Newsletter| SA is ranked 106 on the World Happiness Index. The question now is whether our anaemic economy, squeezed household budgets and high unemployment rate will affect attitudes towards the governing party, writes Mondli Makhanya
is that it is bull dust because, at number 106, we rank below nations that definitely cannot be happier than us, this nation of kwaito, gqom and sakkie-sakkie.that parties so hard on weekends that we express our exuberance by stabbing each other with broken bottles.
Basically, we know more about our circumstances than many people know about their respective countries, and we are therefore in a better position to be aggrieved. The trend coming out of research across the globe is that the happier people are, the more engaged with politics they are likely to be, and that “very unhappy people are likely to be disengaged from politics”.
The index adds that, because of this, governments are increasingly focusing their policy making on improving citizens’ well-being, not only for its own sake, but also “out of enlightened self-interest”.
Joblessness, the high cost of living, poor service delivery and rampant corruption have been major themes.
South Africa Latest News, South Africa Headlines
Similar News:You can also read news stories similar to this one that we have collected from other news sources.
Mondli Makhanya: SA’s voters have grown up and cannot be taken for granted by ANCNewsletter| The South African voter has grown up. Gone are the days when ANC leaders could dismissively claim that voters would back it regardless of whether its leaders were messing up, stealing or abusing public resources, writes Mondli Makhanya
Read more »
Mondli Makhanya: When spooks fall apartNewsletter| The ANC must act on the recommendations of the high-level review panel that interrogated the workings of the State Security Agency and it must return to being a political party, not a spy agency, writes Mondli Makhanya
Read more »
Mondli Makhanya: SA’s voters have grown up and cannot be taken for granted by ANCNewsletter| The South African voter has grown up. Gone are the days when ANC leaders could dismissively claim that voters would back it regardless of whether its leaders were messing up, stealing or abusing public resources, writes Mondli Makhanya
Read more »
Mondli Makhanya: When spooks fall apartNewsletter| The ANC must act on the recommendations of the high-level review panel that interrogated the workings of the State Security Agency and it must return to being a political party, not a spy agency, writes Mondli Makhanya
Read more »
The important message the upcoming election results will send South AfricansGiven the many indefensible and crippling problems facing the governing party, the 2019 elections will communicate an important message, writes Mpumelelo Mkhabela.
Read more »
South Africa: A first step towards justice for South African pensionersBetween 2007 and 2013, more than 6,000 pension funds in South Africa were cancelled in a process littered with errors and oversights. Today, Open Secrets has written to five of the country’s largest pension fund administrators to demand swift action to reinstate pension funds that have been incorrectly cancelled. This is the first of many necessary steps of ensuring accountability for a shameful decade in pension fund administration that has harmed many vulnerable pensioners.
Read more »
Agencies continue relief efforts in cyclone-affected southern African countriesThe United Nations says the storm is possibly the worst weather-related disaster ever to hit the southern hemisphere.
Read more »
IEC to spare no expense, effort to ensure power cuts don't affect electionsThe Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) says that while load shedding is a threat to the elections, it will do everything in its power to protect the intergrity of the electoral process come 8 May.
Read more »
IEC has misgivings about load-shedding affecting electionsThere concerns about the effect power cuts will have on counting, as well as the credibility of the system
Read more »