Riveting piece of journalism in this weekend’s New York Times Magazine as well as an accompanying video piece (narrated by correspondent Barry Bearak) on the ordinary murder of a Zimbabwean migrant and widespread mob “justice” in Diepsloot, a squatter camp to the north of Johannesburg. The piece is generally good. As one friend remarked: “To his credit, he’s clearly made an effort at getting to know Diepsloot and writing a good story. It just had a whiff of Rian Malan‘s ‘Hammerman’ tale towards the end, with the white man’s discovery of and fascination with muti, etcetera. But it is generally good, and didn’t stray into laziness.”
It is an improvement on the nonsense he wrote on the elections. Incidentally, Sean, have you read Mngxitama’s review of Anton Harber’s Diepsloot, in the M&G?