"The Spear" has been taken down

Ferial Haffajee, Editor of City Press, wrote an editorial explaining the paper's reasons for removing "The Spear".

In her statement, Ferial Haffajee, Editor of City Press, says that the painting "The Spear" was taken off the website out of care and as an olive branch to help turn the saga around and because of death threats she and her staff have received. You can read more about the statement here.
Haffajee has apologised to President Zuma's family and removed the picture of "The Spear" from City Press' website.

Haffajee's dilemma is a common one in business – how can leaders handle pressure from external forces? Buntu Potwana, a corporate motivational speaker at Cabanga Leadership and Skills Development, offers the following advice on how to best handle pressure from top management or outside forces:

1. Never set unreasonable targets for yourself
If you know a particular project will take you three or more days to complete, you must communicate that to your seniors. Most employees shoot themselves in the foot by always stating lesser days to complete the task than the feasible days. This will make you look incompetent to your management, because you will not submit on the date you mentioned. Just be straight on when you can complete the task.

2. Always begin with the urgent things
There are things that are very important, but you find that they are not urgent. Make sure that you don’t have a backlog of work on urgent issues. First things first.

3. Today’s work must be done today
One of the best ways to handle pressure is to complete your daily to-do list. You must be bothered if there are duties left undone. You must learn to get rid of pressure before it becomes pressure by completing your day-to-day duties.

4. Spread your load if you can
Ask for assistance. If you love doing everything yourself, you will later find yourself under immense pressure. Ask your colleagues to help you with some work. You will achieve a lot when you identify that you need extra hands. Individual success cause blisters in the long run.

5. If you can’t do a particular task, say so at the start so the leader can find someone else to do it.
Don’t keep loads of work in your drawer when you know very well that you won’t be able to do it. Selfishness will put big pressure on you. Let others do the project while you are still busy with something else. Don’t swallow everything, as you will choke.

Pressure is not a bad thing at all; it becomes a bad thing when you no longer see it as performance booster but as monster. “Don't let pressure stress you, but let it cultivate you. Take it easy and do your work right the first time," concludes Potwana.