Despite my forecast a few weeks ago that South Africa’s financial markets might have more going for them than last year’s dismal time, don’t be misled into thinking the “real” economy is in anything other than an unmitigated mess. If the effect of the financial sector is stripped out of the calculations which make up […]

David Shapshak The horse racing industry has been rocked with rumours that bookmakers tried to hobble Horse Chestnut, one of South Africa’s top horses and the hot favourite for this weekend’s J&B Met. The horse, owned and bred by Harry and Bridget Oppenheimer, almost had its legs broken two weeks ago. But security guards shot […]

THE New National Party’s legal challenge against a requirement that voters possess bar-coded identity documents in order to register began on Friday morning before a full bench of the Cape High Court. NNP legal adviser Andre Gaum said on Thursday that whatever the outcome, the matter is expected to be referred to the Constitutional Court […]

The Lexmark 1000 Color Jetprinter started irritating me when I unpacked it, because it came with a standard thick printer cable. I suppose I should be grateful – colleagues reviewing other Lexmark printers didn’t get any cables. This is rather like selling a toaster without a plug, only worse, as a printer cable costs a […]

to die for Evidence wa ka Ngobeni Vista University’s final 1998 examination results improved dramatically – and some lecturers admit this was after they received death threats from students. Lectures at the university’s five campuses were disrupted last year by a student boycott, and the final examinations were postponed for two weeks after students said […]

Evidence wa ka Ngobeni A man who was arrested on charges of stealing computers which were to be distributed to North-West province schools was robbed of the equipment before it could be recovered. Police are not able to explain why they did not take the computers – more than 900 of them valued at R12 […]

The appointment of Ramesh Vassen as consul general to Delhi could well be a turning point in the way our government handles corruption. Here we have a man with a criminal conviction – confirmed by the highest court in the land – a man who stole money, a man who was expelled from his own […]

THE KwaZulu-Natal provincial government may soon retrench redundant employees, Finance MEC Peter Miller said on Thursday. Miller said at a press conference that national government will soon release guidelines for retrenchments and severance packages. A process of job evaluation will begin in all departments to determine who gets the chop. About 83% of the 1998/99 […]

AMANDA Coetzer beat defending champion and top-seeded Lindsay Davenport of the United States 2-6 6-4 6-3 on Friday in the Toray Pan Pacific Open in Tokyo. The upset sees the seventh seeded South African advancing to the semi-finals — along with Australian Open champion Martina Hingis, who defeated Steffi Graf of Germany 3-6 6-2 6-4. […]

A friend with zero tolerance of nonsense points out that not a shred of credible evidence has yet been produced to support the view that a group of militant Muslims is responsible for the spate of evidently politically motivated bomb attacks in the Western Cape. He is right. The only support comes from inference drawn […]