Grants for Investigative Reporting

The Henry Nxumalo Foundation gives grants to individuals and organisations to produce public interest investigative journalism of relevance to contemporary Southern Africa. We enable journalists to have the time and resources to undertake reporting that might not otherwise be done.
We operate three specialist non-profit virtual newsrooms to address areas of our society that need urgent attention: Our City News focuses on Johannesburg; The Education Desk probes the challenges facing our schooling system; XenoBarometer tracks the anti-immigrant movements and its impact.

Improve your local govt reporting skills

HNF, in partnership with SANEF and the ASISA Academy, is offering a four-part programme for journalists who want to develop and hone their local government reporting skills. The Journalism Masterclass Programme on Municipal Finance is free of charge and takes place in online 90-minute weekly sessions from October 27. You are welcome to attend selected sessions, but must attend them all to qualify for a certificate.

SA | AJP to make thematic calls

Our Southern African Accountability Journalism Project will be making thematic calls for proposals on particular topics in the near future. Subscribe to our newsletter to be kept informed of this and other opportunities. Meanwhile, we are open to any proposal for a good, investigative story that meets our guidelines.

Our Latest Stories

Union Street in Vereeniging. Potholes scar the road, dirt obscures what remains of the tarmac. Once thriving shops now struggle to survive. (Photo: Nathalie Bertrams)

The DA hammered the ANC in Emfuleni — the how and the why

Tristen Taylor 11 November 2026

The most important result of the 2026 municipal elections is in Gauteng, and it’s not Johannesburg, Tshwane or Ekurhuleni. While these metros are pivotal, what happened in Emfuleni Municipality, a place of nearly a million people and the heart of the Vaal Triangle, has the potential to be utterly transformational.

Lenasia South Extension 1 resident Preetham Mangar carries bottles of water along Liverpool Block in Johannesburg on 15 October 2026, highlighting the daily difficulties faced by households amid persistent water interruptions and unreliable supply. Despite ongoing infrastructure upgrades, residents continue to grapple with recurring pipe bursts, fluctuating water pressure and prolonged periods without water, raising questions about when the community will finally enjoy a dependable water supply. Photo: Globepost

Can South Africa’s Public Service Amendment Act deliver better governance in Johannesburg’s Deep South?

Shirley Govender 5 November 2026

Lenasia South Extension 1 resident Preetham Mangar carries bottles of water along Liverpool Block in Johannesburg on 15 October 2026, highlighting the daily difficulties faced by households amid persistent water interruptions and unreliable supply. Despite ongoing infrastructure upgrades, residents continue to grapple with recurring pipe bursts, fluctuating water pressure and prolonged periods without water, raising…

A man walks past a spaza shop displaying an EFF election poster in Goodwood, Cape Town, on 2 November 2026. Political parties have increasingly placed immigration enforcement at the centre of their local government election campaigns. Photograph: Shelley Christians/SA|AJP

Hard-line promises on immigration may be impossible for parties to fulfill after elections

Sean Christie 3 November 2026

XENOBAROMETER: Immigration is at the centre of many parties’ local government election campaigns. But most are making promises they cannot keep as the councils they are contesting do not have the power.

A 45-year-old Ugandan man suffered several injuries and was admitted to hospital in Durban on Wednesday, 21 October 2026, after a mob of March and March supporters attacked him. In a video of the attack, which circulated widely on social media, attackers are seen landing more than a dozen blows on the man in the space of 20 seconds. (Photo: Supplied / Source)

Ugandan man nearly killed by March and March mob speaks from hospital

Riley Singh 29 October 2026

A Ugandan man who was attacked by a mob of March and March supporters in Durban on Wednesday last week has described his brush with death from an Addington Hospital ward where he was recovering from his injuries.

March and March supporters protesting in Bellville in May 2026. Photo: Ashraf Hendricks/GroundUp

Ministers’ statements on R5-million visa rule weaponised against foreign traders

Lucas Nowicki 28 October 2026

Anti-immigrant protesters seeking to intimidate traders and shut down foreign-owned shops across South Africa have repeatedly invoked a misleading claim amplified by at least two government ministers in 2024.

Irene Molefe, founder and house mother at Power of Women and Children, and their liaison officer, Tom Fikiri, at the organisation’s premises in Tshepisong . Molefe must always have alternative plans in place for power outages, including candles for children to study after dark and firewood for cooking outside. (Photo: Leon Sadiki)

Disconnected from survival

Irene Chirobo 26 October 2026

When power and water go off, those who are dependent on their medical support systems count how long they can survive if they don’t come back up.

Spekboom doesn’t draw down more atmospheric carbon than other tree species in this tiny plant community. But it is a drought-tolerant succulent that’s easy to grow, even in badly degraded areas. Image by Leonie Joubert.

A new gold rush (Pt 5/5): Soil carbon: is SA’s novel spekboom restoration a new farming frontier

Leonie Joubert 26 October 2026

Mass-planting spekboom to repair damaged farmlands in the Eastern Cape, paid for through the carbon markets, got super-sized with the arrival of Global North investment. Could this mark a new era for African agriculture, where farming soil carbon replaces conventional crops?

90% of the Albany thicket plant is so badly damaged after decades of goat farming, that some of the land is good for nothing. Could farming with soil carbon revive a moribund rural economy? Image by Leonie Joubert.

A new gold rush (Pt 4/5): Can carbon-funded spekboom planting restore South Africa’s thicket?

Leonie Joubert 26 October 2026

Global finance is flowing into mass planting of the indigenous succulent, but ecologists disagree over how, and how soon, to judge whether the wider ecosystem will recover.

wethu Sibaya Clinic at the Denis Hurley Centre which is situated in the city centre of Durban, 19 October 2026. Photo: Rogan Ward/HNF

Durban’s Denis Hurley Centre clinic buckles under the pressure of xenophobia and medicines stockouts

Greg Ardé 21 October 2026

Amid a flood of desperate foreign nationals and a shortage of TB and HIV drugs, staff are now forced to turn away people who are ‘crying for life-saving medication’.

The Constitutional Court in Johannesburg, South Africa. The court on 7 July 2026 upheld a ruling striking down provisions of the Refugees Act that restricted access to the asylum system.. Photo: Ashraf Hendricks/GroundUp

What the Constitutional Court judgment on asylum actually said

Sean Christie 15 October 2026

March and March’s portrayal of a Constitutional Court judgment as a radical change to immigration law fueled days of violent anti-immigrant protests in Durban, Soweto and outside the court itself. But a close reading shows that the ruling was more complicated than that.

Primary school kids playing on their way home from school. Photo: Calvin Manika

Illegal private schools proliferate in Harare, despite government ultimatum

Calvin Manika 14 October 2026

Eight months after Zimbabwe’s deadline for illegal and unregistered schools to regularise or close, schools operating without formal registration remain open in Epworth, Harare. This includes institutions that have also received closure or enforcement notices from the Epworth Local Board (ELB), local authority governing the settlement.

Rodric Tore shows his healing scars after doctors removed a metal piece out of his body in Highfield, Harare, Zimbabwe on 06 May 2026. Photograph Enos Denhere / SA I AJP

Workers accuse company of serious breaches after life-threatening blast at Harare scrap yard

Enos Denhere 14 October 2026

Six months after an explosion seriously injured workers at a Harare scrap metal company, questions remain over whether Rungs Mining Products and the National Social Security Authority (NSSA) fulfilled their legal duties.

Reproducing Our Stories: We welcome the reproduction and republication of our stories in the interest of wider public access to quality journalism. If you are interested in republishing any of our work, please contact us in advance to request permission and discuss the appropriate terms of use.

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