Between the lines

Yesterday, 1 000 Grahamstown children read, or were read to at 23 different sites in the city.

People who believe in reading have an almost religious conviction of its value. And it’s backed up by research that proves children who are read to at home enjoy an advantage over children who aren’t.

Some experts recommend you start reading to children from when they’re born!

Whenever you start reading to them – and it should be early, the experts say – some of the advantages you’re giving children are a better vocabulary, higher literacy, better ability to concentrate and pay attention, and better preparation for formal learning generally.

Next week is the Puku isiXhosa Story Festival. Some of it is focused on specific groups of schoolchildren, but there are public events too - see the programme and more inside Makana Sharp! (it’s in isiXhosa and there’s a link to the online English version).

This year it features the legendary Madosini, who boasts the increasingly rare skill of playing the uhadi traditional bow – not an instrument you’ll often hear played live.

Also in this edition is a commemoration by some of our regular contributors of the sinking of the SS Mendi on 21 February, 100 years ago.

New among them is Albany Museum historian Lindinxiwa Mahlasela, who will be sharing his research into Grahamstown’s hidden histories with Grocott’s Mail readers in coming months.

It was a respected church leader who advised, fix the leadership and everything else will follow, at a meeting of Makana Municipality, provincial officials and members of the Grahamstown Business Forum yesterday. He claimed that strong direction from the current leadership of the municipality was what had seen it begin to function better.

Convened by the GBF, it was a strategic planning meeting to come up with a plan to boost the municipality’s turnaround efforts.

Outlining the basis for the engagement, a provincial official alluded to the possibility of Makana again going under administration should it fail to right itself.

“When you’re under administration, you have to listen no matter what – and there’s no telling where the city’s next administration will come from.”

In preliminary discussions, there were other questions asked too, such as “If all were well with Makana Municipality, would it have enough money to run itself?”

Addressing participants at the end of the first discussion session, GBF chair Trevor Davies described a significant part of the solution for Makana as “a money issue”.

“In any business, the income stream must be more than its expenditure,” Davies said.

Grocott’s Mail will next week carry a report by the municipality’s communications team on the outcome of the strategic planning session.