Talk:South Africa

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Date: 12:36, 11 June 2008 (UTC)
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Contents

[edit] Malaria numbers

Saying that malaria deaths are down 73% doesn't convey enough information. Are they down 73% from 100 per year or 10000? Can the author please add this? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 146.232.65.6 (talk) 15:53, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Quite right. I removed the section and replaced it with verifiable information. -- leuce 18:07, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Governmental Form

Even though it is officially referred to as such, does the form of government still qualify to be called a Republic? It appears that, in contradiction to the constitution, that anything can be voted away.

The definition of "republic" is not opposed to that of "democracy", even though in the USA you get a "republican" and "democratic" party. See the Wikipedia definition of "republic". -- leuce 17:54, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Crime citations please

The government is criticised for doing too little to stop crime. Some question the effectiveness of the South African Police Service, which is known to make use of private security firms to protect its police stations[citation needed]. Due to the high crime rate in South Africa, many private individuals also make use of these systems[citation needed].

The Government was criticized when the Minister of Safety and Security was in Burundi promoting peace and democracy while there was a spate of crime in Gauteng. This spate included the killings of an alarming number of people, including members of the South African Police Service killed while performing their duties[citation needed].

Lack of citations make bunny cry, especially in a story where everything else is cited. ManicParroT 19:44, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

Read the history again & again until you SEE that the poverty is all caused by the WAGE SYSTEM! It is slavery! 100%! So USA should end the wage since we force it on the world, in ignorance! You can't "raise wages" to help ALL peoplem, we can only end the wage system worldwide! If USA ends our wage (to help starving americans) that would pull all nations into ending their wage systems & only that will help every person. Every person needs an RFID to eliminate money now! Sundiiiaaa 04:01, 31 December 2006 (UTC)

oh why? because the whole world follows after america.America's changing the wage system wouldn't make anyone else change theirs the whole world does not copy america Charlieh7337 (talk) 00:13, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Archived

Please remove this message with first post. The rest of the content has been archived -- Chris Lester talk 18:00, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

That was really archived way too soon.... Zazaban 05:23, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Scouting in South Africa

Can we add a section on the South African Scout Association to the article (Titled something like Scouting in South Africa). Scouting in general owes many of it's traditions (and in fact it's very extensise) to South Africa. Scouting has also been around in South African since 1908 and was one of the first truely multi-racial organisations (With multi-racial meetings taking place since the 1970s). There are rougly 300 000 scouts in South Africa (with approximatly 70% of them in rural areas)

I think that adding a section on the SASA will really help this article Jediwannabe 08:26, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

I don't think that scouting is important enough to have a whole section in this article. If you look at the section topics, they are all pretty general topics - "Geography", "Culture", "Economy" etc. Maybe scouting deserves a mention in the "Culture" section. - htonl 12:57, 12 August 2006 (UTC)
I see your point. I'll for one or two extra comments, then I'll add it in the the Culture section (If there are no objections) Jediwannabe 15:51, 12 August 2006 (UTC)
I'm assuming that everybody is cool with me adding a bit about scouting in sa under "culture" then? Jediwannabe 05:44, 16 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Religion

There should really be a section on religion--either as its own section or as a subsection of demographics. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.183.168.41 (talk • contribs)

I agree. I don't know if a seperate section is necessary, but there should be some mention of it somewhere on one of the South Africa pages. An article about a country just doesn't seem complete without the very word "religion" being mentioned in it... ¬¬¬¬
True. One place to start looking for info might be [1]. - htonl 19:50, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

That's an incredible source! It's one of the most accurate descriptions of African Traditional Religion I've seen on the internet. Zyxoas (talk to me - I'll listen) 20:22, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Scythian1 has changed the number of Muslims in the population from 1.5% to 2-3%, twice. The source for the 1.5% is the official Stats SA census from 2001, and is backed up by US State Dept and the CIA world factbook. The 2nd time you changed this number, you said that your sources were "more recent", however one of your sources is a book published in 1994! Unless there's some more compelling evidence that the census is that far out, I'd suggest we leave it at the official figure. On a side note, I notice that you cited the CIA factbook when you updated Georgia's Islamic population, but you have replaced the CIA factbook's number for Uganda and South Africa. In all cases you have chosen the source which has the highest Muslim population. If you wish to change the South African population, please discuss here first. —Preceding unsigned comment added by HiltonLange (talk • contribs) 06:10, 6 December 2007 (UTC)

I see you've just put your stats in again. Until you can justify why 2001 official census data from Stats SA is inferior to a book which makes a rough reference to "2-3%", I don't believe we need a special note about the Islamic population. If you can provide a verifiable reason why you believe that your source carries at least equal weight to a national census, I'm all ears. Please discuss on the talk page, and don't just edit again. --HiltonLange (talk) 19:49, 6 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Crime Expo - a plug?

I don't know about anyone else, but the paragraph dedicated to the Crime Expo website under Crime seems to me to be a blatant plug for the site. I think a link like this can be in the 'External links' section, but doesn't warrant being written about directly, since it doesn't add much to the content of the site ... I'd go so far as to hazard that this may be simply here to draw traffic.

May I suggest some discussion regarding this? If no-one is forthcoming, I will remove the offending paragraph.

Stuart Steedman 07:16, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

Please do remove it. The thing that really makes me wonder is how all of these sock-puppets and very new users are related. Are they all just User:JackAss? Is the creator of the Crimexpo site also involved? It doesn't look good for the "for"s when a new user with no edits to their name spontaneously materialises and fixes the link in this article (and then promptly disappears). You really do need to think hard about your position when you find yourself resorting to such dirty tactics (and violating Wikipedia policy: WP:SOCK). Zyxoas (talk to me - I'll listen) 07:42, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

I deleted the link in the external links section that linked to the crime expo site. Whoever added it (an unregistered user) actually had the audacity to write: "Added Crime link to provide a non-biased view for safety of potential tourists." Explain to me how a site is non-biased when the author of the site describes South Africa as a "hell on earth." Besides, wikipedia is not here 'for the safety of potential tourists,' nor is it here to advertise unreliable and biased (and frankly, offensive) websites. This link certainly does not meet any of wikipedia's requirements for external links, nor can it be considered a reliable source. If there should be any link to crime statistics it should be to the statistics section of the SAPS website. Lionchow 13:35, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

Agreed, the link shouldn't be on the main SA article. Incidentally, someone (presumably the same individual you refer to) keep adding the same link at the Wikitravel site (http://wikitravel.org/en/South_Africa). I've been removing it there too (as an ip). Mikker (...) 17:40, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

If you do intend to link to the SAPS Website for crime statistics, please add a note (a disclaimer if you like) stating that the Minister of Safety and Security has placed a moratorium on the release of South African crime statistics to the media. In effect, all stats are at least one year old before release. DawnTreader 196.207.40.213 18:39, 15 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Crime is a reality - why do you choose to ignore the facts?

Hi there, I'm the creator of crimeprotest.co.za, with no relation to Neil Watson.

Please help me by telling me what's wrong with the content I posted to the SA site, and if possible provide me with guidelines on how the content should be posted:

"A website to raise public awareness of crime, gather support to re-instate the death penalty, and pressurise government to do more about the crime problem has been created in July of 2006. The site invites the general public to provide ideas to government to assist in stamping out crime. Several other websites have also been created with various agendas, all focussing on the crime problem, of which Crime Expo South Africa was the most controversial. This site was created to expose the crime problem in South Africa to the world, and possibly have negative implications on the 2010 FIFA World Cup."

The crimeprotest.co.za website is created by community, for community, to improve the situation in South Africa, no more no less. I can't see Watson's site mentioned but not crimeprotest? IMHO, it does not make sense...

Take them both out. There are lots of websites, on lots of issues re: South Africa. Concerned people who are afraid to divulge who they are needn't divulge themselves here either. Wizzy…☎ 12:27, 18 August 2006 (UTC)
To expand on Wizzy's explanation, just because this is the article on South Africa doesn't mean that anything relating to South Africa can (or should) be included in this article. By necessity, the main article on a country must be a summary or a general overview. Perhaps the paragraph you give above would be appropriate for a more specific article, like Crime in South Africa, say. (I see that article doesn't exist, but maybe it should be started.)
Given, however, the importance which the crime problem has at the moment in public opinion, a discussion of the public concern about crime is certainly relevant (IMO) to this article. And that discussion is what we already had in the Crime section, even before the links to Crime Expo SA started being added.
Basically what I am saying is that Wikipedia is not a repository of links. Just as you don't see a discussion of Hellkom in the Economy or Media sections, so you don't see discussion of Crime Expo in the Crime section. In general, websites that relate to a country are not viable for inclusion in the main country article. - htonl 15:01, 18 August 2006 (UTC)


Thank you very much for the info and explanations, even though Wizzy's comments are uncalled for. If you live in South Africa or read the news, you'll probably know how corrupt government is, and how dangerous it is to interfere in their matters; See my anonymousity in that context, and respect my views as I respect yours. Have you ever considered that this site (crimeprotest) has been designed for free and is being maintained for free? Have you considered the objectives and reasons for the site's existence? It's clear that you have not been affected by violent crime if you take these matters so lightly, and throw it (crime) in with other issues. Just read a few South African newspapers for a week, and you'l soon realise that crime is not like the other issues. I did not invite flaming in any way, and never condone it when it's uncalled for. Flamers are usually much more confident on the Internet than in real life. Wikipedia is owned by the world, not a select few who choose to lable themselves as wizards. Thanks again for the positive explanation Htonl! - Crime Protest Webmaster (webmaster_|_at_|_crimeprotest.co.za) 19 August 2006 11:21 (GMT+2:00)

"and how dangerous it is to interfer in their matters" - which version of South Africa are you living in? Declaring yourself to be the "crimeprotest webmaster" is a great way to make sure you have little "anonymousity"; besides, I doubt that that's the primary reason why you're too chicken to register for a Wikipedia account. Your internet bandwidth comes from Telkom, which is almost entirely owned by the government; so why haven't they closed your site down, then, if they are indeed as dangerous as you say? Zyxoas (talk to me - I'll listen) 10:12, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

same version as you, Zyxoas: the version wher corruption, crime and lawlessness reigns! The version where HIV is a myth. The version where Christianity is banned from schools. The version where Police service do not exist. There is a huge difference between chicken and stupid. I'll rather be chicken then. I have all the anonymousity I need, thank you. I have a Wikipedia account, and cannot see how that has anything to do with my identity(??). Government cannot close the site down because (1) They do not have the skills. (2) There are still laws in place to prevent then from doing that. You have a lot to say about me. What more have you done for South Africa other than your Sotho translations? Do you think I'm doing this for persoanl gain? Are you afraid that you'll miss the soccer world cup? Where are you coming from with this attitude? (or rather come again.. as they say) Cpwebmaster 09:54, 20 August 2006 (UTC)
Though I agree with Zyxoas, wikipedia is not a place to debate these issues. And also, I totally agree with the decision not to have the website in the text. In fact, it shouldn't even be a link IMO. Mikker (...) 15:33, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

(This is a response to the Crime Protest webmaster, not to Zyxoas or Mikkerpikker). The fact that the site is designed and run for free and the motivations for its existence don't affect its relevance (or not) to this article. I have never suggested that crime shouldn't be discussed in this article; only that specific websites are not sufficiently important to get whole paragraphs devoted to them. I have in fact been personally affected by crime, though not nearly as seriously as many other people have; but in any case, I reject the argument that only those who are victims of crime have the "right" to have a say in these kinds of discussions. I do in fact read the Cape Times every day; I am well aware that crime is a very serious problem. But wouldn't you agree that HIV/AIDS, poverty and unemployment are equally important "issues" (or whatever one might call them)? Especially so since poverty and unemployment are among the things that drive people into crime. - htonl 18:59, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

I now see that these sites do not belong under the main article, and have started with the stub for Crime in South Africa. I wouldn't put HIV/AIDS under the same umbrella as crime. HIV and AIDS has to do with belief systems, lifestyle and culture - I believe it's choice (except for cases of blood transfusion, accidents etc.), and if you choose to have unprotected sex like South Africa's ex vice president Jacob Zuma, then it's you choose your own destiny. He knew the woman he allegedly raped has HIV and still chose to have unprotected sex with her. Luckily we have lots of garlic and the African Potato and we can always have a quick shower to wash off the HIV after unprotected sex. Poverty and unemployment causes crime, but what causes poverty and unemployment? Corruption, mismanagement of a country, lack of schooling etc; basically all forms of bad governance of a country causes and breeds more crime. When you have as many unschooled, uncultured people as we have in South Africa, there is not really much point in debating the issue of why crime exists - the acts of assault, murder and rape are utterly barbaric, especially the forms thereof found in South Africa, committed by barbarians for no othe reason than primal instinct. Some extremists even believe that boer genocide or ethnic cleansing is happening in South Africa. - Cpwebmaster 09:39, 20 August 2006 (UTC)Cpwebmaster

