn’t pay," he said.

The Hawks said this was a case linked to "state capture", a term used in South Africa to describe widespread corruption that occurred under Jacob Zuma when he was president from 2009 until 2018.

Mthimkhulu is reportedly planning to appeal.

[lboogie1906]

Dr. Eduardo Mondlane (June 20, 1920 - February 3, 1969) an educator, nationalist, and leader of the Mozambique independence movement, was born in the Gaza District of Southern Mozambique. He was the child of a Tsonga chief, the fourth of sixteen sons, and the only one of his family to receive a primary education.

He attended several mission primary schools and worked as a shepherd for part of his youth before obtaining a scholarship to attend a Presbyterian secondary school in Transvaal, South Africa. He was admitted to Witwatersrand University, he was expelled from South Africa because his views came into conflict with the government’s apartheid policies.

He was accepted into the University of Lisbon, Portugal but transferred to Oberlin College. He obtained a BA in Sociology and Anthropology from Oberlin College and completed a Ph.D. in Sociology from Northwestern University. He became the leader of Frente de Libertacao de Mocambique, He always made education for young Africans one of his foremost priorities, creating scholarship opportunities for Mozambican children in education.

He moved to Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, where he became president of FRELIMO, With the backing of the Soviet Union and many African nations, FRELIMO launched a guerrilla war against the colonial Portuguese government to win Mozambique’s independence. With him as president of FRELIMO, the campaign for independence was a campaign for a socialist state.

He was killed by a bomb which had been disguised as a notebook and sent to him by unknown assassins. FRELIMO continued to fight for independence. On June 25, 1975, FRELIMO was given control of Mozambique and the country gained its independence. #africanhistory365 #africanexcellence

[magz]

"Uber Eats drivers in South Africa are unionizing"

(Article date: July 20, 2023)

Article quotes:

Uber Eats delivery drivers in South Africa are looking to form a union to hold the company accountable. -

Drivers say they lack basic equipment and benefits, and that Uber Eats has not been responsive to their grievances, forcing them to consider unionizing. -

Uber says it has done its best to create flexible and rewarding work conditions for its drivers, including providing insurance. But drivers say they have not received any such benefits.

The working conditions for gig workers in South Africa are far worse than their peers in other parts of the world,

according to studies by Fairwork — a global research project that analyzes digital labor platforms — and the University of the Witwatersrand’s Southern Centre for Inequality Studies. [...]

Globally, unionizing has been effective in helping gig workers fight for their rights.

In 2021 the U.K. Supreme Court ruled that two dozen of its drivers were workers — and not independent contractors — which set a precedent for the tens of thousands of drivers who operate in the country. [...]

According to the Uber spokesperson, the company offers both funeral and accidental insurance to all its drivers in South Africa.

But drivers allege they have been unable to access these benefits.

“As drivers, we are having to find our own way to survive by contributing money for funerals, forming our own security teams to guard against bike theft, and doing cash stokvels [community-based savings schemes] to assist each other in the case of robberies, sickness, or accidents,” Dlodlo said.

“Uber must be pushed to play its part and that’s where a union comes in.” [...]

The union, with its over 90,000 members, is attempting to unite all South African gig workers — including cabbies and food delivery drivers — under one body, Tamela told Rest of World.

[culmaer]

look what finally arrived !!!

hopefully this contains the answer to the "umtshingo"/kelp overtone flute mystery

The Musical Instruments of the Native Races of South Africa by Percival R. Kirby. First published in 1934 by Oxford University Press, this is the second imprint (1968) of the second edition by the Witwatersrand University Press.

now the title does give off colonial vibes, but with some critical reading this is an invaluable resource which I hope will fill in some of the gaps of information unavailable digitally. Kirby was born in the 1880s in Scotland and comes to South Africa at the turn of the century and realises that the indigenous musical instruments and musical traditions of Africa were dying out due to colonialsm/European influence. so he gets funding from Carnegie in New York and the South African government to do research expeditions to remote villages and document their music. in the Preface to the Second Edition, Kirby writes :

during the past thirty years [since the original publication] the rapidly increasing urbanization [has resulted] in a dying out of many old tribal institutions and the disappearance of many objects of material culture, including musical instruments. The case of the mbila, the great resonated xylophone of the Venda, is typical, for the old craftsmen who used to make it and the skilled musicians who used to play it have all died, and as they were apparently unable to train successors, the instrument in no longer being made and is now virtually extinct (1964. p. xii)

On the topic of Kirby, he was one of the first people to play on the trumpets found in the tomb of Tutankhamen when he visited Cairo in 1933. in true British colonial fashion, he goes into the Royal Egyptian Museum and they basically just let him play the trumpets :

