It has been an interesting year. Here's a selection of quotable quotes from and about southern Africa and South Africa published in the media the past year.
After careful consideration in which we looked at the evidence and the facts dispassionately, we have concluded that, while there is a prima facie case of corruption against the deputy president, our prospects of success are not strong enough.
That means that we are not sure if we have a winnable case.
- National Director of Public Prosecutions Bulelani Ngcuka, announcing that Deputy President Jacob Zuma would not be charged with corruption relating to South Africa's controversial arms deal.
My standard of proof is if there was a reasonable suspicion.
- Former African National Congress intelligence unit commander Mo Shaik, on why he had said publicly that he thought Ngcuka was a spy.
I was agent RS452 and I have had enough of the lies and deceit.
- Former human rights lawyer Vanessa Brereton, who said she was a spy for the apartheid government and that the code name alleged to have belonged to Ngcuka was in fact hers.
This Hitler has only one objective: justice for his people, sovereignty for his people, recognition of the independence of his people and their rights over their resources. If that is Hitler, then let me be a Hitler tenfold.
- Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe.
I have always had a nagging feeling that for all their propensity for liberal values and civilised norms, these people (South Africans) are dirty.
- Zimbabwean Information Minister Jonathan Moyo, after a newspaper exposé of a shopping spree by Moyo and his family in South Africa while ordinary Zimbabweans go hungry.
We are near, so we don't have to shout as much as Britain does, otherwise we will injure Zimbabwe's hearing mechanisms. The law of physics tells you that, never mind diplomacy.
- South African Foreign Affairs Minister Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, saying Europe and the United Kingdom could shout their objections to what was happening in Zimbabwe.
I think that the government's policy is so vague, so subtle, so nuanced, that it scarcely amounts to a policy.
- University of the Witwatersrand political science professor Tom Lodge about South Africa's policy towards Zimbabwe.
If leaders on the continent do not do more to convince President Robert Mugabe to respect the rule of law and enter into a dialogue with the political opposition, he and his cronies will drag Zimbabwe down until there is nothing left to ruin.
- United States Secretary of State Colin Powell.
Personally, I don't know anybody who has died of Aids.
- President Mbeki. Asked whether he knew anyone with HIV, he added: "I really, honestly don't."
These things are affordable for South Africans, not like things like ARV (anti-retrovirals), which are not.
- Health Minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang, recommending (on the advice of Aids dissident Roberto Giraldo) that HIV-positive people should eat garlic, onions, African potatoes and virgin olive oil.
I said to her that I didn't want to sit next to someone who was the cause of the death of thousands of people. She said "fuck off". I asked her if that was the way a Health Minister should respond and she told me to fuck off again.
- Cape Town resident Jens von Wichtingen, who asked to be moved from his aircraft seat next to Health Minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang in protest against the government's HIV and Aids policy.
All this noise every day about HIV/Aids and so on, that suggests that this country is about to collapse as a result of HIV/Aids, is really unfounded. There is really no alarm in this country.
- Defence Minister Mosiuoa Lekota.
The primary crime of Iraq is the fact that it floats on oil. Because we are endowed with several rich minerals, if we don't stop this unilateral action against Iraq today, tomorrow they will come for us.
- ANC secretary-general Kgalema Motlanthe at a march against the looming US-led war on Iraq.
The United States, awakened to the implications of being the sole superpower, joined by Britain as a born-again colonialist, and other Western countries have turned themselves into fierce hunting bulldogs raring to go, as they sniff for more blood, Third World blood. We, their hunted game, are for slaughter.
- Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe on the prospects of an invasion of Iraq.
The Democratic Alliance, and elements within the ANC, will however be delighted to know that she is seriously considering a suggestion that she travel to Iraq as a human shield against American attacks.
- A statement from then ANC Women's League president Winnie Madikizela-Mandela's office on her wish to travel to Iraq to offer herself as a human shield.