That's funny. HIV is not a choice, Mr. "Anonymousity". You went to school; you are not living in poverty; you have a TV and a radio in your house. As I explained to my 13 year old nephew after he expressed shock when I made the comment that Fredy Mercury died from AIDS, AIDS does not affect mostly "black" people - it affects mostly poor people. The type who can't go to school, can't afford a radio or TV, and are powerless to protect their dignity (shadow, in the African languages). And what caused their poverty? Let's just say they weren't filthy rich pre-1994. Also, if a population of people are systemically raped and brutalised continuously for several generations you can't expect them to suddenly become perfect, elevated people immediately when the victimisation stops. There was nothing "civilised" about Apartheid (which means a lot more than simply "apartness"). Zyxoas (talk to me - I'll listen) 10:20, 20 August 2006 (UTC)

This whole discussion is similar to the one I had a few months ago about how relevant South Africa's worsening corruption levels were [[2]] to the main South African page. It seems to boil down to what some consider a typical encyclopædia entry might contain. Traditionally, encyclopædia did not cover things like crime and corruption, so they have a point. However, Wikipedia is different and also in today's world we have better ways of analysing these things (especially corruption) so who says it should not be included?
What people would want to read NOW should be the criteria for its content. In my view, people certainly would be intrigued to read that a country (not at war) has unnatural death figures exceeding those in Iraq (apparently both car accident victims and murder victims exceed Iraq's deaths). People might also be interested to read that the number of unnatural deaths annually since Apartheid, exceeds all political deaths during the Apartheid years combined. I reckon that crime and corruption is now so pervasive in South African life that to give it the watered-down overview that it currently has is a cover-up crime in itself.
My April section on corruption levels worsening so rapidly has unfortunately been removed permanently by the likes of encyclopædia traditionalists. I have unfortunately not been able to convince them that it should be mentioned as part-and-parcel of the piece on crime. I am glad to hear Cpwebmaster echoing the notion that crime stems from government's corruption and mismanagement. I quote again from Junius' first 1769 public letter to the people of Britain, who were going through their own socio-political upheaval at the time (i.e. the corruptions of the Duke of Grafton).
The ruin or prosperity of a state depends so much upon the administration of its government, that, to be acquainted with the merit of a ministry, we need only observe the condition of the people. If we see them obedient to the laws, prosperous in their industry, united at home, and respected abroad, we may reasonably presume that their affairs are conducted by men of experience, abilities and virtue. If, on the contrary, we see a universal spirit of distrust and dissatisfaction, a rapid decay of trade, dissensions in all parts of the empire, and a total loss of respect in the eyes of foreign powers, we may pronounce, without hesitation, that the government of that country is weak, distracted, and corrupt.
I differ with Cpwebmaster and htonl on one issue - that poverty and unemployment causes crime. There are many poverty striken people throughout the world and in Africa where crime has not reached ludicrous levels. This poverty and unemployment routine we hear time and time again - it is the clichéd "we are not criminals; we are merely the victims of circumstance". If you looked closely, you'd see that those driven to crime by desperation constitute mostly petty crime. However, the major crime problem in South Africa is murder, grand theft, assault, rape and organised crime. These kinds of crimes are not the poorest of the poor driven by desperation. And the new breed of robbers are not on a crusade of sharing what they steal with the poor. They are driven by pure greed. This is a morality crisis, not peoples' circumstances! I believe the "poverty and unemployment" routine is simply the political excuse for those who are ineffectively dealing with the problem. Cpwebmaster and htonl, please do not give their excuse validity by repeating it.
Zyxoas I am dissappointed to see you also writing as though people are helpless to their circumstances. Your debate centres around the notion that people were once in terribly unfortunate circumstances and are not going to get better soon. Well, thats fine - a bit pessimistic perhaps, considering the 1994 "democracy" that should empower poeple out of their current circumstances. But why are things dramatically worse is the real question? Why are corruption levels still steadily declining and why is crime and morality still at this demonic level? This is the real question! Your arguments would imply that we should see the 1994 levels of poverty, crime and social status at the very least staying constant - but we dont, so what is the cause?
Lastly, I would like to suggest to the www.crimeprotest.co.za guys to publish statistics on the number of South African politicians (and their immediate families) who have criminal records. Then people may finally see the link between corruption and crime. - Eltharian Talk 20 August 2006 UTC

Your last point is a very good idea; then we can debate whether being convicted of treason against a fascist, racist state makes one a "criminal". Btw, I'm not convinced that poverty and immorality have increased since Bliss Apartheid (be careful how you present your statistics, if any). "unnatural death figures exceeding those of Iraq"? What's the population of Iraq, again? I have a feeling that the answer is less than 4 billion, and that these "figures" of which you speak are raw numbers, not percentages. It's just a hunch I have; I could be wrong... Zyxoas (talk to me - I'll listen) 14:43, 20 August 2006 (UTC)

Zyxoas I know the debate you want to make but I don't want to go there. Let me rather correct myself. I should have said, "publish statistics on South African politicians with criminal records (crimes without political motives or crimes committed after 1994)", to avoid any confusion.
Regarding Iraq, all crime statistics are usually measured per 100 000 people - it is a ratio and has nothing to do with the population size. I will try to dig up the figures I found a year or two ago. In the mean time you may look at [3] for the 2004 figures.
Not convinced of Poverty or Immorality not getting worse? Well, what can I say - at least you are not simply accepting my statements at face value. As I see it, there are generally 5 points of view to choose from when it comes to explaining crime:
  • POVERTY: Either you think that poverty causes crime, in which case poverty MUST be getting worse if crime is getting worse.
  • IMMORALITY: You take my view where poverty and crime are not linked, where morality is getting worse (and question where that stems from).
  • INCOMPETANCE: You take the view that the police and/or the authorities above them can not do their job (though they have budgets higher than many countries which are able to contain such crime).
  • SHIFTING BLAME: You blame other external factors (i.e. drug lords from Nigeria, 3rd force activities, legacy of Apartheid, etc. Or if you are really intellectual you may be able to put together a huge capitalist conspiracy like the USA being creators of HIV/AIDS for economic benefit, etc.)
  • IGNORANCE: Lastly, (and we get back to the title of this discussion), you may choose to ignore the facts and pretend that high crime and corruption in South Africa are not real. (this is your only real option that doesn't reflect on government's mismanagement. bliss)

- Eltharian Talk 20 August 2006

I must jump in here and add that even though it is probably encouraged to pontificate about the causes of crime and analyse crime in general, the causes of crime are extremely complex, and similarly is its solution. A better approach would be to include a whole list of factors as being causes of crime, and similarly a whole list of approaches as a solution.
Therefore, I believe that poverty can be seen as a contributing factor to crime. As is a lack of discipline, as is a lack of law enforcement, as is an ineffective judicial system, as is silent diplomacy from a government, as are drugs and alcohol, as is corruption, as are dim streetlights, as is a lack of societal unity, as is a lack of community co-operation, etc. etc.
Any actual solution to crime -- I believe -- would come from an 'all angles' approach.
Please feel free to contribute ideas about solving crime, and if you really want to do something about it, I think the best course of action is to simply put pressure. Put pressure on your neighbourhood, on your household, on your community, on your police station, on your local politician, and most importantly, on government itself. Good luck, and gold bless Africa, and the rest of the world!
Rfwoolf 06:14, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Culture: Afrikaans Music

I'm a little concerned that the section detailing South African music - specifically the Afrikaans music part - has turned into a linkfest of sorts (sans the links, but there's a lot of band-names listed.) I have only heard of one of the listed bands there; are all these band names important enough to be listed on the article, or should they not rather be put into another, seperate article?

Your input on this appreciated. If no further discourse is met on the matter, then I am going to trim back these band names.

Stuart Steedman 06:31, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

Fokofpolisiekar (?) does have it's own article, but this article does not link to it. Zyxoas (talk to me - I'll listen) 07:51, 24 August 2006 (UTC)


Alrighty then, trimming back the band names. The article is, after all, about South Africa, and not a billboard for aspiring South African musicians.

[edit] Culture: Sports

There is no mention of sporting activities in this article at all. Wouldn't it be prudent to include something under the Culture section in this regard? I suppose cricket, rubgy and soccer at least should get a mention. Parodygm 15:51, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Evolution

Can we remove the evolutionary content in the history section? As a studied scientist I cannot let the people who read this think that those theories are plausible. Evolution is merely a hypothesis, and is NOT a science, nor does it have sientific backing in any way! Thank you71.230.10.96Jinny

I wonder which Science you have studied. "No Scientific backing in any way"? :-/ And what does this have to do with Afrikaans bands? Punk rock is a very evolved music genre... Zyxoas (talk to me - I'll listen) 23:28, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

No Zyxoas, you got it all wrong. It doesn't have any 'sientific' backing in any way. That's completely different from 'scientific' backing. Lionchow 15:33, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

True, evolution is a theory, however there are still lots of grey areas which are not completely backed by scientific facts, such as carbon dating and the thermodynamics of space. However, a big chunk of evolution can be considered as factual. There are lots of theories that have successfully proven evolution wrong, however they do not have the popularity to influence it. Evolution theory is accepted by most people - even though this does not prove its factuality or authority. For while being, we should accept most of evolution. Someday the grey areas might be clarified. However, evolution theory shall always be a theory. --Adriaan90 15:15, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

Why is a discussion of evolution here on the South Africa page? Take it to the evolution articles! (Or rather, users like Jinny can take it to forums which believe in the Book of Genesis as infallible fact overruling all science). Rexparry sydney 22:54, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

You have mistaken the meaning of scientific theory. "Theory" does not mean that it might be wrong. That is a common misconception. A "theory", in science at least, is simply an explanation for a set of observations that have been well-tested and are generally accepted by the scientific community.

By contrast, a scientific law is just a set of repeated observations. If "what comes up comes down" was a scientific law (just as an example), "what comes up comes down because of the gravitational pull of the earth" would be a theory. A scientific theory is not a lower-grade than a scientific law. 12.219.137.255 04:01, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

This is a Wikipedia, not a Bible. Bennelliott • Talk • Contributions 09:48, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

"You have mistaken the meaning of scientific theory. "Theory" does not mean that it might be wrong."

I'm afraid that's exactly what it means... 66.167.146.221 16:40, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Yes, like the "theory" of gravity. Why do we even have an article about cosmology when it rests on such shaky ground? Go and check out "evolution as theory and fact" before trolling here again. --Slashme 07:18, 7 September 2007 (UTC)
I agree, this is the last place to have a debate about evolution vs. creation. Let the article cite what scientists HAVE found here (whether they be right or wrong) and not about what you believe Jinny. Wynand.singels 13:24, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Jews

The article History of the Jews in South Africa is not linked in any way from this article, neither is Afrikaner-Jews, which I really think should be included somehow. I'm not sure where though, since I didn't even read this whole article but only searched the page, so I'll leave it to someone more involved to add the links. Thanks. --Jacob no. 9 13:33, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

Why do you think should it be added? We can't add all articles that have something to do with South Africa or with history. That is what the Wikipedia search function is for. Just my2c. -- leuce 18:27, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Mahatma Gandhi

There need to be some information about Mahatma Gandhi and his contribution to the freedom movement in South Africa. Also information on the incident that made Gandhi the Mahatma. Chanakyathegreat 07:01, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

This is a slightly debatable issue. I have seen several articles claim that Ghandi only fought for the liberation of the Indian people. Specifically by saying that they are not k****s like the Blacks. So he was not really part of the freedom movement as a whole. I am not discrediting Ghandhi in anyway, nor any of the great things he did, I just wonder if it's applicable here. Wynand.singels 13:33, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] HIV/AIDS and Citing Sources

I moved this section from the article because it cites no sources. If the author or others would like to improve it by citing sources, and hopefully improve it in general along the way, please do. Until then, please don't add info without properly researching it and citing your sources. Lionchow - Talk 09:02, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

