Welcome to the new and improved The Common Sense. We took the data from the months since our founding to understand what readers like and what they don’t, and the result is what you see here – we don’t think there’s anything nicer in the domestic media landscape, and it’s up there with the best news and analysis sites in the world.

Our readers seem to value it when we explain what’s going on. So, that is the mission now captured in our new slogan: We Make South Africa Make Sense. It’s not hard. Just have the data and interpret it, and the answers to what is happening, why it is happening, and what will happen next fall into place.

A big part of that is polling. The Common Sense has joined up with the Social Research Foundation (which called the 2024 election result to within a percentage point) to make all those data available via this platform. Serious users and major institutions still get direct support, help, and numbers from the SRF, as they always did. Check out the new dedicated polling section of this site.

Part of our mission from day one was to stress the “bridge issues” that unite South Africans, not the “wedge issues” that divide them. The poll data helps us do that best because it shows, as it always has, that eight in 10 South Africans share a common bond of decent Judeo-Christian values.

We did that last week when the most scurrilous nonsense was parroted in the media about the new American ambassador. That sort of thing does real damage to a country and sows division, fear, hate, and suspicion. It’s a big part of why South Africa has not struck a trade deal with the US. We’re sick of that sort of thing, and we are calling it out.

The economic analysis, from Bheki Mahlobo, has been very precise on the rand, inflation, interest rates, growth, and investment. If you’ve followed his calls, not much would have happened in the economy that caught you by surprise.

And, off the record, many of the politicians have dropped by to see what we are all about, which is of course a two-way street. We are there to give them a fair and transparent platform from which to talk – as was the case for John Steenhuisen last week when he said an editorial calling for his sacking had got it wrong. Our YouTube star Gabriel Makin (the prettiest host of a YouTube channel anywhere, his fans profess) put John on to set out that The Common Sense had got it wrong.

The Common Sense is also becoming a bit think-tanky. Today saw the release of our first Special Report, which sets out six scenarios for the war in Iran, together with their currency and market implications. There is no better quality geo-strategic analysis available anywhere in the world. Further reports are in the pipeline, including one that explains that farmers in South Africa are at much greater risk of attack than the rest of the population – and that includes black farmers too. Another looks at the extent to which legacy media companies have run false news reports about racism. A third examines the relationship between firearm ownership and crime in South Africa, making the case that stricter gun laws will make the country more dangerous than it already is.

Part of the refit means that subscription to The Common Sense is now a thing. With an email address, you get all the free content. For R99/month, you get all the content. For R349/month, you become part of the family and help us build a new media company dedicated to the success of the country. We will soon be hosting our first town-halls for members where they can put their questions directly to our writers and analysts.

The list of columnists writing for us has also expanded. RW Johnson is our big fish. We have Richard Tren, who heads the Yorktown Foundation for Freedom in Washington, DC, on board. So too James Myburgh, who heads the European BRE-DE-RE think tank – and who wrote the most brilliant analysis of the ANC’s historical relationship with Iran last week. Greg Mills and Ray Hartley appear this week (and we hope they will keep appearing). Simon Lincoln Reader has transplanted himself from London to California (swapping Starmer for Newsom?) and will keep writing from there. Koos Malan is extraordinary, as his recent piece on the Paleo-Western Renaissance and Munich Security Conference again showed. David Ansara at the Free Market Foundation writes weekly and was excellent on the new American ambassador this week. Frans Cronje is in the pack. And then there is Benji Shulman, who runs the Middle East Africa Research Institute and has done such fascinating and important research on terror links between Africa and the Middle East.

What would make The Common Sense happy? South Africa is such an amazing country with such amazing people. They’re the greatest people with the greatest values. The potential – as set out in Frans Cronje’s op-ed last night – is to be one of the greatest emerging markets in the world. And it can be that. And that is the greatest tragedy in the world – there is absolutely no reason why 30 years after democracy, millions of people live in horrifying poverty with no jobs, no homes, no assets, and no means to ensure that their children will have good lives. Here, we cannot live with that – and it must change. But the country is not changing because of poor analysis of what is happening and why, wrongheaded policies, and the populist sowing of hate. It would make us happy if a reader told us we had helped to change that by providing the best data and analysis from which to explain what was really happening and why, using understanding to advocate for what must be done to crush poverty and build a middle-class future, and all the way to calling out the hate-mongering that, if left unchecked, poses such a risk to the future of all South Africa’s people.