I trusted Marthinus like Caesar trusted Brutus, but refused to die like Caesar. After the many battles I fought and won, I could only ask him: 'Et tu, Brute?'
- Peter Marais, accusing New National Party leader Marthinus van Schalkwyk of stealing the Western Cape premiership from him.
This infamous 4x4 has become the most expensive 4x4 in South Africa.
- Viwe Notshe, SC, defence counsel of former ANC chief whip Tony Yengeni. Yengeni was convicted of fraud in connection with a 47 percent discount he got on a luxury 4x4 vehicle.
It would rather appear you were pushed.
- Pretoria Commercial Crimes Court Magistrate Bill Moyses on defence arguments that Yengeni "fell on his sword and showed remorse". Moyses sentenced Yengeni to four years in jail.
If they are going to punish every ANC member who is guilty of corruption with a fine of R5 000, they might as well call it a fund-raising effort.
- Independent Democrats leader Patricia de Lille after the ANC fined its chairman, Mosiuoa Lekota, R5 000 for failing to declare certain financial interests to Parliament
I love jazz.
- Northern Cape transport MEC John Block, who admitted he attended jazz festivals at a cost of R50 000 to the taxpayer.
I heard the people under my feet clawing and kicking but there was nothing I could do. The clawing carried on for five minutes and after the struggle died down there was total silence.
- Neo Lithebe, who was rescued from the roof of a bus that fell into the Saulspoort Dam in the eastern Free State, claiming the lives of 51 people on their way to Workers' Day celebrations.
I have gone to jail for the sake of the African National Congress. That is the one indisputable fact that remains.
- Allan Boesak, who declined an award from the ANC for his role in the formation of the United Democratic Front. He was jailed in 2000 for theft of donor funds from his Foundation for Peace and Justice.
I asked him how he would get rid of all the blacks in the country. He said they had to be chased north to Zimbabwe, and anyone who resisted should be summarily shot dead.
- State witness JC Smit, referring to Mike du Toit, one of the 22 alleged Boeremag members accused of attempting to stage a coup
I believed that by shooting innocent black people I would keep my promise to God.
- De Wet Kritzinger, who pleaded not guilty to, but was sentenced to life imprisonment
for, the murder of three black people on a bus in 2000. He admitted he shot them, but said it was not wrong because it was in keeping with a promise he had made to God.
When a black person says he does not like white people, that is not racism, it is prejudice... because whites created racism, blacks have no capacity to be racists but they can only respond to it.
- ANC Youth League spokesman Khulekani Ntshangase.
We did not participate in the struggle to become a nation of hijackers, abusers of children and women. Or a society of fraudsters.
- Archbishop Desmond Tutu.
The beautiful thing about murder is that you get a body. It is different from other crimes where we work with averages. We have a body to see that a person has been killed.
- Safety and Security Minister Charles Nqakula at the release of a report containing crime statistics.
Can you bring them back? Can you bring back my little girl's giggles and my fiancée's hugs?
- Pretoria father Clifford Rawstone to Tshwane mayor Father Smangaliso Mkhatshwa on the loss of his daughter, his fiancée and his mother. They were hijacked in Sunnyside and later murdered.
In many cases, black economic empowerment has been understood to mean the personal mega-enrichment of a handful of individuals who happen to be black.
- The South African Communist Party.
Outcomes-based education is a system that yields illiterate children with masses of self-confidence.
- The unnamed principal of a West Rand school.
An image of a male organ that continuously has sexual intercourse with the goddess of the air.
- How Cobie Swart, wife of a minister of the Brackenfell West Dutch Reformed Church, described the church building's tower.
Perhaps this year we will go all the way.
- Then-captain Shaun Pollock, who was part of the South African cricket team who reached the quarterfinals in 1996 and the semifinals in 1999, ahead of the World Cup tournament.
We came here to win and didn't.
- Rudolf Straeuli after the Springbok rugby team lost their World Cup quarterfinal match against the All Blacks by 9-29. He resigned after the tournament. - Sapa.