While disaster is not yet imminent, farmers would do well to hedge their bets, reports Madeleine Wackernagel The Maize Board has been disbanded, but some old farming habits are taking longer to die. El Ni–o will be the big test, says Rod Gravelet-Blondin, general manager of the agricultural markets division at the South African Futures […]
Justin Arenstein in Nelspruit Mpumalanga’s provincial government “ran out of patience” with its former high-rolling government consultant, Ntsoaki Mohapi, this week and asked South Africa’s most powerful investigation body, the Heath Special Investigative Unit, to extract the R220 000 she owes the government. Mohapi paid herself the money, at a rate of R15 000 a […]
Gaye Davis A hoax letter “signed” by Professor Cecil Abrahams, rector of the University of the Western Cape (UWC), nearly put a spoke in the wheels of the selection of a new vice- chancellor for Witwatersrand University this week. The letter, received by chair of the Wits council, Judge Fikile Bam, and circulated by him […]
FRIDAY, 11.30AM: IT has emerged that US-based Dow chemical Company mopped up batches of Sentrachem shares on the open market before announcing its offer this week to buy the local chemicals group for R10,50 a share. It is also believed that SBC Warburg, which is advising Dow on the deal, brokered a sale of 2,3-million […]
their leaders Beata Lipman It’s a funny old world. There we are, interviewing Jessie Duarte, Minister of Safety and Security for Gauteng, on rampant police corruption. She sounds off strongly. Then we interview a guy called Wilfrid Scharf from Cape Town for SABC television and he tells us politicians must do more than talk. After […]
THE ANGELLA JOHNSON INTERVIEW `You’re not wanting to talk about that driving licence thing, are you?” questioned Ina, the formidable secretary for Baleka Mbete-Kgositsile, when I requested an interview with her boss. “If you are, then I’ll stand six feet tall to protect her. The whole thing has been blown totally out of proportion.” Well, […]
and justice A dossier that Richard Motasi painstakingly built to prove his assault case did not bring him justice. But it captured the imagination of writer John Miles, who told his story In 1988, author John Miles was given, by Lawyers for Human Rights, a Checkers packet filled with documentation relating to the case of […]
Slowly, slowly, Brenda Fassie, the original South African pop diva, seems to be finding her feet again. Charl Blignaut joins her in the studio where she’s recording a new album Over the years, I have come to the conclusion that there is no way to write a Brenda interview without its being personal. That’s because […]
Janet Smith Anand Naidoo’s final appearance as a news anchor on the SABC will be on August 22, a few weeks before he becomes part of the slick CNN International media machine run by Time Warner chair Gerald Levin and vice- chair Ted Turner. Naidoo leaves his high-visibility post on the English bulletins of the […]
Melvyn Minnaar: Moveable Feast The latest welcoming arrival drink at yuppie dinner parties in fashionable areas has its roots deep in terra Africana and with-it hosts gloat with pride over their find as patriotic gulps immediately kick life into the event and the spirits rise. Yes, witblits is back and becoming respectable. South Africa’s own […]