Conversations With Gabriel
The Common Sense's one-on-one interviews with politicians, businesspeople and other fascinating South African commentators
Episodes
US Ambassador Leo Brent Bozell III says South Africa could become one of the biggest economic powers in the world, and every bit as successful as the United States, with the right policies. He points to the country's natural resources and tourism, and to the way it ended apartheid without a war.
He also says Pretoria has refused to condemn "Kill the Boer", to make rural crime a national priority, and to give mining and telecoms the ...
Helen Zille, the DA's mayoral candidate for Johannesburg, tells Gabriel Makin that the city is not at the brink of the abyss but already over the edge, and that the DA will not stay in power at all costs. She explains why the least bad option after the 4 November election may be opposition rather than a coalition, why she does not believe corruption can be removed from Johannesburg with the ANC in government, and why she wants vote...
DA MP Mlondi Mdluli, the party's spokesperson on small business development, returns to Conversations with Gabriel, this time in the studio. He walks Gabriel Makin through the five reforms from his piece for The Common Sense: working capital that is not a bank loan, a real foothold in formal retail space, by-law enforcement that does not ruin livelihoods, a single front door for support, and a better-resourced competition watchdog....
Princy Mthombeni, chair of South Africans for Constitutional Reform, is back with Gabriel Makin for the third episode of The Royal Sense. Home Affairs is moving asylum applications online after the Constitutional Court ruling, and the minister says 95% of applications are rejected as unfounded. So why do so few people leave? Princy argues that South Africa's borders are wide open, that deportation is the law and is cheaper than kee...
David Ansara, CEO of the Free Market Foundation, sits down with Gabriel Makin days after returning from Washington, where he and Dr Martin van Staden presented the FMF's Don Caldwell Memorandum on Socialism and Racial Engineering at the White Cross Project conference, and attended the vigil of 3,000 named crosses on the National Mall for South Africa's farm-murder victims. He explains why the FMF thinks the US government's five ask...
Two years after the 7 October 2023 attack on Israel, Chief Rabbi of South Africa Dr Warren Goldstein sits down with Gabriel Makin. He describes what that day meant for South Africa's Jewish community, why he calls it a genocide averted, and what 3,800 years of Jewish history teach about enemies who say they want you dead. He explains why he stood up to the ANC government after, in his words, it declared solidarity with Hamas and th...
A collaboration between The Common Sense and the African Renaissance Podcast (Thabo Mbeki Foundation).
Former EFF MP Dr Mbuyiseni Ndlozi, now a senior fellow at the Thabo Mbeki Foundation, sits down with Gabriel Makin to unpack his 11 Theses on the Call for a Batho Pele Convention. He argues that South Africans traded their agency for the ballot ("we vote, and then we wait"), that local government is sliding into a mafiocracy run by...
Washington has run out of patience with Pretoria. Joshua Meservey, senior fellow at the Hudson Institute and one of the voices behind the new US visa restrictions, tells Gabriel Makin why the Trump administration moved to "the stick", what the five asks actually are, and why he believes the South African government has been trying to run out the clock. He traces the rift back to the Biden years: ambivalence on Ukraine, the Lady R, ...
"South Africa belongs to all who live in it." Princy Mthombeni wants that line out of the Constitution. She chairs South Africans for Constitutional Reform, the movement that grew out of her viral review of the whole Constitution. She tells Gabriel Makin that the Constitution must change in other ways too. She wants the president elected directly by the people rather than by Parliament, citizen referendums, the informal economy res...
In this episode of Conversations with Gabriel, Gabriel Makin speaks to Rob Katzen about how a group of old boys helped turn Johannesburg’s Jeppe High School for Boys from a declining public school into one of South Africa’s strongest education success stories.
Rob explains how Jeppe had fallen into serious decline by the mid-2000s, with falling applications, deteriorating infrastructure, lower fee collection, weak board...
In this episode Gabriel Makin is joined again by producer, pastor and youtuber, Bonsai Shongwe. The conversation starts on the question of the African National Congress' influence in South African churches. Bonsai explained that while the ANC used to hold huge sway over the politics of South Africa's churches, that influence has waned dramatically. Following this, the conversation turns to Gabriel and Bosnai's frustrations surround...
In this episode Gabriel Makin is joined by the Head of Policy for the Democratic Alliance (DA), Mat Cuthbert. The conversation begins with Mat's background and then transitions to his role in proposing the fundamentally important "Economic inclusion for all" bill, which seeks to restructure the way that the South African state does empowerment policy. Mat explains that the changes he is proposing would include replacing race with p...
In this episode Gabriel Makin is joined by the DA's eThekwini (Durban) mayoral candidate, Haniff Hoosen. The conversation begins with Haniff's background, highlighting his over 30 years in South African politics and his decision to come out of retirement to run for mayor. After that the conversation turns to the problems that currently beset Durban: failing infrastructure, rampant crime and corruption and general mismanagement. As ...
In this episode Gabriel is joined by Wandile Sihlobo, who is the Chief Economist of the Agricultural Business Chamber and the Presidential Envoy on Agiculture and Land. The discussion begins with a brief introduction to Wandile and the overall state of South African agriculture, where Wandile highlights how the agricultural industry in South Africa is flourishing. From there the conversation turns to land reform as Gabriel pitches ...
In this episode ofConversations with Gabriel, Gabriel Makin and Dr James Myburgh give a definitve historical analysis on the uniquely South African problem of farm murders. The conversation traces the ideological history and how the propaganda and underground campaign of MK in the mid-80s laid the groundwork for the later explosion of violent crime in South Africa. The conversation goes through the transcripts of the ANC's propagan...
In this episode of Common Sense Conversations, Gabriel Makin talks to Nicholas Nyati about his running for Deputy Federal Chairperson of the DA. The conversation ranges through a number of topics, covering Nicholas's background, his entry into politics, his goals for the next DA Congress, and his goals for the DA. He also explains two of the six resolutions that he is proposing at the upcoming DA congress. The first concerns the DA...
In this episode of the Talking Sense Interview, Gabriel Makin and James Lorimer go into a deep dive into South Africa's mineral and petroleum resources. They explore where South Africa's oil comes from. What effect the Iran war could have on the country's oil supply and price. And South Africa's massive potential in the industry.
Chapters
00:00 Introduction to South Africa's Fuel Sources02:07 Current Refining Capacity and Challenges0...
In this episode of the Talking Sense Interview, Gabriel Makin and Helen Zille discuss the Johannesburg results from the latest SRF/The Common Sense poll. They unpack the DA's progress and what the polling data reveals about her prospects of securing a majority in the city.
In this episode of Talking Sense John Steenhuisen strikes back against a Common Sense editorial that called for him to be fired. He argues that he has done a very competent job in addressing South Africa's Foot and Mouth pandemic and that The Common Sense was way off base to suggest anything else.
Executive Mayor of Cape Town, Geordin Hill-Lewis, joined Gabriel Makin to talk about Cape Town and South Africa. The conversation looks at his successes in the city, what challenges he has faced, and what is needed to make South Africa successful.
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The Common Sense website: https://thecommonsense.co.za
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