AT least 45 people were killed when a bus plunged off a bridge in eastern Kenya on Thursday night. About 27 people survived the accident, the second transport disaster to hit Kenya in a week, but the death toll was expected to rise to at least 50. The bus, with an official capacity of 65, […]

FORMER South African president Nelson Mandela was holding intensive talks in Tanzania in a last-minute bid to bridge deep gaps among Burundi’s warring political factions. With only one day left before a historic power-sharing deal is due to be signed, he was pressing all sides to overcome their differences. Tanzanian officials in Arusha said Mandela […]

NAMIBIAN security forces have arrested 33 Angolans suspected of being agents of the rebel Unita movement since the beginning of the year, says Namibian Police Chief Inspector Moses Hawanga. The arrests took place in a series of security ”clean-up” operations in the Kavango region near the Angolan border where police claim more than 50 civilians […]

The Human Rights Commission has completed its quest to find racism in the media Howard Barrell, Evidence wa ka Ngobeni and Jaspreet Kindra Two years after starting an inquiry into alleged racism in, first, the Mail & Guardian and the Sunday Times and, then, the entire media, the Human Rights Commission (HRC) has produced a […]

Barry Streek Provincial land MECs were given a direct lesson last week on the implementation of land reform in Zimbabwe after Minister of Agriculture and Land Affairs Thoko Didiza invited them to a meeting to discuss the realities of farmer settlement. Professor Sam Moyo addressed the MECs on land reform and farm settlement in Zimbabwe […]

Fiona Macleod Insurance tycoon and sometimes funder of the African National Congress leadership Douw Steyn is spending millions of rands on putting down roots in a private game reserve in the Northern Province. Steyn, founder of Auto & General Insurance, was friendly with the ruling party’s top leaders in the early 1990s before he moved […]

Thebe Mabanga in your ear The complaint that local music does not receive sufficient airplay is so old it has moral fatigue. The call has been made at various platforms by everyone in the music industry and an attempt to improve the situation has led to initiatives like South African Music Week (August 28 to […]

communist Dale McKinley Crossfire I have been expelled from the South African Communist Party for being a committed, critical communist. That is really the gist behind the SACP central committee’s decision to throw me out of the ranks of the organisation, no matter the cleverly argued rationalisations presented by Jeremy Cronin (“Setting the ‘free thinker’ […]

Robert Kirby CHANNELVISION Recently BBC World ran a documentary that I sincerely wish someone would shove down the throats of Mr Ronnie Kasrils, Mr Jeremy Cronin and any other latter-day commies they can find. Called Mission to Moldova, the documentary told the story of a voluntary United Kingdom charity aid convoy bringing three large pantechnicons […]