AfricaIs aCountry

City Press

Africa Is a Country Podcast
African Five-a-Side Podcast

City Press

By
Sean Jacobs


A few years ago during bouts of insomnia, I used to imagine redesigning a newspaper, any newspaper. I’d always get stuck on the Johannesburg newspaper, City Press, historically aimed at black readers.  I hated their ugly design. (I wrote some freelance pieces for them in the early 1990s).  Now the paper is having a design face-over.  That’s the old design on the left and the new on the right. Link to the web page of the graphic designer, Peter Ong, responsible for the redesign.  (BTW, I think the redesign has a lot to do with the fact that it has a new editor, Ferial Haffajee, formerly editor of the Mail & Guardian).

For more on the redesign, see also Charles Apple‘s website as well as The Daily Maverick, which contains some errors.

* Nowadays when I have insomnia, I play computer games.

Further Reading

Atayese

Honored in Yorubaland as “one who repairs the world,” Jesse Jackson’s life bridged civil rights, pan-Africanism, empire, and contradiction—leaving behind a legacy as expansive as it was imperfect.

Bread or Messi?

Angola’s golden jubilee culminated in a multimillion-dollar match against Argentina. The price tag—and the secrecy around it—divided a nation already grappling with inequality.

Visiting Ngara

A redevelopment project in Nairobi’s Ngara district promises revival—but raises deeper questions about capital, memory, and who has the right to shape the city.

Gen Z’s electoral dilemma

Long dismissed as apathetic, Kenya’s youth forced a rupture in 2024. As the 2027 election approaches, their challenge is turning digital rebellion and street protest into political power.

A world reimagined in Black

By placing Kwame Nkrumah at the center of a global Black political network, Howard W. French reveals how the promise of pan-African emancipation was narrowed—and what its failure still costs Africa and the diaspora.

Securing Nigeria

Nigeria’s insecurity cannot be solved by foreign airstrikes or a failing state, but by rebuilding democratic, community-rooted systems of collective self-defense.