===HIV/AIDS===
As in many African countries, the spread of AIDS (aquired immuno-deficiency syndrome) is a serious problem in South Africa. The link between HIV, a virus spread primarily by sexual contact, and AIDS has long been denied by the president and the health minister, who have insisted that the many deaths in the country are due to malnutrition, and hence poverty, and not the HIV virus.
AIDS is affecting mainly those who are sexually active, which means the deomographics of the country are slowing changing. Most deaths are people who are also economically active, resulting in many families losing their primary wage earners. This is resulting in many 'AIDS orphans' who in many cases depend on the state for care and financial support. Elderly people, traditionally supported by younger member of the family, are also becoming more and more dependant on the state for financial support.
The above information is correct, however I agree with you that is has to be referenced. --Adriaan90 10:38, 8 October 2006 (UTC)
Ok I re-added the information with its required citations. --Adriaan90 12:57, 8 October 2006 (UTC)
I'm new around here so I can't edit a protected article. However, I would like for somebody to do the following: First on the structure of the article. There are a two paragraphs on the AIDS situation under the Economics heading that should be moved to the HIV/AIDS section. Second, rewriting those paragraphs. The number of infected is given as 21% which is wrong and based on outdated projections from years ago. Fortunately the numbers in the main article on HIV/AIDS in South Africa are correct so please copypaste from there. It's also worth mentioning the Nelson Mandela HSRC Study of HIV/AIDS [4]. The prevalence rates of 11% in the 2002 Mandela study were also largely corroborated by Statistics South Africa in a survey from the same time (though with a somewhat lower percentage). However, I have difficulty finding that survey on the SSA website. If somebody finds it, please cite that one too. I think this is very important since newspapers, activists and people in general commonly cite outdated studies with flawed methodologies and fantastic projections ("one third of South Africans will have HIV in 2007!") when they talk about the HIV/AIDS epidemic in Africa. Therefore please mention the dichotomy between outdated estimates and projections with actual reliable statistics. I also strongly suspect many African countries have their HIV/AIDS rates overestimated in a similar manner, simply because their statistical bureaus are incapable of providing reliable data to counter the wilder claims. If South Africa's HIV infection rate is around 11%, then how can a country like Lesotho have 40% when it's completely enclosed by SA? Sorry, I shouldn't engage in advocacy like that but it disturbs me that many outside Africa view the situation as hopeless when they hear numbers like 40%. The situation is dire but by no means hopeless. Dell Day 21:21, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Concentration camps

Lgh, I've reverted your edit because the Boer war concentration camps can't be called a British invention. The term first came to be applied around then (see Concentration camp for more info) but the idea of rounding up and confining your enemies was hardly new (although the level of mistreatment of course differed from case to case). Greenman 12:21, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

Correct, concentration camps were used in the American Civil War. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 146.232.65.7 (talk) 15:41, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Other Links

I would like to add an other links section onto the wiki, fro other general links like *South African Directory etc.

[edit] Article now has two AIDS sections

The article now has two AIDS sections. This is not good. Fix this. --Xyzzyplugh 00:56, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Link to my news site

I have put a link to the news website that I edit: South Africa The Good News under External Links>News on Wikipedia's South Africa page. It was removed and I received a message from an administrator saying that the link had been removed and that I was not to re-insert it. Why is the link to http://www.sagoodnews.co.za not relevant to the page on South Africa? Is it too biased? Fellla1 13:48, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

I don't se any messages left on your talk page, but I would guess that the link was removed for any one of three reasons:
  1. It is not considered a reliable source. As you said, it is a website that YOU edit. Does it for example have any sort of fact-checking or peer-review process to determine the accuracy of the info it contains? Does it provide a collection of stories that appear in other publications, with citations and references to all the info on it, or is it a primary source of information (i.e. is the information self-written)?
  2. Just judging by the name of the site, I was guess that the news presented therein is not neutral in the Wikipedia sense.
  3. "Utility" (a wishy-washy term but hey...). How useful (to the average Wikipedian reader, who would NOT be South African and would NOT be interested in reading news with any type of biased slant) is the addition of your site to the already extensive list of sites provided under the See also and External links sections?

I've left you a welcome message. feel free to message me if you have any further questions. Zunaid 15:17, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

"it is a website that YOU edit" Is a source unreliable when someone edits it? That's absurd. Someone has to edit it, of course... Help me if I misunderstand. --Adriaan90 17:19, 17 October 2006 (UTC)
There are (well-intentioned) links added to South African (and other) pages all the time. We try to keep the links encyclopedic. One persons writing is non-encyclopedic, unless they are themselves encyclopedic (my opinion). Cape Town would be awash with accommodation links without regular pruning. People might be looking for accommodation, but we just point to official tourism websites. I am sure your site is great, but it has to be really good to survive as an external link on the (important) South Africa article. Check What Wikipedia is not. Wizzy…☎ 17:35, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

In response to Adriaan: the rest of the paragraph clarifies what I meant by my statement. Perhaps I should have written it out in one sentence i.e. "a news website that you edit that has no fact-checking or peer review mechanism". Obviously SOMEONE has to edit the site, but the distinction made here is the peer review process. Zunaid 09:26, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the response. Most of the content on http://www.sagoodnews.co.za is sourced from other news websites or from press releases, etc. I'm basically a one-man show, so am not able to dig deep and verify every story that I post. Although I do think accuracy of the content of my site would stand up to scrutiny, I accept that it may be biased and lacking in a peer review mechanism. Sniff. Thanks again. Fellla1 13:25, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

Well in that case your website does not have to verify the stories it posts, so long as they are, in turn, obtained from reliable sources (in general press releases and newspapers would be considered reliable). However in this case you run into #2 and #3. If I were, say, an American reader, I'd be MUCH more confident being directed to a bona fide impartial news site such as IOL or News24 (which are backed by large media corporations), than being directed to an overly-partisan or overly-critical (did someone say Crime Expo?) website run by a small group or an individual. Zunaid 14:15, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Media in RSA

I dispute that the south African media is free . It’s largely controlled by government/ANC cronies in their fat cat AA positions

Just look at the following : http://www.mg.co.za/articlePage.aspx?articleid=287413&area=/breaking_news/breaking_news__national/

http://www.mg.co.za/articlePage.aspx?articleid=287091&area=/breaking_news/breaking_news__national/

The RSA seems to becoming just another banana republic controlled by a corrupt ruling elite supported by poor ignorant masses

And as evidence that ZA media are not free, you cite reports in the ZA media. OK. --Slashme 18:35, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

Slowly the grip of a fascist regime is grabbing your country’s social liberties away from you.

Now the SABC , tomorrow the M&G ……….. and so it slowly goes on

Yes, "it's becoming another Zimbabwe", or something... Personally, I don't mind living in a country that tries to minimise and control the distribution of porn (like "late night" e.tv Emmanuel movies about women who enjoy being raped, and pictures of skiny topless strippers on the 3rd page of every edition of the daily "Die Son" Afrikaans tabloid), and is respectful enough and has enough Ubuntu not to allow the publishing of tasteless, disgusting pictures of Muhammad especially designed to anger Muslims, but that's just me... Zyxoas (talk to me - I'll listen) 18:45, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

Zyxoas, have you read On Liberty by John Stuart Mill? Mikker (...) 20:14, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

According to Reporters Without Borders SA is 44th in the world wrt media freedom [5], ahead of numerous other liberal democracies (of which, incidentally, there are 89 on Freedom House's classification). Mikker (...) 20:14, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] TSHWANE is the Capital

The Capital city is no longer Pretoria, it is Tshwane. Regardless of the politics behind it (pro./anti apartheid) the Republic of South Africa has changed the name of its capital from Pretoria to Tshwane, Wikipedia should respect that.

I was under the impression that it was just the municipal area that was changed to Tshwane - not the actual city name i.e. if you were under the Pretoria municipal area you now fall under Tshwane?SparrowsWing 23:59, 24 October 2006 (UTC)
Yes, Tshwane is only the municipality's name. The city is still Pretoria. Tshwane includes Pretoria, and loads of other little towns near it. --Adriaan90 04:52, 25 October 2006 (UTC)
Pretoria is the capital. Tshwane, as above, is only the name of the municipality. Wikipedia is not in the wrong here, at this point in time. Look at OR Tambo International Airport - it has changed. Hopefully this makes sense. -- Chris Lester talk 06:03, 1 December 2006 (UTC)
If you are going to make accusations, please research your facts and provide references. Find out what the legal requirements for a name change is, and find out whether they have been followed through. Just because some politicians (and policically motivated persons) incorrectly use a proposed new name, does not make it official. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 146.232.65.7 (talk) 15:46, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Whats missing?

Great page, but i just feel that there is not there enough to really capture the "essance" of South Africa. There is no mention of the 76 uprising, or much of the struggle at all.

And what about the fact that there is no mention of the World Heritage Sites.

Inequality is still a big part of South African life. This has to get in there somewhere. A small mention under Economy is not sufficiant for a country like SA.

Also a mention of BEE policies to address the past should be mentioned. And please, a non biased acount.

Tourism is a big earner for the South African economy. Its what non South Africans would look for on a page like this. Someone's got to put it in there.


I would suggest a section on corruption in South Africa. It seems to be the corruption capital of the world ! That would give you the essence of the country

Fire_

Corruption is everywhere and i don't believe a whole section would be needed. -- FayssalF - Wiki me up ® 18:25, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

In that case south Africa is the alcoholic with the rest just being social drinkers

[edit] gay marriage

why aint there nothing about this —Preceding unsigned comment added by User:76.214.80.184 (talk • contribs)

→ Gay rights in South Africa. -- Szvest Wiki me up ® 10:53, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] SA's prosperity

Shouldn't it be noted in bold here that the real main reason that SA is the most prosperous country in Africa is that it was ruled by whites? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 88.113.137.249 (talk) 06:17, 8 December 2006 (UTC).

Shouldn't it then also be noted that the South African economy has grown leaps and bounds since it has become truly democratic? Jediwannabe 07:25, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

Actually know it probbaly should not be noted. The economy has not grown becuase of anything the ANC or the new "democraticlly" elected governemt has done. The economy is the same, the recources are the same, the import exports are the same, and the businessess are the same. The economy has basicly just resumed, its a continuation that has been able to pick back up from before world sanctions were imposed in the 80's. As soon as the apartheid governemnt was gone, the sanctions were lifted and SA was re-admitted to the world economy. Thats why its has grown. As soon as the ANC is gone, we will re-join the civilized world, thats if we can make it through the crime wave brought on by the same 70% of disadvantaged blacks, the sames ones that were disadvantaged during apartheid, and the same ones that are disadvantaged with the ANC. The ANC actually only represents and benifits a small 30 someodd precent of blacks. Everyone was dupped. Its still a minority run country, I don't know why thats so hard for everyone to see.

I absolutely think it should. The basis was laid down by European colonialism, which benefits everybody in South Africa. The article just makes it seem that this development appeared suddenly. Let's keep in mind that the African Black never even developed a written language or the wheel.—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 88.113.137.249 (talk) 07:31, December 8, 2006 (UTC).
If I may say, your views seem flawed from every perspective. Lets 1st start with the assertion that "the basis was laid down by European colonialism, which benefits everybody in South Africa. The article just makes it seem that this development appeared suddenly." So what you trying to say is that Colonialism actually did South Africa a favour. You seem to forget that over 300 years of oppresion, many people died needlessly. Not to mention that colonialism gave rise to apartheid, which is now considered a crime against humanity. Or do you choose to believe otherwise?
And what exactly did you mean by "Let's keep in mind that the African Black never even developed a written language or the wheel" Do you think that they deserved to be colonised because of this? Or that perhaps early colonisers were somehow genetically superior, and that is why they invented the wheel and the writen language? Maybe you should look into it further. Neither was invented by the colonisers either. What are probably the oldest writen records are actually found on African soil. Know what it is? Have a good think, look it up, and perhaps you'll lean a new respect for a people you clearly hold in contempt.
For anyone out there that is interested, look up Jared Diamond, and his works. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Cape fox (talk • contribs) 19:36, 13 January 2007 (UTC).
So what you trying to say is that Colonialism actually did South Africa a favour. Yes, I absolutely think so. Colonialised countries are better off than they would be if they were never colonized.
You seem to forget that over 300 years of oppresion, many people died needlessly. Needlessly? Are you saying death is a needed thing? In any case, I disagree that a lot of people died needlessly. People always die.
Not to mention that colonialism gave rise to apartheid, which is now considered a crime against humanity. Or do you choose to believe otherwise? I don't think it's a crime against humanity all. Without apartheid, these negroes would still be living in mud huts (and after apartheid ended, a lot of them have been forced into just such dwellings).
Ever heard about the farm murders in S-A? Wild negroes mutilating farmers (that provide everybody food) in the most animalistic of ways (not that animals know other ways).
Do you think that they deserved to be colonised because of this? Absolutely, although you clearly think colonialism is bad, when in fact it isn't.
Finally, whites brought written language into the darkest Africa. That is fact. Your reference to oldest written records probabyl refers to some cave painting or some crap - that's not writing. Monkeys can draw if you give them a pen.88.113.137.249 00:29, 15 January 2007 (UTC)
As it stands, I think your arguments are poorly researched. How about a grace period before we pick this up again, so that you may edit/revise some of the above? I hope that we can keep it civil, and I hope that you are infact open to reason, and that I am not indeed wasting my time in any way. Thanks --nocturnal omnivorous canine 13:08, 21 January 2007 (UTC)
Don't feed the troll, Cape Fox :) Greenman 08:20, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
I LOL'd. Writing was invented in ancient Egypt, which is in Africa. 198.54.202.246 21:52, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

Don't waste any time replying to the views of notorious racist 88.113.137.249 in this section. This user has a history of disrupting Wikipedia and has been blocked. The section ought to be deleted in line with stated policy at the top that discussion of apartheid will be deleted from this page; on the other hand I suppose it's an instructive example of the kind of racism most South Africans still have to face in the wider world. Rexparry sydney 23:20, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

On the HDI south Africa has been becoming poorer for 12 years strait now. Also on the global competitive rating South Africa has fallen 12 places.