I suggested to Dr. Engelbach that it ought to be an easy matter to play upon the trumpets, and enquired of him if they had ever been sounded before. He replied that they had not, and asked me if I would care to try them myself (p. 34 of the article cited below)

the only condition being that he not publish about it, without written permission from Howard Carter who was still alive at the time. Kirby delays his research and in the meantime (in 1939) the BBC broadcast the trumpets being played "for the first time" ... except they shoved a modern trumpet mouthpiece into the artefacts without mentioning it in the broadcast. all Kirby knows is that what they're playing is impossible, but it's not until after WWII that he could confirm it was played with a modern mouthpiece. this misleading and inaccurate portrayal Really Annoys him (fair). his full article is an interesting read

Kirby, P. R. (1947) "The Trumpets of Tut-Ankh-Amen and Their Successors." in The Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland, Vol. 77 (No. 1), pp. 33–45. https://doi.org/10.2307/2844534 (link to the article on Jstor)

[darkmaga-returns]

This is an addendum to the earlier previous post below, as it mentions Novartis as one the the bad actors, so I’m explaining why.

An Evidence-Based Assessment of the Source of the SARS-CoV-2 Injections Scam: PART 1

Hedley Rees

·

5:07 AM

Read full story

This is Trevor Mundel, Bill Gates’ ‘Mr Fixt it in Pharma.’

Trevor Mundel: President, Global Health, Bill Gates Foundation

“Trevor Mundel leads the foundation’s efforts to develop high-impact interventions against the leading causes of death and disability in developing countries. He manages the foundation’s disease-specific R&D investments in HIV, Tuberculosis, Malaria, Pneumonia, Enteric and Diarrheal Diseases, and Neglected Tropical Diseases. He also manages cross-cutting product development programs, including Discovery & Translational Sciences, Innovative Technology Solutions, Integrated Development, and Vaccine Development & Surveillance. This work relies on close collaboration with an international network of grantees and partners.

Prior to joining the foundation in 2011, Trevor was global head of development with Novartis and previously was involved in clinical research at Pfizer and Parke-Davis.

Born and raised in South Africa, Trevor earned his bachelor’s and medical degrees from the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg. He also studied mathematics, logic, and philosophy as a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford University, and he earned a Ph.D. in mathematics at the University of Chicago.”

The relevance of this is that Novartis was developing a Lentiviral vector gene modified cell tharapy soon after Mundel arrived in 2011.

That was approved by US FDA in August 2017, named Kymriah. This is the package insert today showing side effects:

“WARNING: CYTOKINE RELEASE SYNDROME, NEUROLOGICAL TOXICITIES, and SECONDARY HEMATOLOGICAL MALIGNANCIES

[notasfilosoficas]

“Nadie nace odiando a alguien por el color de su piel” 

Nelson Mandela

Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela nació en Mvezo unión sudafricana en julio de 1918, fue un abogado, activista contra el apartheid, político y filántropo sudafricano. Fue el primer mandatario negro que encabezó el poder ejecutivo y el primero en resultar elegido por sufragio universal en su país.

Mandela estudió derecho en la universidad de Fort Harey la Universidad de Witwatersrand. Se involucró en la política anticolonialista por lo que se unió al congreso nacional africano y luego fundó la liga juvenil. Ganó protagonismo al llegar al poder del partido nacional en 1948. En su ejercicio como abogado fue varias veces arrestado por actividades sediciosas. 

Estuvo encarcelado 27 años, primero en la isla Robben y después en las prisiones de Pollsmoor y de Victor Verster. 

Fue excarcelado en 1990 en medio de una convulsión social en Sudáfrica. Intervino en las negociaciones políticas con Frederik Leclerc para abolir el apartheid y establecer las elecciones generales de 1994 en donde triunfó en las urnas.

Durante su gotero de Unidad Nacional, invito a otros partidos políticos a unirse a su gabinete y además promulgó una nueva constitución.

Creó la comisión para la verdad y la reconciliación para investigar las violaciones a los derecho humanos cometidas en los años del apartheid, así como reformas a las políticas de propiedad de la tierra y combate a la pobreza.

Fue una figura controvertida a lo largo de su vida, pasó de ser considerado un terrorista al presidente de Sudáfrica, muchos de sus críticos le acusaron de ser un comunista y terrorista, aunque ganó el apoyo de la comunidad internacional por su activismo, lo que lo hizo acreedor a múltiples menciones honoríficas incluyendo el premio Nobel de La Paz.

