Dear Editor
The Wild Coast Mallet Award for Fiction

George Monbiot , the widely respected British environmental journalist and social commentator, recently announced that he was putting up a prize for the writer of ‘best climate change fiction’ of the year. This would be awarded to that person who “manages, in the course of 2009, to cram as many misrepresentations, distortions and falsehoods into a single article, statement, lecture, film or interview about climate change.”
Following on Monbiot’s footsteps, we suggest that SANRAL’s Mr. Fanie Van Aardt deserves a ‘Wild Coast Mallet Award for Fiction’ for his statements about the impacts of the N2 Wild Coast Toll road which recently appeared in The Herald article ‘Wild Coast does not need Toll road’.
Mr. van Aardt’s dismisses SWC’s concerns that negative environmental and social impacts of the road will lead to increased poverty, unless the road is accompanied by a regional development plan, as being unfounded and ‘speculative’. As these are the same concerns that are raised in detail in the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) specialist reports about social development and environmental impacts, does this mean Mr. Van Aardt also considers the EIA findings to be purely ‘speculative’?
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Posted on February 16th, 2009 by Louis
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Mr GR Morgan (DA) to ask the Minister of Education:

(1) Whether her department is investigating the incident that occurred on 17 September 2008 at Xolobeni Junior Secondary School where members of the SA Police Service are alleged to have administered corporal punishment to learners; if not, why not; if so, what are the relevant details, [Read more...]

Posted on December 11th, 2008 by Louis
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Ecology or Economy – Debunking a myth

Dear Editor

The N2 ‘Wild Coast’ Toll Rd EIA appears to have resurrected a widespread and extremely short-sighted myth which is common in economic circles. This myth is that ecological losses are justified if they result in economic gains. [Read more...]

Posted on December 8th, 2008 by Louis
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Posted on December 5th, 2008 by Louis
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It has been reported that both the Cape Town City Council and Western Cape Provincial authorities have expressed their concern that their opposition to the tolling of the proposed N2 Winelands toll road has not been acknowledged or recognised by South African National Roads Agency Limited (SANRAL).

We know that SANRAL is committed to trying to improve South Africa’s road network. We know too that of the R44 billion the government received in 2006 from road users, only R10.6 billion was spent by the state in 2004/05 on building and maintaining national and provincial roads.

SANRAL’s budget allocation for 2004 was R1.4 billion, hardly adequate to maintain, never mind improve the national road network. SANRAL therefore proposes to overcome its shortages of income through tolling.
Has the time not come for the government to revise its policy and provide funding for roads that the communities prioritize, so that we don’t get roads built because they can be profitable, often through the policy of “unsolicited bids”?

We now have the draft environmental impact report available for the controversial Wild Coast N2 toll road. Quite apart from the highly debatable merits and demerits of the SANRAL Greenfields route between Mthatha and Port Edward (more specifically, between Lusikisiki and Port Edward), the probable tolls listed in the report are as follows:

This means that in this highly impoverished area, a road which is meant to benefit the local people is going to cost at least R70 between Ntafufu and Port Edward. This road will further isolate the present commercial centres of Bizana, Flagstaff and Kokstad and will hardly benefit the people of that region. This is quite apart from the fact that the report concludes “the proposed new road is considered not ecologically sustainable”.
Surely it is time for the treasury to revise its position, communicating with local communities so that SA develops a road structure that not only takes in the needs of local communities, but recognises the constraints imposed by oil peak and climate change, all of which indicate the need for futuristic planning?
Yours sincerely,

Bishop Geoff Davies Executive Director (SAFCEI)

Posted on November 11th, 2008 by Louis
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September 07, 2008 Edition 1

Alyn Adams

Dear Minister Sonjica,

Just a note of support from a poorish white person, to remind you to keep your chins up in this time of tribulation. I say “poorish” because I know that, democratically speaking, I qualify as a prima facie elitest. [Read more...]

Posted on September 11th, 2008 by Louis
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Rt. Hon. Madame Buyelwa Sonjica
Minister of Minerals & Energy
Private Bag X59
Pretoria 0001

Dear Minister,

Congratulations on your decision to allow the Australians to strip-mine the Wild Coast. As a child, my parents would force me to accompany them on camping trips to Mtentu estuary. I look back on those times with hatred in my heart. I always seemed to have sand up my nose and a bluebottle down my costume. The sun was too hot and the water was too cold. Once a crab almost took my foot off and I remember looking at the estuary and thinking, one day someone will come along and destroy you. And I will laugh. [Read more...]

Posted on September 8th, 2008 by Louis
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