Maybe you should also include a piece on the lack of infrastructure maintenance and the potential effect it will have on growth as the recent spate of power cuts have made a devastating impact on the economy.

Also should be noted the total collapse of the SA military and the impending collapse of the SA police force and the effect AA is playing on these institutions—Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.128.35.243 (talk • contribs)

HDI does not equal wealth, it's a measure that depends on a variety of factors including health. As such, the decreasing HDI rating is a direct reflection primarily of the country's AIDS epidemic, not any slide in wealth. In reality, not even the most obtuse would be able to deny that South Africans are, on average, better off thanks to over a decade of solid and consistent economic growth. Indeed, it has been the longest period of sustained growth since the Smuts government and the most economically prosperous decade of the past fifty years. To those who claim that SA's development is due entirely to the whites, it might be worth asking themselves the question of just how much poorer the country was *because* of apartheid and colonialism, which prevented over 80% of the population from making a contribution to the economy as skilled workers or wealthy consumers. Had SA followed a less destructive path in 1948 and focused on freedom and education, the country may be as wealthy as South Korea today, if not wealthier.
The maintenance of infrastructure is not lacking to the extent you appear to claim, nor were the power cuts a result of it. Instead, they were due to short-sighted government policy which did not do enough to plan for the vastly increased demand that South Africa's added prosperity brought. This is being rectified with the construction of new power stations as we speak. It also contradicts your claim that SA has become poorer in recent years, since if that were true, where did the rapid increase in electricity demand come from?
Finally, it is absolute bollocks to claim that the SA military has collapsed, or that the SAPS is about to do so. It's true that the SANDF hit a low point in 2000/2001, at which point many people (including myself) were dismayed at its likely future, but this is no longer the case. Increased funding and the new manpower introduced through the Military Skills Development System (MSDS) has resulted in a great deal of positive change, nearly halving the average age of enlisted soldiers and rejuvenating units which had for too long been virtually inactive thanks to ranks of unfit and ill troops. The situation has changed so much that for the past three years the SANDF is once more able to rotate entire battalions on deployments, rather than forming ad-hoc formations comprising of men cherry-picked from existing units. I am in constant contact with many of those serving in the SANDF, both officers and enlisted soldiers. To a man, each has said how much better the SANDF is than it was a few years ago and also how much better it's still getting thanks to a number of farsighted reforms and better training. So I'm sorry, but your information is outdated.
The same is true, to a lesser extent, with the SAPS. Again, it too hit a low point around 2001/2002, at which the weight of trying to be a pseudo-paramilitary force with apartheid-era structures and insufficient personnel threatened to crush the organisation. Yet a series of reforms have gradually been implented, ranging from new structures which emphasise local policing, to increased pay and the hiring of more personnel, to the creation of more specialised units (such as the National Intervention Unit) to handle high-risk and difficult operations and policing in order to take the load off ordinary policemen who lacked the specialised training required. Things are not yet where they should be, but progress continues to be made and there's certainly no risk of an impending collapse. This is reflected by the fact that the majority of crimes are statistically decreasing.
Less angry ranting and more serious discussion might get you taken seriously around here. But keep up the ridiculous claims based on poor information, and pretty soon we're just going to regard you as a troll and ignore you. Your choice. — Impi 20:58, 13 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Flag on portal sign

That was not "vandalism", that was me (unsigned at the time). Geez, lighten up over a South African flag on a South African portal sign, that's all I'm asking. --Toussaint 23:12, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

The anon-IP who made an edit with summary "rv" after you added the flag seems to have been a vandal. They replaced the article with a much older version (I have returned it to the version of your edit) and it was their only edit ever. So, essentially, it was a vandal accusing you of vandalising. - htonl 12:21, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Official second languages

South Africa has ten official second languages.. I cut this map from the article because it is garbage:

Map showing principal South African languages by municipality. Lighter shades indicate a non-majority plurality.      Afrikaans      Northern Sotho      Southern Sotho      Swati      Tsonga      Tswana      Venda      Xhosa      Zulu
Map showing principal South African languages by municipality. Lighter shades indicate a non-majority plurality.
     Afrikaans      Northern Sotho      Southern Sotho      Swati      Tsonga      Tswana      Venda      Xhosa      Zulu

Gregorydavid 09:05, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

May I ask why you say it's garbage? Jediwannabe 09:20, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

Erm. They're not ranked. We have eleven official languages - no one is primary and the others secondary. Also, regarding the name - I agree it should just be in English for the table, I was just re-ordering it because people inevitably add the other language names for SA and if there are going to be the others then Afrikaans shouldn't come first. It's third Joziboy 10:39, 21 December 2006 (UTC)
If I was someone interested in reading up about South Africa I'd be interested in the map. I'm going to put the map back in. If somebody can give a good reason why it shouldn't be there then we can take it out, but lets first get a consensus here. The map doesn't try to rank one language over another, all it does is show the distribution of languages according to who speaks it as there first language. As far as I know all eleven official languages are primary languages. Jediwannabe 12:29, 21 December 2006 (UTC)
Yeah, map looks good to me Joziboy 14:48, 21 December 2006 (UTC)
Well, there is no official first language either, if yours happens to be Italian, then that is OK too. I see English is left out of the map, which I also happen to think looks cool, although it is treated as the universal language in South Africa. It reminds me of what the South Africa we may have landed up with if it were not for the 1994 elections. The caption of the map seems to create the impression that the local municipalities had something to do with its creation?Gregorydavid 14:59, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
Umm, I get the impression you don't quite realise what the map is. It's not about "official" languages. It's just a depiction of the census information on language distribution, showing the language with the most speakers for each municipality. (The reason that English is left off is because there is no municipality with an English majority. Ndebele is left off for the same reason.) It's "by municipality" merely because Stats SA breaks down its data by municipality. - htonl 18:41, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
Hmm, I am quite surprised to hear that the map is apparently based on Stats SA or Census information. I would like to see the raw data. The end result is a map that gives the wrong impression. Maybe we can get some information on the design of the survey questionaire. Our electoral system is based on proportional representation but the language map depicts a type of constituency orientation. I suspect that English is a language that the majority of South Africans are able to use to a greater extent than they are able to use any other language..Gregorydavid 19:32, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

(resetting the indentation) I don't have access to the raw data myself - you'll have to ask Wayne for that - but you can look up the information for any municipality by going to http://www.demarcation.org.za/ and selecting a province and then the municipality from the drop-down boxes, clicking on "Go" and then on the municipality page that loads, clicking on "Statistics". Language is about halfway down. AFAIK the census asks for your predominant home language. I didn't do my household's census form last time so I don't know what it said; maybe some other SA wikipedian remembers. By the way, Stats SA itself publishes a very similar map here.

I don't understand your point about proportional representation - this has nothing to do with politics or government; it's a map showing demographic data. It so happens that the resolution of that data is to municipality level because that's the data that was available from Stats SA. I'd like to reiterate that this map isn't about "ranking" languages or saying that one language is more important or better than another. It's about saying which language is the home language of the most people in a given area. You're probably right that more South Africans can speak English than any other language - but this map is about primary/home language. English doesn't show up because of the way English-speakers are distributed throughout the country and because it's spoken by many as a second language but much fewer as a home language. I don't see how you could represent that on a map. We could actually do with a graph showing how many people nationally speak each language as (a) a home language (b) a second language. - htonl 23:08, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

Thank you for this discussion.. Just like the map shows about 50% of South Africa is populated by Afrikaans speaking people, it shows that nobody speaks English as a home language. I do not expect any one Wikipedian to take responsibility for the Map. The discussion started off a bit tongue in cheek..Gregorydavid 06:17, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
It doesn't show that 50% of South Africans speak Afrikaans - maybe 50% of the territory though. It's not weighted for population density (there are many more speakers of Zulu in KZN and Xhosa in the EC than there are of Afrikaans in the Western and Northern Cape.. but there's no way of showing that) Joziboy 07:37, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
That's why I think it would be a good idea to have some form of graph showing how many people speak each language as their home language and as a second language. Unfortunately the Census doesn't seem to collect second language data, so I don't know quite how we'd do it. - htonl 08:27, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

Ja. Pity they don't. It would finally quiet the raging debate between English-speakers, Afrikaans-speakers and Zulu-speakers as to which is the most commonly [i]understood[/i] language (as opposed to most commonly spoken at home). Joziboy 10:06, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Link Spam

Here I mark the removal of the following domains "www.samusic.co.za", "www.traveldex.co.za", "www.bizniz.co.za" sited as "spam" adding no value to wikipedia. To the owners of these domains, please do not use wikipedia as an advertising platform. thank you. Removed 29 December 2006.

Repeat link spam offence by "www.samusic.co.za" using "www.getitat.co.za" as a redirect to their portal. (same reason as above) Removed 29 December 2006.

"Sorry Joziboy, Im an anonymous editor your name / account link was simply a copy and paste error in my date formatting".

LSD! When did you get to Johannesburg!?! What's up? Zyxoas (talk to me - I'll listen) 09:20, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

Um. I didn't write that comment! How bizarre. I don't even know what removing domains means! Nah, I'm in KwaXhosa Tebello (I know how much you love that!) on vac. Still got six months left at inyunivesithi esiKotilandi :) How've you been? Joziboy 10:01, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

I was okay (rather optimistic, actually), but now I am SO agitated and angry! I'll live, though, and I AM grossly over-skilled for that stupid job, anyway...

Yeah, dude, I'm fine. How are those isiXhosa lessons in the middle of England coming along? Zyxoas (talk to me - I'll listen) 10:21, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] A stray article!

Noticed under climbing places, South Africa:

HELL under Mpumalanga, South Africa ?????

Definitely way out of place! Where does it belong?!Fconaway 07:32, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

Mpumalanga is mentioned 3 times in the article and "HELL" is inexistent. -- Szvest - Wiki me up ® 16:28, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

I think you're referring to the link to Hell, Mpumalanga on the page List of climbing areas. See [6]. Zaian 10:14, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] South African Food

How about a brief section, or even under culture. There is a rich history. Think Wors, snoek, biltong, potjiekos, baai vleis, buny chow, gatsby, mopani worms, morogo, chillies on chips, chakalaka and even Nandos!!! —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Cape fox (talk • contribs) 19:46, 13 January 2007 (UTC).

Oh boy, worms are a really rich form of food culture all right... hah.88.113.137.249 00:31, 15 January 2007 (UTC)
Well, dried Mopani worms are considered a delicacy for many of the northern (Where Mopani worms are found) tribes in South Africa, so yes, they are a rich form of the food culture of South Africa. Don't forget things like bobotie, melktert, koeksusters, vetkoek, melk kos, etc. Jediwannabe 10:02, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

You are welcome to add to the Cuisine of South Africa article. Wikipeditor 02:33, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Namibia's Status until 1990

I recently received an e-mail from a friend who's studying in Namibia, and she mentioned as a part of Namibia's history that it gained its independence from South Africa only in 1990. I read the Namibian entry on Wikipedia, which at least mentions that situation in passing, albeit without a lot of detail. This article, however, mentiones nothing about Namibia being a territory or actual part of South Africa.

