The community of Lawaaikamp in the city of George, in the Western Cape, is similar to many other township areas: A community of small houses and dusty streets, the area struggles with poverty, unemployment, crime and drug abuse. And like many others, it is a community that loves soccer.

With less than 100 days to go before the FIFA 2010 World Cup, South Africa’s stadiums are receiving high praise from across the world, more than two thirds of the match tickets have been sold, and other infrastructure projects are nearing completion.

In this week’s newsletter, we share with you the thoughts of a South African living abroad, Miles Giljam, who explains why he thinks white South Africans, starting foremost with himself, need to consider returning home to build the new South Africa that we were once so excited about. The views expressed in the article are Miles’ own.

The flood of memories and emotions evoked by the release of the movie Invictus should provide South Africans, especially white South Africans, with an opportunity to reflect on the state of reconciliation and race relations in our country.

On the corner of Twist and Plein streets in the inner city of Johannesburg stands an historic red-roofed building that has been witness to the city’s decades of transformation, and is itself an agent of new beginnings, bringing change to the people of the city.

The Drill Hall, as it is still known, was built in 1904, its name testifying to its original purpose as a military barracks. South African soldiers sent out to fight in World War I and II, were recruited and mobilized from this point.

Since the State of the Nation Address I have pondered on why so many felt the speech “flat”, why much of what we have achieved as a Nation was left out, why some of the important pronouncements lack re-assuring detail and even why some of what was said, was said in the first place!

I have gone through the speech in detail “tracking and changing” the content to deal with the above. I have specifically not included new topics like the state of the defense force or inflation targeting, just stuck to what our President chose to present while “adding flesh to the bone” trying to make it more meaningful to those of us who listened attentively and are passionate about the future of our country. Above all I have attempted to be constructive.

When you enter the surgery department on 9th floor of the Orange Block at the Charlotte Maxeke Hospital in Johannesburg, you'll find photographs from cities across the globe posted on the walls, an upmarket doctor's quarters, sparkling floors and friendly staff. I enter the reception to find the man leading this troop of healthcare professionals, ready and waiting. 

Prof. Ken Boffard, Head of Surgery at Charlotte Maxeke (formerly Joburg Gen) Hospital, has recently been appointed President of the International Society of Surgery. It's the first time in the organisation's 150-year history that the position has been filled by a surgeon from Africa.

Peet du Plooy is a man every South African needs to meet right now. The World Wide Fund (WWF) for Nature's Trade & Investment Advisor is spearheading proposals for South Africa's future energy systems that all of us can agree on, regardless of social standing or political inclination. Read on and you'll see why. 

The mechanical engineer from Pretoria spent six and a half years in Eskom's Research & Development department focusing on improving the efficiency of coal power stations. “It was here that I got to the innards of how the coal power stations work,” says du Plooy. “My frustration at the time was that it seemed like I was fixing something at a micro scale, in the sense that what I was doing wasn't fixing the policy that kept us building these machines.”   

My name is Julie Cunningham, I have just joined the SA – Good News team as Editor on their website after Ian Macdonald, who developed the brand over the last five years, left to pursue his passion in renewable energy. For the last six years I have been in the TV news industry, but I wanted to pursue my passion for writing and speaking, and wanted to leave a positive legacy in the South Africa media.

Having come from the South African TV news scene, I would like to share some of my insight and thoughts about how the media go about making decisions, like the eNEWS report that ran last Friday by a journalist who'd just recently joined their Johannesburg operation.

South Africa - The Good News ended off the year by celebrating Christmas with 150 small children from the crèche we have adopted in Doornkop in Soweto. It was a special occasion enabled by our co-sponsors Digipos Systems and eg solutions, with stationary gifts from BIC. We took the kids to the zoo, where the polar bear performed, the hyenas ate, the baboons entertained and the lions slept!

The global economic slowdown was one of the big stories of the year and it ended the longest economic upswing in South Africa's history. It has been a tough year, but there was still plenty to cheer about in 2009.

After 5 years as editor of South Africa's premier good news website, Ian Macdonald is leaving South Africa - The Good News at the end of the year in order to pursue opportunities in the renewable energy sector. These are some of the things he has learnt during his time with us.

