Gary Younge : BODY LANGUAGE Not for the first time the spirit of the United States Declaration of Independence and the rule of the American Constitution are at loggerheads. The founding fathers said everyone had the right to the “pursuit of happiness”. Now the state of Alabama has told women they have no “fundamental, constitutional […]
Ted Leggett The Gauteng police media liaison officers recently released a statement of support for a directive issued by National Commissioner George Fivaz earlier this year. This directive admonishes police officers to “refrain from making unauthorised and unguarded statements to the media”, and to direct press inquiries to media liaison. This kind of policy, Fivaz […]
THE DAVID GLEASON COLUMN Believe me when I tell you that, for small businesspeople, the thing that counts most is the interest rate. I wrote about this last week, but it is such an important matter it needs to be addressed again. Interest rates determine how consumers behave; they set the pattern of spending. If […]
Michael Finch : Athletics If the double “MJ” show doesn’t pack out the Ruimsig stadium in Roodepoort tonight, then Athletics South Africa (ASA) is faced with a crisis. Just the mere presence of the fastest man and fastest woman on earth, Michael Johnson and Marion Jones, in the second of the three-leg Engen Grand Prix […]
Ian Clayton South Africa’s poorest provinces have the most civil servants, it was revealed in Parliament this week. There are more civil servants in the Northern Province – 119 465 – than there are in Gauteng – 112 851 – although Gauteng has 2,4-million more residents. The Northern Province has 25 civil servants for every […]
THE descendants of Saartjie Baartman, the Khoikhoi woman known as the Hottentot Venus, have given a French museum until July to return her remains to South Africa, SABC TV news reported. Baartman was displayed as a freak in Europe at the turn of the century until she died in Paris at the age of 25. […]
Deon Potgieter : Boxing WBA , WBC, IBF, WBO, WBU, IBA, WBF and so forth. Looking at all the different world title sanctioning bodies, things are getting pretty confusing for fight fans. Terry Pettifer, Golden Gloves publicist, coined the phrase: “It’s the alphabet soup of world boxing” and indeed that’s what it seems to be. […]
Ferial Haffajee : TAKING STOCK >From the Top of Africa we look down on one of the continent’s largest cities. Johannesburg. At the top of the Carlton Centre (now called the Top of Africa), the city looks like a mini-land. Cars rush about on highways that criss-cross the city linking Sandton in the north with […]
THE police have proposed that a special court be set up to hear cases involving crimes against tourists, a spokesperson for the police crime prevention unit said on Thursday. Unit director Piet van Rensburg said perpetrators often get off free because victims are back in their own countries by the time the assailants appear in […]
ONE of President Nelson Mandela’s nephews, Reverend Daliwonga Mandela, is to establish a branch of the New National Party at Motherwell, near Port Elizabeth. NNP MP Dr Manie Schoeman said in Parliament on Thursday that Reverend Mandela had resigned from the African National Congress in 1990 and has now decided to join the NNP. Said […]