Even though the majority of information should be contained in the other article, I believe that this information should at least be referenced here too. Unfortunately, I don't know anything about the details surrounding the independence of Namibia (since it's not here in these two articles!), so I can't add it myself. --156.143.89.87 13:53, 16 January 2007 (UTC) KeplerNiko

[edit] How about a page on Tourism In SA

I've been looking around at pages of other countries, and some seem to have a seperate page regarding tourism (see Norway Tourism). I think it would be an interesting page. It could include World Heritage Sites, List of Tourist attractions, Info on activities ranging from conservation, shark diving, whale watching, tourist attractions.

Clearly such a page would have to be developed by someone in the biz. --nocturnal omnivorous canine 14:40, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

I wonder about that one. Isn't that what WikiTravel is for? If this is meant to be a general reference encyclopedia (not a travel dictionary), should we rather leave that detail out of this article. I think WikiTravel has a link -- and that should be good enough. -- Chris Lester talk 15:22, 2 February 2007 (UTC)
Sorry, didn't know there was a WikiTravel. --nocturnal omnivorous canine 13:45, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Higher education

With detail on South Africa on Higher Education: University Governance, it is available for contribution to the page. I am just not sure if it details enough on education in South Africa sufficiently to add. Do let me know if you would like me to create a section for the page. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Kenneth M Burke (talk • contribs)


you should include these stats on this page :

http://www.nationmaster.com/country/sf/Top-Rankings

http://www.worldmapper.org/display.php?selected=172

http://www.worldmapper.org/display.php?selected=173 http://www.worldmapper.org/display.php?selected=174 http://www.worldmapper.org/display.php?selected=175 http://www.worldmapper.org/display.php?selected=177 http://www.worldmapper.org/display.php?selected=178 http://www.worldmapper.org/display.php?selected=185 http://www.worldmapper.org/display.php?selected=227 http://www.worldmapper.org/display.php?selected=228 http://www.worldmapper.org/display.php?selected=255 http://www.worldmapper.org/display.php?selected=256 http://www.worldmapper.org/display.php?selected=291

[edit] Category:Germanic culture

South Africa has been add to the new Category:Germanic culture by an editor (not me by the way - I'm querying this). Please discuss this to ascertain whether this is appropriate or not - and act accordingly.-- Zleitzen(talk) 13:46, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

I don't see the link mentioned above. It has probably been removed. Wynand.singels 21:09, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Lead Section does not conform to Wikipedia style

This article has a long and unwieldy lead section. The purpose of such a section (see Wikipedia:Lead section) is to provide an overview of the principal points about a country: admittedly South Africa has a wealth of notable features, but four paras is the suggested limit. Also the first sentence is unreadable because of the number of alternative names. This is the English language section of Wikipedia and, having a wealth of names in other languages, they should be a separate para, once the country is defined in English. Rexparry sydney 00:57, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

I agree that having the name in all 11 official languages is not practical in the opening sentence, and is also not in line with Wikipedia style. Switzerland has four official languages and uses the Infobox to list the name in all of them (as well as the opening sentence). India has 23 official languages, and the names in all of these languages are listed on a page Official names of India linked from the Infobox. That seems like a practical solution, so I've added a link to Official names of South Africa from the infobox. Any comments on whether the names can be deleted from the opening sentence now? Zaian 20:05, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Flag

Why is the old South African flag present in the info box? Could this be changed please...

That's just the result of some tired old vandalism by someone living in the past, which has been done many times before; you can just click to undo it (see Help if necessary). Rexparry sydney 03:00, 11 April 2007 (UTC)
The vandal has been blocked indefinately. See [7]. -- Chris Lester talk 19:53, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

Why can't the old South African flag be added? It was part of the country's history! What are you so afraid of???? Things evolve - let's not forget what came before - stop trying to pretend it never happened! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.128.35.243 (talk • contribs)

Nothing wrong with showing the old flag. In fact, if you'd bothered looking, it's shown in a number of places on Wikipedia. In this case, some fool had placed it in the infobox in place of the current South African flag, thus making it look as though the old flag is still in official use. That's nothing less than vandalism and the previous users are perfectly right to be annoyed at that sort of behaviour. — Impi 21:03, 13 May 2007 (UTC)

The current flag (Svg) file does not open correctly in illustrator.

[edit] ZAF/RSA

ZAF redirects here, and RSA (disambiguation) links here. It would be useful for the article to tell in which situations one abbreviation or the other is or has been used. -- Jao 14:33, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

ZAF is new to me. ZA is well known as the internet "top" domain name for South Africa - e.g. www.invalid.co.za. It is also used in international trade as ZA Rand or ZAR to denote the currency. RSA is simply the initials of Republic of South Africa and is used the same way as USA is used for the United States of America. (For the record I am a 40 year old white male South African.) Roger 22:42, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Getting Tired

I'm starting to get tired of Americans... Firstly, just because it's Africa, doesn't mean it's above 90 degrees Fahrenheit during the summer AND winter. Hearing that just makes us Africans cringe. Secondly, just because Americans are the only poor bastards stuck with the British Units system doesn't mean they should make others use it on other articles. It's called SI, try learn some of it. You can play with your Btu's and Slug's on your own articles about America. Gilawson 17:29, 30 April 2007 (UTC)

FYI, the British don't use Fahrenheit. The Americans are the only ones that can't be bothered to use Celcius (and still use absurd imperial measurements for almost everything). I totally agree, Fahrenheit shouldn't be anywhere NEAR any commonwealth countries articles, leave it for the Americans. I have mind to get rid of the ( F) stuff, but someone would probably put it back again. Bennelliott • Talk • Contributions
Well, you know, you should leave in the bracketed Fahrenheit conversions. The very first point in WP:UNITS says "Conversions should generally be included and not be removed.". Of course, all figures on a page about South Africa should be in SI units primarily with the US/Imperial units given in brackets. - htonl 16:01, 15 May 2007 (UTC)
I thought that there would be a policy on it, so good job I left it at that. Bennelliott • Talk • Contributions 19:08, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Pretoria or Tshwane

Saw that someone had changed the name from Pretoria to Tshwane. This is an important edit and I decided to undo it for the meanwhile and then ask the community what they think should be done about this matter. Gilawson 19:31, 6 May 2007 (UTC)

The South African government's website refers to Pretoria as the Administrative Capital [8] (its the third or fourth instance of Pretoria on the page, dated November 8, 2006), so I would argue that Pretoria it should be, unless the RSA govt changes it. Flyguy649talkcontribs 20:17, 6 May 2007 (UTC)
Too right! Bennelliott 08:17, 7 May 2007 (UTC)
This is quite difficult, especially since Ramokgopa (Tshwane mayor) said Pretoria is a suburb, not a city, and that the union buildings fall outside of Pretoria, as reported in Afrikaans by Beeld on 4 May 2007[1]. But I agree with naming it Pretoria for consistency within the article, and if the SA government websites reflect it as such.Goodlucca 08:49, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

Okay, thanks for your input. If you would like to keep adding your comments and opinions, please feel free to, but it seems this issue has been resolved. Gilawson 17:21, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Article quality

Am I the only one to notice a significant decline in the quality of this article since it achieved FA status? It's riddled with pro-ANC and pro-Apartheid POV, rather than a simple neutral view, as well as just filled with items of irrelevance. Examples:

  • "apartheid, which was instituted in 1948 by the National Party" (pro-ANC)
  • "(although segregation existed prior to that date)" (a poor attempt to defend Smuts or whoever)

Why not just state that the National Party expanded on previous segregation to the level of apartheid?

  • "Two philosophies originated in South Africa: ubuntu (the belief in a universal bond of sharing that connects all humanity); and Gandhi's notion of "passive resistance" (satyagraha), developed while he lived in South Africa."

Who cares? Only a pack of feel-good intellectual fools care. Irrelevant to the country as a whole.

  • "South Africa is often referred to as "The Rainbow Nation", a term coined by Archbishop Desmond Tutu and later adopted by then-President Nelson Mandela. President Mandela used the term "Rainbow Nation" as a metaphor to describe the country's newly-developing multicultural diversity in the wake of segregationist apartheid ideology."

Multiculturalist POV

  • "By 2007, the country had joined Belgium, the Netherlands, Spain, and Canada in legalising same-sex marriage."

Homosexual POV

  • "the Black majority remained disadvantaged by almost every standard, including income, education, housing, and life expectancy."
  • "However, the average income and life expectancy of a black, 'Indian' or 'coloured' South African compared favourably to many other African states, such as Ghana and Tanzania."

Another attack / defence bit like my first example. Why not just state that "South African blacks, Indians and coloureds had the highest average income and life expectancy on the African continent, yet their incomes were one tenth (?) that of White South Africans."

  • "This is partly attributed to the legacy of the apartheid system" (pro-ANC POV)
  • "(although poverty is also a problem throughout much of Africa)" (pro-Apartheid POV)

Things of this nature should be removed altogether as evidence and sources are dubious. The entire last paragraph of the history section is an attack (with subtle defence) on the ANC.

There are more examples throughout the article. Michael talk 03:07, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

South African GDP now stands at $13,300 PPP according to the CIA figures. Why is this not updated?

[edit] LOL

I can't begin to imagine the irony at play here; the only picture of an apartheid camp shows Boers suffering at the hands of the British! Tragic, funny and patently banal! To the insensitive David Duke follower who put that picture up, at least be consistent and put one up of Black kids suffering at the hands of the apartheid government. uNSIGNED - JULY 22 07

I fail to see how Boers suffering at the hands of the british is "funny" to you. You obviously have no idea what effects this war has had on the South African people. See Anglo-Boer war. — Adriaan (T★C) 15:47, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Abahlali baseMjondolo

Is Abahlali baseMjondolo notable enough to be discussed in the main South Africa article (it was recently brought in)? Are there any subarticles about current events in SA that would be a better place to discuss it? Smmurphy(Talk) 16:09, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

I'm a South African and consider myself to be fairly media-savvy and this page is the only place I have ever seen this organisation mentioned. As far as civil society organisations go this one is not a big deal. Organisations like the Treatment Action Campaign or South African Council of Churches have a much higher profile. I think the editor who added this section is soapboxing Roger 18:48, 30 October 2007 (UTC)
I agree with Roger. The article claims that the organisation has very high media attention, yet I have never heard of them either. Wynand.singels 19:15, 30 October 2007 (UTC)
I'll second Roger (or is that third?). I'd like to consider myself up with current things but I don't see a lot of media attention. The issue itself does get plenty of coverage, but protest action does not appear to rise from a single organisation; it often originates from flashpoints in various residents' organisations, etc. Kit Berg 21:07, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] /* capitals */

I thought Jo'burg, Cape Town and Queensland are the three capitals of South Africa. But found they are different than whats i m thinking. --Jayanta (Talk) 08:53, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Funny... They are in fact Pretoria (Administrative), Bloemfontein (Judicial) and Cape Town (Legislative), and if you look carefully, you'll see that they represent the three branches of the trias politicas.

[edit] Abolition of slavery date

http://www.bbc.co.uk/abolition/ - states On 25 March 1807, the Abolition of the Slave Trade Act was passed. On that basis I amended the year. Klynchk 16:37, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Genocide in South Africa

There is clearly genocide going on in South Africa against Whites, Indians, Somalians, and all other non Black African groups. The nature of many of these killings are no different than what happened in Cambodian or Rwanda.