The following is a speech delivered by former newspaper editor Richard Steyn at the Michaelhouse Speech Day prize-giving in August. It has been slightly edited for this newsletter.

"I don't want to talk about the Reitz 4", said Professor Jonathan Jansen.  "I want to talk about the Reitz in all of us."

I read and hear constantly that we are "worst in the world" in a range of areas. For example, the SA Institute of Race Relations recently claimed that our schools are the "most violent in the world" amongst other things. We hear constantly that our HIV infection rate is the "worst in the world", that our doctor/population ratio is "amongst the worst in the world", that our murder rate is the same. On top of this, we are constantly reminded that Africa is a basket case and "worst in the world" at most things.

As a nation we are addicted to publications that measure our economic, social or political standing on a global scale. We lend so much weight to these surveys and research reports that they often lead our national media agenda. This practice is understandable, as a developing country we want to know how we are fairing in comparison to the rest of the world, and more importantly we want to know how the rest of the world is rating us.

Unfortunately many of these surveys and reports, that find their way into the headlines of the national media, are used to show what South Africa does wrong, rather than what the country does right.

The recent request by Eskom to the National Energy Regulator of SA to increase tariffs by 45% every year for the next three years has been met with outrage, shock and a flurry of impotent online petitions in a bid to stop it. But the price hike is actually good news.

"Good news in Nigeria, is there any?" was the incredulous response to the next book we intend to publish. (Much the same as when we launched South Africa - The Good News and Africa - The Good News!). And it got me thinking, why do we do this work, why do we focus on good news out of South Africa and Africa when seemingly there is so much bad news?

This week I learnt that building a community is difficult. And I learnt that it is so very easy.

Thursday was one of those days when I felt that I was at the start of something special. Packed into a large room with 500 of the country's most dynamic young entrepreneurs, a dream took root. The dream: to turn Cape Town into South Africa's version of the famed Silicon Valley.

The growling drone of a generator reminds me, as I write of my visit to Lagos, Nigeria, that I am in a city where electricity supply barely exists, and that my hotel could not function without it. I have just returned from a no-holds-barred tour of the city and in the background there is an "Inside Africa" CNN report on Zimbabwe; lamenting economic disaster, corrupt politicians and the purging of white contribution. I have seen first hand a mad combination of unbelievable squalor and surprising elegance, of aggressive, rude scooter drivers and demure, polite people, of wallowing poverty and sophisticated wealth.

It's the look in their eyes. Unmistakable. Delightful. It's why I do what I do, to see that look in their eyes.  It is a real thrill for me to stand in front of people from all walks of life and of all ages, and talk about stuff that begins the process of eroding fear and creating safety. Facts drop like seeds of hope causing panic and paranoia to wilt and peace and humanity to rise.

This week I delivered a talk to the Grade 6s of SACS junior school on the good news in South Africa and the power of positive thinking. It was a fantastic experience and I was so impressed and inspired by the attitude of the kids.

How a young South African had a planet named after him.

Canada is a very large place, seriously in the market for more people. It was not, however, aching for the company of Brandon Carl Huntley, 31, late of Mowbray, a Cape Town suburb. He was in the country illegally. His resume, according to newspaper accounts, included stints as a carnival worker and as a garden sprinkler salesman, positions Canada is manifestly able to fill from its current reserves of human capital and which would not classify his departure from South Africa as contributing greatly to any brain drain.

"The only risk is wanting to stay" is the Colombian TV advertisement byline.  In a country which has a global reputation for long-term kidnappings, high homicide rates, bad crime and vicious paramilitary/guerilla conflict, this byline is clever.  But it is misleading; does it pretend to tell a story of "risk" that does not reflect Colombian reality?

Lyal White, a colleague of mine from the South African Institute of International Affairs, who has visited Colombia on a number of occasions and lectured for a semester at Los Andes University in Bogota, thought it appropriate for us to travel to Colombia to investigate the perception/reality gap to see if our "Good News" model was appropriate in another developing, but much misunderstood, country.