Audiobooks narrated by Charl Van Heyningen

How to Steal a City: The Battle for Nelson Mandela Bay: An Inside Account

How to Steal a City is the gripping insider account of this intervention, which lays bare how Nelson Mandela Bay metro was bled dry by criminal syndicates, and how factional politics within the ruling party abetted that corruption. As a former senior state official and local government ‘fixer’, Crispian Olver was no stranger to dodgy politicians and broken organisations. Yet what he found in Nelson Mandela Bay went far beyond rigged contracts, blatant conflicts of interest and garden-variety kickbacks. The city’s administration had evolved into a sophisticated web of front companies, criminal syndicates and compromised local politicians and officials. The metro was effectively controlled by a criminal network closely allied to a dominant local ANC faction. What Olver found was complete state capture – a microcosm of what has taken place in national government. Olver and his team initiated a clean-up of the administration, clearing out corrupt officials and rebuilding public trust. Then came the ANC’s doomed campaign for the August 2016 local government elections. Having lost its way in factional battles and corruption, the divided party went down to a humiliating defeat in its traditional heartland. Olver paid a high price for his work in Nelson Mandela Bay. Intense political pressure and even threats to his personal safety took a toll on his mental and physical health. When his political support was withdrawn, he had to flee the city as the forces stacked against him took their revenge. This is his story.

Crispian Olver (Author), Charl Van Heyningen (Narrator)

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Future Tense: Reflections on My Troubled Land

‘From the vantage point of years in active politics, Tony Leon provides a lucid analytical balance sheet of SA Ltd 2021. Eschewing political correctness, Leon tells it as he sees it.’ – Judge Dennis Davis ‘Anyone who wants to understand South Africa today – a country so beautiful, yet so broken – simply has to read this book.’ - Niall Ferguson, author of The Ascent of Money In his riveting new book, Future Tense, Tony Leon captures and analyses recent South African history, with a focus on the squandered and corrupted years of the past decade. With unique access and penetrating insight, Leon presents a portrait of today’s South Africa and prospects for its future, based on his political involvement over thirty years with the key power players: Cyril Ramaphosa, Jacob Zuma, Thabo Mbeki, Nelson Mandela and FW de Klerk. His close-up and personal view of these presidents and their history-making, and many encounters in the wider world, adds vivid colour of a country and planet in upheaval. Written during the first coronavirus lockdown, Future Tense examines the surge of the disease and the response, both of which have crashed the economy and its future prospects. As the founding leader of the Democratic Alliance, Leon also provides an insider view for the first time of the power struggles within that party, which saw the exit of its first black leader in 2019. There is every reason to fear for the future of South Africa but, as Leon argues, ‘the hope for a better country remains an improbable, but not an impossible, dream’.

Tony Leon (Author), Charl Van Heyningen (Narrator)

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Enemy of the People: How Jacob Zuma stole South Africa and how the people fought back

He swore to serve the people, but Jacob Zuma robbed us blind. This is the first definitive account of Zuma’s catastrophic misrule, offering eyewitness descriptions and cogent analysis of how South Africa was brought to its knees – and how the people fought back. When Jacob Zuma took power of the ANC in December 2007, he inherited a country whose economy was growing and a party that had the support of two-thirds of the electorate. Today, South Africa is caught in the grip of state capture, the economy is moribund and a divided ANC is staring down the barrel of defeat at the 2019 elections. How did we get here? Zuma ruthlessly brought his party to heel, subduing and isolating his political opponents. Then he built a patronage network of family, friends and business associates – powerful, corruptible political tenderpreneurs – who stopped at nothing to take control of state institutions and enterprises. State capture became Zuma’s brand – a maze of corruption so far-reaching that it has replaced many parts of government, causing irreparable damage to institutions, state enterprises, and the ANC itself. But it hasn’t all gone Zuma’s way. In a new era of activism, former political allies, public-minded civil servants, the media and the people have stepped forward to join the anti-Zuma groundswell. In the courts, too, the pressure has mounted against a bad president, who has become an enemy of the people. As a deeply divided ANC squares off for the party’s conference in December, journalists Adriaan Basson and Pieter du Toit offer an insightful, up-to-the-minute account of the Zuma era.

Adriaan Basson, Pieter Du Toit (Author), Charl Van Heyningen (Narrator)

Audiobook

Audiobooks Narrated by Charl Van Heyningen