Someone needs to have the balls to cover this in the article. Angry Aspie 01:47, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

Maybe you need to familiarise yourself with the exact definition of genocide, and perhaps even the real situation in South Africa. As a white South African I can assure you that these rumours are nothing but rumours.
Sure crime is rampant in SA, but it is nowhere NEAR what happened in Rwanda. Wynand.singels 18:32, 28 October 2007 (UTC)
You forget that they called the recent killings in Kenya a genocide, yet the numbers are far smaller than those that are being killed in South Africa every day! If they can say that opposition in Kenya are calling what happened there a genocide why not ZA see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007%E2%80%932008_Kenyan_crisis

[edit] Independence Dates

I noticed the dates of Independence are different from the last time I was here and if you go to the Union of South Africa page, it displays different ones as well. Am I missing something or is this a mistake? Fatla00 07:53, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

The dates are correct as they appear currently

[edit] Mid-2007 Population estimate

More information here: STATS SA

Going back to the HIV/AIDS and citations as I see this has been discussed a bit, how is it thought that demographics of the country are changing? I mean there's some fairly clear ideas here which are pretty much intuitive regarding age particularly, but I'm not sure if it's just me being oversensitive but there's also a potential race slant there given the preceding details, which are more focused on race prevalence than age group prevalence perhaps? That for me would be a massive grey area. This isn't a simple case of more infection in the black population as there are other moving parts here. It would only apply ceteris paribus - but obviously things like migration, birth rates, non-HIV-related death rates, etc. have an impact as well. And a pre-emptive apology - put this query here under population as (a) it's more recent and (b) I guess it's a more relevant query on population than HIV itself... Do move it somewhere more logical if there is somewhere. Kit Berg 00:40, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

165.139.160.4 changed the population from 47.9m to 50m. The latest estimate I can find is the mid 2007 estimate [9]. Please discuss or source if you wish to update the population. --HiltonLange 16:17, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Discovery of gold

I see the date of the discovery of gold in ZA was pushed back by two years by an anon. editor. Does anyone have a proper ref? --Slashme 09:09, 28 October 2007 (UTC)

I don't know who pushed the date back. I did a search and cam up with this link - http://www.state.gov/r/pa/ei/bgn/2898.htm , which gives the date as 1886. Wynand.singels 18:29, 28 October 2007 (UTC)
I know we can't use Wikipedia articles as references, but check out http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barberton,_South_Africa (it says 1881 is the date). -- leuce 13:56, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

Actually, if we take gold rushes as the standard (not specifically the discovery of gold by white people), then gold was discovered earlier in South Africa. There was a gold rush from 1873 in Pilgrim's Rest area, and from 1876 in Knysna area. Gold was been discovered in South Africa by white people as early as 1840, but there were no gold rushes in those cases. Black people have mined gold in South Africa for many centuries before that, but again, there were no gold rushes (or records of gold rushes). -- leuce 14:04, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Emigration numbers

The article states: "In the first decade after the ANC took power, a million white Africans emigrated.". The referenced articles for this section give significantly lower estimated numbers. Does anyone know a source with a fairly reliable estimate? Perhaps the sentence should be reworded to "Thousands per year", or "Over 100 000 since 1994"? --HiltonLange (talk) 16:14, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

I've read Statistics South Africa numbers from 1996 to 2007, the numbers don't tie up at all with the "Demographics" section of the article. All of the referenced links for that section speak about the brain drain, but the numbers are significantly lower. The 10% white undercount is unreferenced. The 1995 population of 5.3 million is wrong. I'm going to remove it unless someone can source better figures for emigration. Also, the South Africa article is far too large, this section is a good candidate for some trimming. --HiltonLange 16:31, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

I am continually worried about this famed 'undercount'. I have also seen it pushing the point of view that thousands of census takers were sent out to make sure that every non-white person was counted but the 'gated communities' weren't. This seems to just be implying that there is an active agenda to minimise the number of white people for whatever political reason; but yet I see no sources for these. Will see if I can find the link I saw this POV on.... Kit Berg 18:09, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

I see that the "million whites" emigration number has resurfaced. There's a reference to a study done by The South African Institute of Race Relations, and the comment from Teatreez that it's a "well-known fact". The problem I have is that there are 4 links, and 3 of them support numbers in the low hundred thousands, whereas only one supports the "million" number. If you are interested in the trends, a very comprehensive document can be found analyzing emigration trends: HSRC skills migration document. This is in addition to the current 4 links in the South Africa article.
This document analyzes the discrepancy between the official emigration numbers, and what appears to be a far higher reality. It arrives at a final estimate of around 250000 emigrations per decade. However, the most interesting thing to me was the table on page 11 which broke down professional emigrations by decade. It shows, interestingly, that there have also been a similar number of emigrations in the 2 previous decades.
This has made me wonder whether the line "Since 1994, X white South Africans have emigrated" might be entirely misleading, akin to writing, "Since 1994, X number of people have died of cancer". It may be true, but it's not indicating what the context my imply.
Please read the HSRC document I've linked, as well as [10] and [11]. Let's resolve this on the talk page before radically changing numbers by a factor of 10 in the main article. --HiltonLange (talk) 22:30, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Languages Categories

Why is South Africa listed under Categories: Dutch speaking countries at the bottom? Is news to me; AFAIK, except for a few stray expats Dutch is not spoken at all. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 198.54.202.242 (talk) 17:03, 3 December 2007 (UTC) 198.54.202.242 17:07, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

I agree - remove the category. Roger 20:09, 3 December 2007 (UTC)
I have already removed it. Tebello TheWHAT!!?? 21:42, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Cities

This article - List_of_largest_cities_in_South_Africa_by_population - possibly should be linked to somewhere here; however, to do this would need to have more believable figures... census 2001 website is a mess though, good luck trying to find anything. Are there any other standard sources used to quote city populations. And yes I know I'm a bit naughty for writing about problems in a separate article on this page, under the guise of linking to this page, but I really think it is probable that it should link to it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Garble (talk • contribs) 16:43, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Advance fee fraud

Kit Berg removed the reference to 419 on this page. I do not mind if, on here, it takes one sentence, but I found this rationale:

  • [12] "bit specific for this page? left it on crime page, but common in US etc too"

In order to support "common in the US" too I would like a citation - I gave one with 419. What I will do is pare the mention so that it takes one sentence and does not explain what AFF is. WhisperToMe (talk) 17:25, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

[13]

This is Secret Service advice, details in the article of amounts, etc. involved relating to American financial institutions.

[14]

Here the FBI's website refers to this type of crime under the heading 'Common Fraud Schemes' and details.

The citations that you provided seemed to be fairly common examples of government advice, as are the US examples above, and I don't think they are enormously persuasive.

I'm sorry if my explanation wasn't clear. The reason I removed it from the South Africa page was because it seems to be a description of a crime which is commonplace in many areas of the world and there is no evidence brought to support it as being 'different'/worthy of mention on the main SA page. I noticed it at The Netherlands' page as well. Was there any specific reason for including it on these two pages but not others? Kit Berg (talk) 18:13, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Kit Berg, the USA secret service may give advice, but it is not talking about massive 419 operations within American borders. When the American FBI talks about 419, most of the time it is assumed that such crimes take place in other countries. Notice that I chose a South African citation that admitted that 419 took place in South Africa
I agree with Kit, it seems a very tangential topic to introduce in an article about South Africa. Crime is a relevant subtopic as it has a large influence and is a very relevant factor in South African life. But 419 scams in particular being something particularly relevant to an article on South Africa? I wouldn't think so. --HiltonLange (talk) 18:41, 22 January 2008 (UTC)
Hilton, perhaps I can show you more. There have been high profile kidnappings and murders in South Africa related to 419. I can show you the citations here:

"

  • Kensuke Matsumoto, a Japanese national, fled his kidnappers in Durban, South Africa after falling victim to a 419 scheme in June 1999.[2]
  • Joseph Raca, a former mayor of Northampton, England, was kidnapped by scammers in Johannesburg, South Africa in July 2001. The captors released Raca after they became nervous [3]
  • Danut Tetrescu, a Romanian who flew from Bucharest to Johannesburg to meet with con men in the Soweto area of Johannesburg, was kidnapped in 1999 and held for $500,000.[4]
  • 29-year old George Makronalli, a Greek man, was murdered in South Africa in December 2004 after responding to a 419 scam.[5]
  • Kjetil Moe, a Norwegian businessman, was reported missing and ultimately killed after a trade with Nigerian scammers in Johannesburg, South Africa (September 1999).[6]"

All in South Africa. It is very important to become informed before making an opinion. This page does not need to go in detail about 419; one sentence is what it needa, and one sentence is all I am asking for. WhisperToMe (talk) 20:00, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

I'm not denying that 419's occur in South Africa, I'm stating that 419s are not relevant to an article on South Africa. South Africa doesn't even make the top 10 locations from which 419's originate. (419 stats) It's just an issue of notability. Perhaps we should add a sentence about cell phone theft. And one about purse snatching, and another about ATM muggings. All of these occur in South Africa, but they also occur in most countries in the world. --HiltonLange (talk) 09:06, 23 January 2008 (UTC)
Interesting document; reading it I agree the Netherlands flag up, together with UK, USA, Canada, Spain, Germany and Belgium (depending on which table you take). Let's add the scam as the most important crime in all those countries.
Not a good idea, I agree, the logic for adding the scam to this (and the Netherlands) article is flawed as there is no comparison whatsoever to overall crime; and other forms of crime in the country.
Furthermore listing example only proves it exists in SA (nobody disagrees) it does not prove anything about the size of the problem. Arnoutf (talk) 18:53, 23 January 2008 (UTC)
There is also a similar discussion, (caused by the same set of edits), on the Crime in South Africa talk page, (Talk on Advance fee fraud).
There is still a discussion going on as whether the AFF section sould be removed altogether.
We added a section on financial crime to try and accommodate it, (originally it was a similar section as the one added here). FFMG (talk) 05:30, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] vandalism in history section i don't know how to fix it or if it needs fixed

under history it says:south africa has some of the oldest "faskflijdklfjkldsajfkl;fjieurag(pronounce that!)" sites in the world; is all that jiberish vandalism or is that an actuall word and if it is a word surely the pronounce that should be taken away if it is not a word what word goes there--Charlieh7337 (talk) 00:09, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

oh i see it has been replaced with "archeological" Charlieh7337 (talk) 01:53, 31 January 2008 (UTC)
archaeological was replaced with "faskflijdklfjkldsajfkl;fjieurag".... obvious vandalism in this case. You can use the history tab to view recent changes if you mistrust something like this. Arnoutf (talk) 14:17, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Economic crisis?

When did the economic crisis section arrive? The text itself doesn't reflect an economic crisis in and of itself (and I have no objection to it elsewhere, it's perfectly valid) but under the heading as it stands it's a little odd. I'd call the continued dichotomous nature of the economy an economic crisis; the influx of refugees a driver of a potential economic crisis; current trade discussions relating to 'air miles' for fruit and vegetables in the European Union; AIDS/HIV... The electricity crisis is indeed a driver for a potential slowdown - but would anyone mind if I moved this text/reformatted it to make it a bit less 'today' driven? Kit Berg (talk) 20:35, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

The current power crisis might be important enough to warrant a mention in the article, but I agree that the section "Economic crisis" isn't really appropriate. It's obviously very topical right now, but even the Eskom article has trouble referencing facts. I agree with removing the section, at least until it can be placed and written more appropriately. --HiltonLange (talk) 04:43, 5 February 2008 (UTC)
I also agree that the section should be re-worded to be less 'current'. But it is a bit tricky to find the right section heading for it. I would be tempted to mention the various problems/crisis in the economy section itself rather than start a new one. FFMG (talk) 05:41, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

Oops, I saw the diff in my watchlist and edited before reading here, but I guess I'm not too far from the growing consensus anyway! --Slashme (talk) 06:29, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

Since you got there first, cool - and that's a bit better. I don't even object to it being described as aging, etc., etc. - it is - but in African terms it's still a reasonable infrastructure, even in developing country terms. Still not sure it merits its own subheading but I think I'm going to start giving up on arguing about subheadings... Kit Berg (talk) 07:43, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

I guess we all have to pick our battles on Wikipedia as a way of managing the motivation level and Wikistress. --Slashme (talk) 10:28, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

I find the rephrasing of the subsection "Electricity crisis" acceptable. Let's hope it remains a small cloud on the horizon, no bigger than the palm of your hand. Fred Talk 19:20, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Soccer vs Football

I am under the impression that the game is called soccer in South Africa. Even though there is the South African Football Association, there is also the Premier Soccer League. Even on the South African Football Association's website, they keep talking about soccer, not football. We talk about the 2010 Soccer World Cup, not the Football World Cup - in fact, I'd find it strange if any of my South African friends had to talk about football. Anyone else share this view? Mulderpf (talk) 06:39, 23 February 2008 (UTC)

