Fownhope’s Heart of Oak Society traces its roots to the age of friendly societies, when communities provided their own safety net. Its anniversary celebrations reveal a tradition still very much alive, says MARK SEDDON
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A salute to the comrades of music and struggle
Chris Searle reviews 4 Blokes by the Louis Moholo-Moholo Quartet (Ogun)
ANGUS REID explains the significance of Cuba’s egalitarian in letter and spirit Family Code and the pertinent lessons it holds for democracies anywhere in the world
Special report by PEOPLE’S WORLD
NICK WRIGHT considers how the isolation of Israel and a new film on the controversial Italian communist leader are creating new reference points for Italy’s left
CARLOS MARTINEZ says Cuba’s achievements in the face of a criminal blockade are startling, but the island’s future if the United States succeeds in crushing it looks bleak
AMNON BROWNFIELD STEIN reports that far-right MPs who mobbed the event organised by Hadash may have helped raise awareness of the brutality of the Israeli right
It is now 40 years since Hazel Miller and her husband, the great Johannesburg-born bassist Harry Miller, founded Ogun Records.
Hazel says that the Ogun label was necessary “to get this music out there,” to enable listeners everywhere to hear this South African sound that was so central to the people’s struggles against apartheid and the creation of a new South Africa.
“None of the big commercial labels were interested,” she says. “We needed Ogun so much to keep alive the sounds of our friends in exile from South Africa and their friends over here.
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