Run for your lives! It's the racists! UKZN is falling to pieces.

As yet another institution meant to bring the country forward collapses into stupidity and ruin, the classical arguments are wheeled out once more. The pro-VC, D.Chetty, claims that the issue isn't academic freedom, but racism. Which is impressive, since one of the people being attacked is another Chetty, and the document that got him fired was talking about how racism is getting worse. In his article, he makes no mention of what's actually going on, preferring to hide being vague talk of 'transformation' and good governance. In another quick move, Cowling, a respected dean of the law school, left under a cloud because he blocked the promotion of one of the vice chancellors cronies, who obviously all deserve jobs for sucking lots of administrative cock. Still, at least such cronies would have no problem spending R100,000 a day prosecuting staff over internal matters, or on the chair the chancellor wants reflecting the dignity of his office. Now, they just have to figure out how to make a chair composed entirely of shit and razorblades hold together... http://www.ukzn.ac.za/ukznonline/15/images/profchetty.jpg http://www.ukzn.ac.za/ukznonline/17/images/prof%20cowling%20n%20studs.jpg

The ultimate cash cow 46% of all road toll income in the country comes from KZN. Which is surprising (since traffic here isn't really that heavy) and unsurprising (because every fucker's on the take) all at once. Apparently, the moneys being used to fund roads in the eastern cape, which makes me wonder why they arent paying for their own roads. Still, the answers gotta be more tolls, at least as far as the city is concerned. The newest one is the toll plaza being built at the new airport, which will not focus on sucking money out of airport traffic, apparently. Which is a pretty impressive trick, given that it'll be the only way to get out of the place. Still, in a city when the roads are devolving into a series of dusty potholes, why spend the money on maintenance? After all, it makes hardly any money for the companies involved... http://politicsoffthegrid.files.wordpress.com/2007/06/toll-road.jpg

tribal protection? Not in Natal, china. At R55 billion, the Amazulu development is big stuff, including a waterfront, marina, Africas largest mall, and a stadium (because why should Durban have just one empty new stadium? Any good city has at least two...). It sounds great - to the

developers, at least - but it's hit a snag; the people that live there don't want to go. Of course, they should have been consulted, but it turns out the great King Goodwill just signed over the rights to the land without bothering to check whether his subjects actually wanted to stay or not. You can't blame him; his government stipend of R800,000 a year just isnt enough to pay the bills. As the residents point out, they've been offered jobs, but they don't want them; if you're a subsistence farmer, living off the land and spending your days in the sun, why would you want to be a carguard or waitron? It's hardly a step up. Still, apparently Durban needs this, unlike, say, public transport, or the safety to actually go to the many entirely sufficient places in town...

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Molweni II: the sequel Last week, a storm destroyed 400 houses and ruined hundreds more in Molweni. Politicians rushed to the rescue, to have their pictures taken standing there looking sad. The mayor and city manager published articles praising the spirit of ubuntu basically, saying they weren't going to help, so the community was helping itself. They also applied for a R23 million repair budget, hopefully not to be given to the morons that built it in the first place. On Saturday, another storm hit, and the same thing happened again, this time in KwaMakhuta. Another seven dead, another 400 houses destroyed, another 300 damaged. Of course, this is all still being blamed on freak storms and acts of god, since accepting that it's their fault for hiring sucky builders is anti-democratic. Democracy being, as we all know, accepting what the leaders say and do without question or criticism.

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