Thank you for reading with us this year
We close 2025 with notebooks full and the work still urgent. This year we stood in places where power rarely stands. We reported on Riverside families living beside sewage without toilets or running water. We stood in Dunoon as residents protested when brick homes in Ezihagwini were demolished and rebuilt from rubble and refusal. We documented families forced to pay five rand to use chemical toilets. We told how a man, after nineteen years on the housing waiting list, decided to build his own brick home on occupied land rather than wait in limbo any longer. We recorded how a neglected park in Dunoon was reclaimed and made safe again for children. We reported claims of a young man allegedly assaulted by an off duty police officer. These were not press releases or staged photographs. They were the lives of ordinary people written so they cannot be denied.
We publish knowing journalism forces movement. When Iliso Labantu reports, water trucks arrive, drains get cleared and officials answer what they once ignored. We do not write for sympathy. We write because neglect thrives in silence and truth only matters when used.
This year we applied to the Digital News and Transformation Fund. Our proposal was acknowledged for editorial strength and public interest grounding. It was judged ambitious and funding was not granted. The decision stung but did not stop us. Journalism does not end when money does. Silence is a luxury our communities cannot afford.
We pause now for the festive season and prepare for what comes next. Our first print edition of 2026 will publish Tuesday 13 January. Until then our website and digital platforms remain active for ongoing updates and new developments.
Thank you for reading us. Thank you for trusting us. We return in January steady, present and unafraid.
We will keep reporting. You keep watching.