Se le consideraba una persona muy reservada que escondía muy bien sus emociones, tenía una vida austera y también la peculiaridad de arreglar el mismo su cama aun como presidente, usualmente era amistoso y cordial aun entre sus opositores, educado y cortés era también muy servicial con cualquiera de la gente, aun si tenia que defender a sus detractores contra sus propios aliados.

Después de una prolongada infección respiratoria, Nelson Mandela murió en diciembre de 2013 a la edad de 95 años, declarando un duelo nacional por diez días y su herencia se repartió entre familiares empleados e instituciones educativas.

Fuente: Wikipedia

[xclowniex]

Anyone who denies that South Africa is incredibly biased in bringing Israel to the IJC obviously has never educated themselves of how jews were treated in South Africa. See this article here about it as well as some quotes from it below.

"In 1930, Dr. D. F. Malan introduced the Quota Act, effectively restricting Jewish immigration. The bill, which did not explicitly state to be limiting of Jews, put high restrictions on countries that had majority Jewish immigrants, and did not restrict countries that barely had Jews"

"The 1956 Treason Trial saw Nelson Mandela along with a group of mostly Jewish men and women, arrested for treason. This resulted in accusations of a Jewish conspiracy to overthrow the white government and a plot involving communism"

"The 1980s saw the rise of far-right neo-Nazi groups such as the Afrikaner Weerstandsbeweging under Eugene Terreblanche. The AWB modeled itself after Hitler's National Socialist Party replete with fascist regalia and an emblem resembling the swastika."

"In May 1998, a Cape community radio station run by a Muslim organisation and aimed at Muslims, Radio 786 broadcast a programme denying the Holocaust. The resulting legal action brought by the South African Jewish Board of Deputies remains unresolved after 14 years. Radio 786 refuses to apologise to the Jewish community and has stood by its version of events."

"In 2009, South Africa's deputy foreign minister Fatima Hajaig claimed that "Jewish money controls America and most Western countries.""

"In 2013, ANC Western Cape leader Marius Fransman claimed ninety-eight percent of land and property owners in Cape Town are "white" and "Jewish". The allegation turned out to be false."

"During the Rhodes Must Fall protests, President of the Students' Representative Council of the University of the Witwatersrand Mcebo Dlamini, who was leader of the protests, stated he "loved" Hitler because Hitler "knew" that Jews "were up to no good", admired Hitler's "charisma" and claimed that "Jews are devils" and were "uncircumcised in heart""

"In 2020, there was an unprecedented conviction for online antisemitism in the country. The Magistrates Court in Randburg found Matome Letsoalo guilty of crimen injuria over incendiary tweets targeting the South African Jewish Board of Deputies (SAJBD)."

Like is that evidence enough for people to finally realize that South Africa has a history of antisemitism and antisemitic people in power? Like Hamas and South Africa have had diplomatic ties for YEARS. This article from 2015 goes into that.

You cannot deny the incredible bias that South Africa has towards bringing this case to the IJC

[queenlua]

betteridge's law applies, but

honestly this was a pretty fun read just for the goofy historiography of What Various Fields (At Various Times) Have Proclaimed Early Humans Are Like, complete with e.g. goofy projection by 1950s anthropologists:

The notion of the meat-loving ancestor has a history. In the nineteen-fifties, the anatomist Raymond Dart, famous for discovering the first authentic fossil of an early African hominin, advanced what became known as the “killer ape” theory. Hunting, Dart thought, made us human. Our furry forebears climbed down from the trees to gorge on “the more attractive fleshy food that lay in the vast savannahs of the southern plains,” he wrote in the book “Adventures with the Missing Link” (1959). Elsewhere, he described the earliest hominins as “confirmed killers: carnivorous creatures that seized their quarries by violence, battered them to death, tore apart their broken bodies, dismembered them limb from limb, slaking their ravenous thirst with the hot blood of victims and greedily devouring livid writhing flesh.” The killer-ape theory seeped into the mainstream. In 1955, Dart, then based at the University of the Witwatersrand, met the playwright Robert Ardrey, who was in South Africa for a reporting trip. Like a convert seeing the holy truth, Ardrey came away transformed. He was convinced that “the predatory transition” not only made us human but also explained what he described as “man’s bloody history, his eternal aggression, his irrational, self-destroying inexorable pursuit of death for death’s sake.” Ardrey was inspired to write the “Nature of Man” series, a set of books about human nature and evolution, published between 1961 and 1976. Time later named “African Genesis,” the first in the series, the most notable nonfiction book of the sixties. It was cited as an influence on Stanley Kubrick’s film “2001: A Space Odyssey” (1968), whose opening sequence showed primate violence as a turning point in the development of our species.