I tend to agree with you, (I am the one who replaced soccer with football), but the governing body, (safa), calls it football.
Having said that there are examples of football vs soccer. This afternoon SABC 1 is showing a game and the show is the soccer zone I think. But e.tv calls it football when they show games on Mondays or Thursdays.
Also we, (my friends and I), don't call it the 2010 soccer world cup, but rather the 2010 world cup and more often than not, simply, 2010. Maybe avoiding the football/soccer issue altogether.
I wouldn't go as far as saying that it would be strange if one of my friends used soccer vs football. I think either way I would understand what they mean.
I don't think South Africans have a preference for either word, they both mean the same thing, there is no confusion or anything strange about it.
But seen that the governing body calls it football, maybe we should to. FFMG (talk) 07:37, 23 February 2008 (UTC)
I'd say there's definitely a bias towards soccer but they're both used. I think it's mainly in the US that it's a really confusing topic where soccer vs football refers to completely different sports. I know South Africans who use one or the other, no one seems to make a big deal about which one uses. I'm not really that fussed which appears in the article although I'd lean towards football simply because that's generally what the associations call themselves. Kit Berg (talk) 10:02, 23 February 2008 (UTC)
I know a number of South Africans who mean Rugby when they say football. These are people who have never in their lives watched a soccer match and they probably never will. They are utterly indifferent to 2010. Roger (talk) 19:06, 23 February 2008 (UTC)
Really? I must admit I have never spoken to a South African who ever called rugby, football.
We might swap soccer and football, but I never, ever, heard of rugby called football by a saffer.
I was at the Sharks rugby game tonight, (we were lucky!), and we all spoke of rugby, not football. FFMG (talk) 19:29, 23 February 2008 (UTC)
Your vocabulary and writing style leads me to think that the people I am refering to are probably old enough to be your grandparents. (I have never come across anyone older than mid twenties who uses the word "saffer") Roger (talk) 20:13, 23 February 2008 (UTC)
I wish I was that young, I pickup that term in my 10 years 'sabbatical' in the uk. FFMG (talk) 20:22, 23 February 2008 (UTC)
People really call rugby 'football'? Wow. I suppose they might if there's only rugby on offer but must admit I've never come across it. Am very pleased that my occasional use of the word 'saffer' (usually spelled 'saffa' in my case, displaying my inherent laziness) would place me a good many years younger than I really am though and shall continue to use it therefore at every opportunity.  :)
I'd still say that these are reasonably isolated examples of rugby vs football confusion, although I certainly know that there are significant numbers of people for whom soccer/football in SA really don't exist and rugby is the sport; the reverse is true as well. Kit Berg (talk) 21:05, 23 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Highest temperature

The 51.7C temperature is wromg. It has been discredit already because the termomeyer was highly overexposed. Correct record and official is 48.8C (jan 1993) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.13.78.30 (talk) 22:44, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

Could you point out a source to justify that claim? Thanks, htonl (talk) 14:09, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Was the current form of South African government "born" in May 1910?

According to the List of countries by formation dates article, the "Birth of current form of government" of South Africa was in May 1910. This is not reflected in the South Africa article. Which date is correct? --Mais oui! (talk) 13:06, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

I don't think South Africa, (or most of the countries in the article), was 'born' at any specific date. The history section shows what happened. Over many years, the constitution changed and evolved. The latest change been 1994.
What is your definition of when a country was formed/born? FFMG (talk) 13:42, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
I do not make any claims at all! However, due to some horrific WP:OR and WP:UNVERIFIED the List of countries by formation dates article is making a whole load of ridiculous "definitions" and claims. All totally unreferenced. --Mais oui! (talk) 13:48, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
Maybe we should ask for some kind of references on the other article. We cannot really change the South Africa article to accommodate another article.
I don't think that South Africa was 'born' at any specific date, (what about the Zulus and so on), but I would guess that then end of the 2nd Boer war would probably be the end of colonial rule.
Maybe others have another opinion on the matter. FFMG (talk) 14:07, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
The article List of countries by formation dates confuses three entirely separate concepts. "Current form of government", "formation of a country as a separate entity" and "aquisition of sovereignty/independence". South Africa became a country in 1910 with limited sovereignty as a British Dominion, this was modified by the Statute of Westminster. It became a Republic (but kept the Westminster parliamentary form of government) in 1961. The current (Republican) constitutional system dates from 1994 though the constitution itself dates from 1996. The example of France is a good comparison: The area of the Roman Empire called Gaul became a separate entity by the Treaty of Verdun in 843. Then a whole bunch of wars and revolutions later, the current 5th Republic was established in 1958. Roger (talk) 14:26, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
Well, exactly!! That article is an utter dogs-breakfast, and goodness knows how on earth it can be knocked into shape from its current sad state. --Mais oui! (talk) 14:31, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
Maybe the article, (List of countries by formation dates), should be a bit clearer on the mater.
Many folks here would argue that the country, (South Africa), existed long before the Dutch landed.
In my opinion, List of countries by formation dates is a lot of hogwash. FFMG (talk) 14:40, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
South Africa did not exist as a country before 31 May 1910. Before that it was a patchwork of a wide variety of different forms of political entities (some were countries in their own right). Chiefdoms, kingdoms, colonies, republics, etc. The Treaty of Vereniging establish a single entity with a unified system of government over the entire territory. See Country Roger (talk) 18:37, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
Really? You might want to edit the Republic]] article, looks like some people thought it was a country, (see Country), back in 1857. FFMG (talk) 18:47, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

(resetting indentation) The South African Republic was the name of the Transvaal when it was an independent Boer Republic. It's not the same thing as the country of South Africa in its present form. The significance of the 1910 date is that it is when the whole of the geographical area of what we now call South Africa was first governed as a single political entity. All the dates are important: 1910 for unification, 1931 for independence, 1961 for republicanism, 1994 for democracy. - htonl (talk) 21:09, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

My mistake then, I didn't know that a country was not a country until it was colonized.
I did not know that RSA was not the same as ZAR, it makes sense. FFMG (talk) 21:44, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
You're still not getting it; this has nothing to do with when SA was colonised. 1910 was the year in which South Africa came into being as a unified political entity with jurisdiction over the entirety of the country's territory. This isn't a value judgement on what came before, nor does it deny that other countries existed in the area before then (the ZAR is one example). It's just that South Africa, as it exists today, began in 1910. — Impi (talk) 21:56, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
Please do not edit my replies or my indentations to suit your talk. FFMG (talk) 22:02, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
A lot of people in 1857 thought they were from a country called South Africa, they even called it South Africa.
Please feel free to edit the article South African Republic, (with references of course), if you think that South Africa did not exist then. FFMG (talk) 22:19, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
You are mixing up the name "South Africa" with the geographical area which is now called "South Africa". I do not deny the existence of the country called the "South African Republic" before the Anglo-Boer war. The point is that that South Africa was approximately the area that we call the Transvaal. It was not the area that we now call South Africa. And the government that was then called the "South African Republic" did not evolve into the government that we now call the "Republic of South Africa"; it was subsumed into/replaced by the 1910 Union Government. - htonl (talk) 12:31, 16 March 2008 (UTC)
Your indentation, FFMG, is unnecessarily restricting the space for replies and making it more difficult to edit. Common practice on Wikipedia once the indentation level becomes ridiculous is to reset it so that the space might be more efficiently used. This is done in order to be polite and to make discussion easier, so I'm at a loss to understand why you object so vehemently to it. As for your point, I have little to add to what Htonl has said, which is accurate. The fact remains that the ZAR has no political continuity with either the Union of South Africa or the Republic of South Africa, and shares only a similar name. South Africa, as it exists today in its structure and form, traces its ancestry directly back to 1910 and no earlier. — Impi (talk) 18:25, 16 March 2008 (UTC)
Never heard of such practice in wikipedia, the indent is fine for now.
In any case, we are going around in circle, remember, I did not start the discussion. I just think that the article, (List of countries by formation dates), is wrong for many countries, (including South Africa). The fact that some of us, (me), do not agree on when a country was formed goes to show how quickly the article , (List of countries by formation dates), can get out of hand. I am not even going to entertain the name argument that was given, I am not confusing anything, feel free to read the links I gave.
I suspect that user Mais oui! started this talk because he does not agree with some dates as well. FFMG (talk) 19:25, 16 March 2008 (UTC)
If you, or Mais oui, wish to argue with the content of List of countries by formation dates the correct place to do it is on that article's discussion page. I'm not unsympathetic to your criticisms of that article, but this isn't the place to air them. The specific query raised here was which date given as South Africa's foundation date was correct, and that is what the discussion has mostly been about. Both my and htonl's replies to you have dealt not with the other article, but with your incorrect assertion that South Africa in its present form was not created in May 1910. I think this is a fairly important point, since it has an impact on the dates we include in this article.
I have read the links you provided, but they have revealed to me nothing beyond what I already know. Which is that the Zuid-Afrikaansche Republiek and the modern Republic of South Africa are distinct and separate political entities with no similarity in political structure or geographical area. The ZAR was subsumed into the Union of South Africa in 1910, it did not become the Union. In fact, there was no country or state prior to 1910 with the structure and geographical area of the Union, which is why that date is universally regarded as the date on which South Africa as it exists today was "born". I honestly don't understand why this is so controversial; after all nobody gets in a huff about the United States of America's founding date being 1776, when the history of the American people precedes that date by over a century. — Impi (talk) 20:10, 16 March 2008 (UTC)
What are you talking about? Mais oui! raised a point, I replied, we are not arguing anything, look at what my original reply to him was. I think you guys are getting confused as to what is going on here.
I am not trying to change this article, (did I ever say we need to change it?), all I said was that I don't think all countries are 'born' at a specific date. Some countries, (the US for example), have an exact date when the country was created, but most countries don't have such a date.
South Africa evolved over many, many years and many people called the country 'South Africa' well before 1910. FFMG (talk) 21:41, 16 March 2008 (UTC)
That is true. Certainly people talked about "South Africa" to refer to the area well before 1910. As to the indentation, the thing is that people with low-resolution screens (or just using narrow browser windows) find the text being forced into a really thin column down the right, making it difficult to read. So there is an unofficial convention of resetting the indentation to zero when it gets too far over. But it's not obligatory. - htonl (talk) 10:47, 17 March 2008 (UTC)

(Reset indent) FFMG said "Some countries, (the US for example), have an exact date when the country was created..." This is also true of South Africa and 31 May 1910 is that date. Prior to then the term "South Africa" was used loosely to refer to a variety of colonies, chiefdoms, republics, kingdoms and "no man's lands". The term even sometimes covered places that did not become part of South Africa, such as Lesotho and Botswana. No amount of saying "The sky is mauve with green polka dots" will ever make it so. One of my high school teachers had a favourite saying "Facts is facts!" See South Africa Act 1909 Roger (talk) 11:35, 17 March 2008 (UTC)

Again, we are going around in circle and you guys missed the original point made by someone else, (and most of my replies to him). I am not making any changes, I am not claiming anything, I just don't agree with your definition of when the country was 'born'.
No need for cute sayings, (did you even read the fact you gave?), as I am not trying to reach a consensus or to change anything. Re-read my original replies if you have any doubts.
Also, feel free to reply to the person who originally started the discussion while you are there. FFMG (talk) 12:14, 17 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] language

I got a simple but not stupid question: The english talked in SA is from UK or from US? Rainbow Nation with many colours or with many colors ? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.195.19.145 (talk) 16:42, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

There is only one kind of English :), the rest are local variants.
But the South African English is closer to the UK english. But there are a few exceptions, (such as 'cell phone' vs 'mobiles' or 'traffic lights' vs 'robots').
To answer your question, it has many colours. FFMG (talk) 17:50, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

Who calls traffic lights robots? SGGH speak! 13:32, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

South Africans do. It is a strange linguistic curiosity. - htonl (talk) 15:19, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Is Ndebele not a language?

The sentence saying Ndebele people speak Zulu should be removed because Ndebele is an official language and i personally know 4 people who speak ndebele —Preceding unsigned comment added by 152.106.240.12 (talk) 12:28, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Real GDP?

