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If you’re in Cape Town this weekend, a visit to the South African National Gallery would be time well spent. Currently on show is a major retrospective of the work of Esther Mahlangu called Then I Knew I Was Good at Painting. Growing up in a rural village, Mahlangu watched her grandmother painting the walls of their homestead in distinctive angular patterns and colours. She would practise doing the same over and over until she had mastered this traditional art of the Ndebele people. She was invited to paint murals at the local museum and global attention followed. At 88 Mahlangu is the face of her culture. Sifiso Ndlovu explains the traditions behind the artworks.
Blue whales, the largest animals on Earth, were once nearly hunted to extinction. Though they’re protected, they’re still very rare and elusive. So it was a momentous finding when Jeremy Kiszka and his team sighted blue whales near the Seychelles, in the Indian Ocean. No information on blue whales in these waters had been available since the last was killed in the region in 1964. Kiszka tells us about their discovery.
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Charl Blignaut
Arts, Culture and Society Editor
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Sifiso Ndlovu, University of Mpumalanga
At 88 the artist Esther Mahlangu is world famous and is the subject of a major exhibition in Cape Town.
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Jeremy Kiszka, Florida International University
The first dedicated scientific surveys have confirmed the presence of blue whales in Seychelles.
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Politics
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Hamdy A. Hassan, Zayed University
Peace in Sudan requires a focus on the concerns of historically marginalised populations in conflict zones.
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Richard Calland, University of Cape Town
The constitution and the principle of constitutionalism will continue to be politically contested territory. So far it’s held in South Africa.
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Omar Shahabudin McDoom, London School of Economics and Political Science
Rwanda’s preoccupation with security is at odds with its desire for unity.
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Helga Dickow, University of Freiburg
Chad’s presidential elections on 6 May will officially mark the end of the transitional government but will not mean a break with authoritarian rule.
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Sandy Africa, University of Pretoria
The security services that watch over South Africans today are a far cry from the instruments of minority rule of the apartheid era. They are subject to the constitution and the rule of law.
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Business + Economy
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Abiodun Odusote, University of Lagos
The law prohibiting abuse of the naira violates Nigerian cultural and traditional practices.
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Health + Medicine
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Susan Goldstein, University of the Witwatersrand
Obesity among children is a growing problem in Africa.
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Idris Mohammed, Gombe State University
With a new 5-in-1 vaccine, Nigeria hopes to contain the five most important serotypes causing meningitis in the country.
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Jaishree Raman, National Institute for Communicable Diseases
Forty million children are born in malaria areas across Africa each year. Two new vaccines are important weapons in the fight against the disease.
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Arts, Culture + Society
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Duane Jethro, University of Cape Town
Commerce, culture and heritage mix in rather strange and sometimes unsettling ways in South Africa, especially when the struggle for freedom is commemorated.
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Environment + Energy
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Susanne Vetter, Rhodes University
Planting millions of trees in natural grassland is largely ineffective in the battle against global warming because it adds little or no additional carbon storage.
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Meelan Thondoo, University of Cambridge
African cities with over 10 million residents are getting hotter fast. Millions face disaster in these urban heat islands unless the cities start greening and adapting to climate change soon.
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Science + Technology
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Ed Elson, University of the Western Cape
MeerKAT has made remarkable contributions to South African and international science.
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30 April 2024
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Stellenbosch
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6 - 8 May 2024
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Bellville
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11 - 12 May 2024
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Cape Town
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21 - 23 May 2024
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Stellenbosch
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