Bücher veröffentlicht von Jonathan Ball Publishers SA

Advocate Thuli Madonsela has achieved in her seven years as Public Protector what few accomplish in a lifetime; her legacy and contribution cannot be over-stated. In her final days in office she compiled the explosive State Capture report and, before that, the report on President Jacob Zuma’s Nkandla residence. Praised and vilified in equal measures, Madonsela has frequently found herself at centre stage in the increasingly fractious South African political scene.Yet, despite the intense media scrutiny, Madonsela remains something of an enigma. Who is this soft-spoken woman who stood up to state corruption? Where did she develop her views and resolve? This book attempts to answer these questions, and others, by exploring many aspects of Madonsela’s life: her childhood years and family, her involvement in student politics, her contribution to the constitution, her life in law.Madonsela once described her role as Public Protector as being akin to that of the Venda traditional spiritual female leader, the Makhadzi, who whispers truth to the ruler. When the sounds of the exchanges between the ruler and the Makhadzi grow loud, Madonsela said, that is when the whispering has failed.No Longer Whispering to Power is about Thuli Madonsela’s tenure as Public Protector, during which the whisper grew into a cry. It is the story of the South African people’s attempt to hold power to account through the Office of the Public Protector. More significantly, this important book stands as a record of the crucial work 

Part memoir, part ethnography, Under Nelson Mandela Boulevardis journalist Sean Hunter Christie’s account of time spent amongst the Tanzanian stowaways who live rough under the Nelson Mandela Boulevard flyover, at the foot of Cape Town. After a year living in South Africa’s most unequal city, the young Zimbabwean is introduced to serial stowaway Adam Bashili, through the photographer David Southwood. This encounter changes everything. Adam introduces Christie to the extraordinary world of the “beachboys”, a multi-port, fourth generation sub-culture of young men from the slums of Dar es Salaam, who came to South Africa with the aim of stowing away on ships bound for other continents. Under Nelson Mandela Boulevard presents Cape Town as it has not yet been seen: as a series of desperate social margents and cloying controls, but also of unbelievable and somehow hopeful beliefs and survival strategies. Leading the author on an unprecedented tour of Dar es Salaam’s underworld, followed by a madcap heroin run down Africa’s east coast, Adam leads him to a trail-head of his own: a way beyond his largely perceived oppressions.

Crime statistics do not belong to the government, academics, specialists, or the press. They are ours: we experience and report crimes and have a right to access and understand their official record. It should not take any particular expertise to get a grasp on what we should make of the figures and graphs that the South African Police Service produces every year.Yet crime, its measurement and control, are as much political matters as they are technocratic. While there is much that remains open to interpretation and discussion, there are some things that we should all be able to agree on, based on a sober reading of the evidence. As crime is a serious issue in South Africa, knowing what the official sources say is critical for productive debates on what we can do to make our country safer.A Citizen’s Guide to Crime Trends in South Africa provides a basis on which to understand the statistics in a manner that is accessible to the general public. Each chapter challenges a set of oft-repeated assumptions about how bad crime is, where it occurs, and who its victims are. It also demonstrates how and why crime statistics need to be matched with other forms of research, including criminal justice data, in order to produce a fuller account of what we are faced with.

''What do you mean?'' Megs gasped. ''It''s impossible.'' ''Well ... I got the test results back and he''s not the father. But it''s more complicated than that ...'' He was holding a sheet of paper in his hand, but seemed unable to articulate what was on it. Megs reached out for it: ''Let me read it then.'' ''And that''s how I found out. Boom! It was like I had been stabbed ... I collapsed on the floor at the back of the shop. It was as if I had passed out from shock. Then I cried. I cried for the child I had and the child I didn''t have. I knew without a shadow of a doubt my life had changed forever.'' In 1990 two South African mothers were faced with an impossible choice, one that no mother should ever have to make. Should they surrender the child they had lovingly raised in order to get back the baby they had given birth to? Megs Clinton-Parker and Sandy Dawkins chose nurture over nature, simply unable to give up their two-year-old sons who were switched at birth at an East Rand Hospital. Instead they decided to try to make their strange relationship work, although they lived in different cities, 500 km apart. And they decided to sue the South African state, whose negligence had altered the fates of two families forever.Robin Dawkins and Gavin Clinton-Parker grew up living each other''s lives, brothers-but-not-brothers, acutely aware that their mothers'' hearts were torn. Unable to escape the consequences of the swap, Robin decided at the age of 15 that it was time to claim what was rightfully his, adding a further twist to this bitter saga. Theirs is a story of how to live with the unliveable, and how some decisions can never be unmade.