What is the correct GDP? I see an article http://www.fin24.com/articles/default/display_article.aspx?ArticleId=1518-25_2290513 in which Schüssler a reputable south african economist says that it is R1.9 Trillion which if you divide by lets say 8 gives 238 Billion dollars not over 500. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.198.44.16 (talk) 20:18, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

The data comes from List of countries by GDP (PPP), (but even that would mean that the article needs to be updated).
The discrepancies are probably in the exchange rate as well as the definition of the GDP itself. FFMG (talk) 20:26, 18 March 2008 (UTC)
List of countries by GDP (PPP) has 3 lists. IMF, World Bank and CIA World factbook. IMF lists South Africa as 20th ($660b), whereas the other 2 lists have South Africa as 25th ($400b-$470b). I've been to the IMF website, and the 2008 South Africa data shows $300b, very out of line with their 2007 numbers. Given that there are 3 sources, 2 of them say that South Africa is 25th, and the last is very inconsistent with their own latest data, I'm reverting South Africa's rank to 25th. --HiltonLange (talk) 13:20, 27 March 2008 (UTC)
Sounds good to me, maybe we should update the GBP page as well at some stage.
You must also update the info box to 25th. FFMG (talk) 13:23, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure, the IMF is more reliable than the CIA factbook. Also the second ranking with South Africa at no.25 was way back in 2005. So perhaps it should be stated that in 2007, the country was ranked at no.20. Teatreez (talk) 15:32, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] south african homogeneous core

does any body know the core of people and cultures in south africa —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.192.6.64 (talk) 05:17, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

Predominant core would be Southern African/Bantu people and associated cultures; predominant home languages isiXhosa and isiZulu but English is widely used in commerce, etc, Afrikaans less so. Legal system is predominantly Roman-Dutch with influence of English law and African customary law to a lesser degree.
But 'homogenous'?? Not sure what the background to this question is but we're talking here a country with 11 official languages and many others which don't have 'official' status, numerous ethnic groups and subgroups, numerous tribes and subtribal groupings....I don't think the word 'homogeneous' in any way has relevance unless I'm misunderstanding your question. Perhaps if you rephrase it you'll get a more complete answer. Kit Berg (talk) 09:02, 23 March 2008 (UTC)



well i am writing a paper on the 5 themes of geography....in the region we have to identify the homogenous core and ambigous boundries within this country..... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.192.6.64 (talk) 22:47, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

Well that's going to be a bit difficult...I'll let someone else have a shot at answering that question if anyone else will. I think that it's probably best if you do slightly wider research than asking around here on that - that's a pretty daunting task if you try to go beneath the surface.
If you just stick to the very basics of the five themes then it's much easier. Location is pretty easy....borders aren't disputed except perhaps in terms of sea boundaries and Antarctic. I'm not aware of any significant disputes externally although there are internal disputes as to towns which sit over provincial boundaries (see Khutsong).
People - diverse but you can get that info anywhere if you're prepared to go into the detail, same with physical geography.
Maybe just sit down and brainstorm a list of specific questions you need to answer from your core question and then do your research on the answers. If you can imagine doing a paper asking about the homogenous core of the USA....this is as broad a topic if not more so. Kit Berg (talk) 12:54, 24 March 2008 (UTC)
Just as a matter of interest the CIA World Factbook lists a dispute with Namibia about the exact position of the border along the Orange River. The Factbook is a great source for the basic facts & stats which you can use for your paper. Roger (talk) 14:10, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] "Illegal" evictions

The section added by 41.244.248.39 about a UN report on illegal evictions is misleading. The reference is to the UN homepage for the human rights council and not to "UN report on housing rights violations in South Africa" as the link title suggests. Reading the South African report, there are well over 100 major points in 29 pages, with both the strong and weak areas. There is no clear reference to "illegal evictions". Some concerns are raised about the post-eviction support, but there is certainly no outright condemnation as the edit suggests. In fact, the government's "Breaking new ground" policies are praised, with concerns being raised about their implementation. I am reverting the edit unless a source is added which supports the text --HiltonLange (talk) 08:46, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

I saw the same edit in the Durban article but I didn't have time to read the report, (glad you did). I will remove it from that article as well. Thanks FFMG (talk) 08:57, 25 March 2008 (UTC)
It appears that the edit has resurfaced, this time in multiple articles and with various references. However, the references still vary significantly from the inserted article text. One reference is an advocacy site, another is a misnamed link which is a generic link to a UN conference. Another is subscriber only. Certainly none support the text "human rights abuses are widespread", or "international human rights reports have regularly condemned abuses against shack dwellers". Even if the references were accurate and the incident was accurately portrayed, I'd have to question if it's significant enough to feature on the main encyclopedia page about South Africa. --HiltonLange (talk) 11:57, 26 March 2008 (UTC)
Yes, I have been trying to keep it out of the Durban article as well. I have looked at the references and some of them barely even mention Durban at all.
I have tried to explain it to the user but I think, (by the number of pages that are edited), that they are not really interested in a neutral entry. FFMG (talk) 14:35, 27 March 2008 (UTC)


[edit] Tembe?

I was trying to find definition and info on the word "Tembe" on Wikipedia. I can't find much. Tembe Elephant Park says "The park was developed by Tembe Tribal Authority and Ezemvelo KZN Wildlife." Is there a "Tembe tribe"? Is Tembe the name of a place? Thanks. -- 201.37.229.117 (talk) 13:05, 4 April 2008 (UTC)

Yes they are a tribe. The phrase "Tembe Tribal Authority" is a clue. Roger (talk) 14:42, 4 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. I think that ideally Wikipedia should not contain "clues", but clear presentations of facts. (Making redlinks here for Tembe and Tembe tribe, and for Tribal authority as well, in case anyone feels inspired to create articles.) -- 201.37.229.117 (talk) 12:44, 6 April 2008 (UTC)
Just remember that it's spelled "Thembe", not "Tembe." Tebello TheWHAT!!?? 20:06, 6 April 2008 (UTC)
Thembe, Thembe tribe -- 201.37.229.117 (talk) 04:14, 8 April 2008 (UTC)
Tebello - Both spellings appear to be in common use, I got hundreds of Google hits for both "Thembe Elephant Park" and "Tembe Elephant Park". The wikipedia article is Tembe Elephant Park and the park's own website www.tembe.co.za, Ezemvelo KZN Wildlife www.kznwildlife.com as well as the Tembe Wilderness Trust www.tembetrust.com all spell it without an "h".
201.37.229.117 - I was being just a little sarcastic when I said "The phrase "Tembe Tribal Authority" is a clue", Surely if you read a phrase like that it is quite obvious that the word "Tembe" is the name of the tribe who's authority it is. Would the phrase "French Language Academy" really leave you in doubt whether French is the name of a language? Roger (talk) 22:06, 6 April 2008 (UTC)
Since I had no clue what "Tembe" means, it certainly was not "quite obvious" that Tembe is the name of a tribe -- that's why I asked. I "assumed" that it quite likely was the name of a tribe, but you know what they say about "assuming" ( http://www.google.com/search?q=assume+makes+an+ass ). Better to ask. For all I knew, "Tembe Tribal Authority" could have meant "Central Tribal Authority" or "New Tribal Authority", or many other things, or "Tembe" could have been the name of a place but not a tribe ("Johannesburg Tribal Authority" would be a reasonable name for an organization, but there is no tribe "Johannesburg".) In all likelihood there are institutions called "New York Language Academy" and "London Language Academy", yet neither of those is the name of a language.
As I said before, let's just say what the facts are, or ask if we don't know. Why criticize people for not guessing? Wikipedia edits are full of "guesses" that aren't actually correct and have to be fixed, when just checking in the first place would have saved trouble.
Have a good one. -- 201.37.229.117 (talk) 04:31, 8 April 2008 (UTC)
Point taken. Thank you. Roger (talk) 15:09, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] natural resources

what are the natural resources of south africa —Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.30.36.61 (talk) 16:25, 9 April 2008 (UTC)


[edit] Olympic Banning

Why is there no information about South Africa's being banned from the Olympics in 1964 due to its apartheid policies? 130.160.193.236 (talk) 13:15, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

See South Africa under apartheid. This article is a general overview of the country - not a comprehensive record of everything that ever happened there. Roger (talk) 16:51, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Repeated demographic edits

The same unsourced, seemingly inaccurate edits are being made to this article every day. Each edit is from a different IP address, but the parts of the article edited are consistent. The demographic racial breakdown is being changed to show a far higher number of white South Africans, the AIDS infection rate is being increased, various other minor details are being tampered with. Examples of these edits are [15], [16], [17] and [18]. All edits come from an IP address allocated to Bell.

I initially assumed good faith, but after the 3rd and 4th edit, this appears to be vandalism. Firstly, please be on the lookout for these unsourced changes and roll them back promptly. And secondly, I'm struggling to return the national population to a "correct" figure. CIA world factbook has 43.8m, Statistics South Africa has 47.9m. That's a very big discrepancy, simply choosing one over the other seems arbitrary. --HiltonLange (talk) 05:32, 16 April 2008 (UTC)


[edit] 3 capital cities?

The article states:

South Africa is the only country in the world with three capital cities. Cape Town, the largest of the three, is the legislative capital; Pretoria is the administrative capital; and Bloemfontein is the judicial capital.

So actually, the above is 4, if we were to include Johannsburg.. But doesn't Phillipines also have 4 capitals? And many countries have 2 capitals (e.g. Malaysia, Hollands etc). Albeit, Not sure about 3 capitals. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Waqas1987 (talk • contribs) 11:16, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Johannesburg is not a capital city. --HiltonLange (talk) 13:21, 25 April 2008 (UTC)
To be honest, even Bloemfontein is no longer a 'capital city', as the Supreme Court which is based there has been superseded by the Constitutional Court in Johannesburg. SA is fairly unique in that it has split the three power centres of government (the executive, legislature and judiciary) into three different cities. This was done for political reasons relating to the formation of the Union of South Africa in 1910. But to be honest, the whole concept of having three capital cities is flawed, since it's based on the incorrect assertion that your capital city is the city which houses your executive, legislative and judicial HQs. In reality, your capital city is whatever you declare it to be or (in the case of Israel) whatever other countries accept it to be. South Africa has always had only one capital city, Pretoria (Tshwane). — Impi (talk) 14:25, 25 April 2008 (UTC)
But on what declaration, then, are you basing the claim that Pretoria/Tshwane is the only capital city? When has the government made a declaration of that nature? The only argument for Pretoria being the only capital is that Pretoria is the location of the administrative headquarters, which is exactly the type argument you describe as flawed. - htonl (talk) 08:56, 26 April 2008 (UTC)
No, my argument was that believing that the cities holding your legislative, judicial and executive headquarters were all automatically 'capital cities' as a result of their having these institutions was flawed. After all, were we to still abide by that, then we'd have to conclude that Johannesburg had now replaced Bloemfontein as the judicial capital as the result of the ConCourt now being the highest court in SA. The South African government treats Pretoria as the de facto official capital of SA, since it is also the location of the head of government and where most government duties are undertaken. This is, in effect, a declaration of sorts. Furthermore, all foreign countries, correspondents and so forth regard Pretoria as the capital city of SA, which is why their embassies are based there. Look, I'm ok with compromising and referring to Pretoria as the 'administrative capital' for the sake of Wikipedia and I don't think my personal rant is justification for changing the article, but come on, we all know it's a sham. It was silly when it was done to placate provincial governors in 1910 and it remains silly now. I just don't see the merit to it. — Impi (talk) 16:38, 26 April 2008 (UTC)
Whoops, you are right that Johannesbourg is not the capital, my stupid mistake. However do u have a citation to show that it is the only country in the world with 3 capitals. From the top of my head, as I mentioned before, Phillipines has 4 capitals and many countries have 2 capitals. I am not sure how many countries have 3 capitals from the top of my head, but hoepfully someone can provide a source to that statement.--Waqas1987 (talk) 16:58, 26 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] (Semi-) Protection requested

This article is prone to petty vandalism from unregistered users. It is my feeling that a semi-protected status of the article would be highly useful if we want to get it back to FA-status. Any support for this proposal? Michel Doortmont (talk) 22:46, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

And again vandalised twice today... Michel Doortmont (talk) 15:38, 28 April 2008 (UTC)
Requested semi-protection with the administrators. Michel Doortmont (talk) 16:15, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

Article semi-protected until 2 May 2008; let's hope it helps. Michel Doortmont (talk) 16:21, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

Asked for semi-protection again in view of large amount of vandalism by IP users. Michel Doortmont (talk) 19:36, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

Semi-protection issued until 27 May 2008; let's hope it helps this time. Michel Doortmont (talk) 21:50, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] GDP Accuracy

I think that the GDP listed might be a bit high; $470T is more than the rest of the world combined. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.181.6.230 (talk) 05:46, 4 May 2008 (UTC)

You have missread - it is $470Billion, not $470Trillion. Roger (talk) 12:40, 4 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Help w SA English

Can someone with some knowledge of the IPA help with SA English at IPA chart for English? There's a column there waiting for ya. It seems silly for SA to be left out. kwami (talk) 20:04, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Mining Industry?

I don't want to edit this article, since it is of fairly high quality in most parts. However, as a South African, I find it astonishing that there is little or no mention of the mining industry. Given that it really is the backbone of the economy, should it not be discussed in more detail? Companies like Anglo American PLC and De Beers were founded there, but at this point, the words "mine" and "mining" don't even appear in the article. (Gold, diamonds and "minerals" are mentioned as an aside under International Trade.) Warrickball (talk) 13:43, 24 May 2008 (UTC)