UREGENT moves were afoot on Thursday to get the Sierra Leone national soccer team to travel to Nigeria for this weekend’s World Cup qualifier against the Super Eagles, sports ministry officials said. The statement came a day after the team refused to board the helicopter which should have taken them to the country’s international airport […]

Fuel shortages, roadblocks, hijackings and intimidation are all part of daily life in Harare. Mercedes Sayagues reports I returned to Harare after two weeks in Latin America and found a city that lives in fear. Many – I am one – fear when the needle on the fuel indicator drops below half a tank. Grief, […]

The United States’s biggest selling soundtracks of all time: 1 The Bodyguard (1992, $16-million). Spawned the monster/monstrous I Will Always Love You plus four other hits, now all back with a vengeance on Whitney Houston’s current No 1 Greatest Hits set. The United States’s ninth-biggest-selling album of all time. 2 Saturday Night Fever (1977, $15- […]

WORLD Cup qualifiers being played in Africa this weekend. Group A At Luanda: Angola v Zambia At Tripoli: Libya v Cameroon Bye: Togo Group B At Lagos: Nigeria v Sierra Leone At Omdurman: Sudan v Liberia Bye: Ghana Group C At Annaba: Algeria v Senegal At Windhoek: Namibia v Morocco Bye: Egypt Group D At […]

The leader of the notorious vigilante organisation Mapogo a Matamaga is fighting to keep his position Evidence wa ka Ngobeni A crisis meeting called by the head of South Africa’s largest vigilante group got off to a bad start last weekend when the group struggled for three hours to gain access to the community centre […]

Evidence wa ka Ngobeni Mapogo a Matamaga, the vigilante organisation that has attracted 40 000 members for its practice of sjamboking suspected criminals, has started a professional security firm in a bid to go mainstream. Unlike the main organisation, Mapogo a Matamaga Security Services, which plans to expand its area of operation from the Northern […]

The bulk of the New National Party favours a closer relationship with the ANC Howard Barrell and Barry Streek The Democratic Party and ruling African National Congress are engaged in a tug of war to win over the bulk of the collapsing New National Party. Whichever way the NNP leadership decides to go looks likely […]

Gregory Mthembu-Salter Rwandan forces claimed victory against Uganda in Kisangani last Sunday after a week of heavy fighting. Kisangani’s electricity and water supply has been crippled and residents lack sanitation and food. Thousands have been leaving the city on foot, carrying whatever possessions they can. The latest fighting broke out despite an agreement, brokered in […]

Johannesburg, once a beautiful woman, has become an ugly old harlot. Bongani Madondo walks the streets of a filthy city and mourns his lost love It’s a freezing Wednesday at 7am when I decide to board a taxi – one of those rickety jalopies promising to break apart in the middle of the road while […]

AN Ethiopian delegation will head to Algiers to sign a ceasefire agreement brokered by the Organisation of African Unity on Sunday. An Ethiopian government official said that the delegation would likely be at the ministerial level. After claiming further military gains Wednesday, Ethiopia officially accepted the OAU plan which Eritrea had already agreed to in […]