10. Lood se Praatjies' commentary in Beeld on Jacob Zuma's state of the nation address:

Lood notes that the presidency was very pleased that twice as many people tuned into this year's 7pm broadcast as had done last year, when it went out in the morning. However, "Wat die presidensie gerieflikheidshalwe uit die oog verloor het, is dat sy toespraak uitgesaai is terwyl miljoene mense verbaas gesit en wonder het wat van 7de Laan geword het."

9. The Carte Blanche story on how deaf individuals have proven to have an extraordinary talent for spotting in-store theft on CCTV footage:

Security expert and software engineer Jan Schoeman told the programme that the hearing impaired are: "‘so much better than able-bodied people and the reason is simple - body language. These people grow up reading body language.' So Jan conducted tests and found the results astounding. 'Take a hard disk [of CCTV footage] from a retailer, give it to an able-bodied person and they would pick up six or seven incidents of theft. I'd take the same one and give it to a hearing impaired person and they would find 60 incidents'."

8. Business Day editor Peter Bruce's article in the Gulf News on the legacy of Nelson Mandela:

Bruce writes that by the time Mandela's single term in office was over "many South Africans were quietly satisfied. He had brought great honour on the country but headway on the big political and economic challenges the country faces had been painfully slow. He was all feel-good and no action. We needed, we thought, a modern political manager, someone who could get things done. Boy, are we sorry now. His successor, Thabo Mbeki, turned out to be an eloquent and elegant disaster. He didn't think the HIV virus caused Aids, he thought the country's high crime rate was a figment of white racist imaginations, he protected a painfully dubious head of the national police service when prosecutors tried to arrest him. Worst of all, he virtually guaranteed his successor's victory at a party congress in 2007 by refusing to stand down and let someone else challenge Jacob Zuma."

7. Tim du Plessis' article in Beeld on why even the disaffected should be grateful for our constitution:

Du Plessis argues that for all its imperfections, and the ANC's tendency to dishonour its spirit, the constitution provides the framework of, and bulwark for, our open society. This places important limits on the use of power, and when abuses occur, provides the space to civil society to contest them. "Die Grondwet is 'n feilbare, menslike document" he concludes. "Hy is net so goed as wat die maghebbers bereid is om hom in stand te hou. Ons moet hulle daartoe dwing - op elke denkbare manier. Dis waarheen die energie moet gaan, nie na 'n steriele verwensery van die verlede nie."

6. The Mercury report on how Nonkululeko Mhlongo, mother of two of President Jacob Zuma's two children, received R3,7m worth of catering tenders from the KwaZulu-Natal legislature:

The newspaper reported that Mhlongo's company, Bucebo General Trading was paid R1 303 671.50 in 2008/09 and has received R2 359 880.81 in 2009/10. Bongani Sibisi, the "chief operations officer of the legislature, conceded that while the tender had been advertised in the print media, it had - contrary to legal requirements - not been advertised in the tender bulletin."

5. John Scott's column in the Cape Times on (inter alia) the best posture to adopt when a presidential convoy happens to pass by:

Scott advises the unwary student jogger: "Watch your gestures like a hawk. Don't even stick up your finger to see if it's raining. The VIP police are ever-vigilant to see which finger is being raised, aware that one of their chief functions is to protect the president from the wrong finger. Now for the good news. There are still things you are allowed to do when the president's blue-light brigade roars past you, all sirens going. You can wave enthusiastic greetings, you can doff your forelock, you can hold up both hands in surrender, you can give a Hitler salute (the Fuhrer never complained), or you can simply bow, scrape and otherwise demonstrate your abject respect."

4. John Kane Berman's article in Business Day on the similar contradiction at the heart of South Africa's two grand racial projects of apartheid and transformation:

Apartheid, he writes, "rested on an unsustainable contradiction. The NP did not want the blacks in the country, but it needed them.... And now here we are, 20 years later. The country is again going downhill, faster than most people wish to admit. ANC policy also rests on a contradiction: it doesn't really want the whites, but it needs them. At one stage, particularly under Dr Verwoerd, the NP was willing to sacrifice economic growth to racial purity. The ANC is also willing to sacrifice economic (and job) growth, not on the altar of racial purity, but on those of black economic empowerment and employment equity. This means that the ANC is trying to build a ‘development state' without exploiting the skills of the whole population. It cannot be done."

3. The Times article on a damning forensic report on corruption in Johannesburg City Parks

According to Nkosana Lekotjolo the report by Edward Nathan Sonnenbergs Forensics found that "tenders for more than R117-million, involving 'corruption and maladministration ... on a large scale', were irregularly awarded by the department." Apparently the MD of City Parks, Luther Williamson, "personally negotiated the purchase of City Parks' headquarters, in Braamfontein, for R12.8-million - 23 days after it was bought on auction for R2.24-million by a company belonging to a close associate."

After a few days of silence City Parks loudly rejected the report as "baseless". Meanwhile Williamson quietly went on indefinite sick leave.

2. The Sowetan scoop on the abduction of Chumani Maxwele in Cape Town by Jacob Zuma's bodyguards:

Anna Majavu wrote that "Maxwele was jogging on Cape Town's De Waal Drive just before 6pm last Wednesday when a convoy of six government cars sped past him. ‘I waved them away, as if to say 'hamba', because of the noise. After that a black BMW X5 pulled up and three guys jumped out, pointing guns at me,' Maxwele told Sowetan. This was the start of a 24-hour nightmare for Maxwele..."

1. The Star's lifestyle audit of ANC Youth League President, Julius Malema:

Angelique Serrao reported that according to "sources in the [ANC Youth League] have said [Malema] earns R20 000 a month...At the same time that the transfer of [his R3,6m] Sandown house went through, Malema attended a press conference in a Gucci suit, and sported a Breitling watch worth about R250 000. The 28-year-old politician owns a black Mercedes-Benz AMG, which retails at R734 000, and reportedly drives an Aston Martin and a red Range Rover Sport too. Last night he went to a lecture at Wits University in a brand-new white Range Rover - with no number plates - which sells for R1.2m. Malema is the director of four companies: 101 Junjus Trading CC, Blue Nightingale Trading 61, Ever Roaring Investment and SGL Engineering Projects."

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