In thirty-two entertaining chapters, humorist and master storyteller Henry D. Spalding introduces us to a wide range of colorful characters from the Jewish past and present. Hundreds of witty stories are retold here with care and verve. Every old and tasteful joke is included in one form or another, with punch lines returning to the reader from jolly memory. So, sit back, read, and enjoy! Available on Demand and also in Kindle, Nook, and other popular eBook formats.I

"There are only two great certainties in a game ranger''s career. The first is that you will never be well off. The second - and best by far - is that you will do things that most other people only get to dream about. This is a collection of stories about the life of a bushveld conservationist as it is lived at ground level by that elite band of men and women who guard the Kruger National Park - at the cost of much sweat and, not infrequently, quite a bit of blood. Bruce Bryden''s tales of 30 years in the service of our most famous park make a gripping and entertaining read, abounding with encounters with elephant, lion, buffalo, leopard and rhino, whether darting for research, managing culling operations by helicopter or stalking on foot. In the best tradition of bushveld stories, there is a great deal of shooting, and a fair amount of running away; there are meetings with extraordinary characters among the rangers; memorable gatherings; hilarious mishaps and narrow escapes; and throughout, a great love and respect for both the wilderness and the creatures that inhabit it."

In The Cowboy Capitalist, Charles van Onselen challenges a historiography of over 120 years, locating the raid in American rather than British history and forcing us to rethink the histories of at least three nations. Through a close look at the little-remembered figure of John Hays Hammond, a confidant of both Rhodes and Jameson, he discovers the American Old West on the South African Highveld. This radical reinterpretation challenges the commonly held belief that the Jameson Raid was quintessentially British and, in doing so, drives splinters into our understanding of events as far forward as South Africa's critical 1948 general election, with which the foundations of Grand Apartheid were laid.

12 FEBRUARY 2015. The South African secret services block the cellphones of journalists covering Parliament. Opposition party members are violently thrown out of the House. President Jacob Zuma - accused of corruption on a grand scale - laughs uproariously. Where is the country of Nelson Mandela headed? The institutions of democracy are falling apart or being captured by a narrow and deeply corrupt elite built around Zuma. Its infrastructure is collapsing. Its economy cannot provide succor to the eight million who don''t have jobs. Protests over service delivery are on the rise. Does South Africa have the resolve and the leadership to stem the slide? In a devastating, searing, honest paean to his country, renowned political journalist and commentator Justice Malala forces South Africa to come face to face with the country it has become: corrupt, crime-ridden, compromised and its institutions captured by a selfish political elite that is bent on enriching itself at the expense of the increasingly marginalised masses. In this deeply personal reflection, Malala''s diagnosis is devastating: South Africa is on the brink. He does not stop there. Malala believes that we have the ingredients to turn things around: our lauded Constitution, our wealth of talent, our history of activism and a democratic trajectory that can be used to stop the rot from setting in. But he has a warning: South Africans need to wake up now, or else they will soon find their country has been stolen.

The Springbok rugby captain, over more than a century, has represented many things to many South Africans. He has united, and he has divided. He has thrilled, he has disappointed. He has inspired, he has disheartened. He has triumphed, he has failed. But he has always had an impact. In this revealing narrative, Edward Griffiths and Stephen Nell depict the men who have been able to call themselves ''Springbok Captain'' through their backgrounds, triumphs and disappointments. Relive the heyday of rugby legends Bennie Osler, Danie Craven, Hennie Muller, Johan Claassen, Naas Botha, Francois Pienaar, Gary Teichmann, Joost van der Westhuizen, Andre Vos and others. Now fully updated with the accounts of Bobby Skinstad, Victor Matfield and Jean de Villiers, The Springbok Captains is the epic story that lies at the heart of South African rugby.

Jan Christian Smuts was soldier, statesman and intellectual, one of South Africa''s greatest leaders. Yet little is said about him today even as we appear to live in a leadership vacuum. Unafraid of Greatness is a re-examination of the life and thought of Jan Smuts. It is intended to remind a contemporary readership of the remarkable achievements of this impressive soldier-statesman. The author argues that there is a need to bring Smuts back into the present, that Smuts'' legacy still has much to instruct. He draws several parallels between Smuts and President Thabo Mbeki, both intellectuals much lionised abroad and yet often distrusted at home. This book is a highly readable account of Smuts'' life. It also examines a number of overarching themes: his relationships with women, spiritual life, intellectual life and his role as advisor to world leaders. Politics and international affairs receive the lion''s share, but Smuts'' unique contributions to other fields - for example, botany - are not neglected. Unafraid of Greatness does not shy away from the contradictions of its subject. Smuts was one of the architects of the United Nations, and a great champion of human rights, yet he could not see the need to reform the condition of the African majority in his own country.