John Naughton There is a saying in the computer business that “only the paranoid survive”. The man who has taken it most to heart is Microsoft’s Bill Gates. The pace of change in the computing industry is such that if you blink you might not spot the threat. Gates blinked spectacularly in 1994, when Netscape […]

Residents of De Buldt in the Karoo now have the resources to rebuild their homes, writes Tara Turkington At the end of a long dirt road in the barren Karoo lies a place where residents defied apartheid, and got away with it. Although now almost a ruin, a major award has given it a brighter […]

Chiara Carter and Marianne Merten A legend who lived a fast life and died a hard death is the inevitable epitaph for slain Cape Town gang leader Jackie Lonte. Lonte – born Neville Heroldt -scripted his life like a B-grade gangster movie and mythologised himself in a city where his gang, the Americans, has resonance […]

Andrew Muchineripi : Soccer It was not a pretty sight for those wearing black and white. Orlando Pirates, who had not lost to Kaizer Chiefs since the Premier Soccer League was formed two years ago, were being teased and tormented. There were 15 minutes left in the first leg of the Rothmans Cup semi-final, Chiefs […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Johannesburg | Friday 11.50pm. THE Transvaal attorney-general’s office is currently investigating possible tampering with evidence from the plane crash that killed Mozambican president Samora Machel by former security police chief General Krappies Engelbrecht. The investigation could lead to a prosecution. Engelbrecht is one of several apartheid-era generals being scrutinised by the special investigation […]

Creating an “inner policeman” was how Minister of Justice Dullah Omar described the moral code South Africans needed to develop if corruption was to be weeded out. Given the extent of the rot in the justice system as well as other government departments, Omar’s metaphor was less than apt, but delegates to this week’s government […]

Justin Arenstein The African National Congress used taxpayers’ money to fund at least one of its provincial congresses in Mpumalanga in 1996. The party also appears to have actively courted the Mpumalanga Parks Board for cash donations totalling more than R105 000 and sponsorship of T-shirts, caps and satchels. The allegations, which are being probed […]

Fiona Macleod Riccardo Ghiazza, the animal dealer at the centre of the furore about the export of 30 baby elephants from the Tuli bushlands, sold two African elephants to pop idol Michael Jackson in 1993. Jackson is listed by the United States Fisheries and Wildlife as one of the American clients who have bought more […]

appeasement “The only defence that can be offered is that the issue was intensely debated by the commission, which ultimately succumbed to the fears of those who argued that Buthelezi’s appearance would give him a platform from which to oppose the commission and would stoke the flames of violence in KwaZulu-Natal, as indeed he himself […]

Philip Machanick Just when you thought it safe to use the Internet, junk mail sharks have started to bite. What’s more, they’re made of spam. Thanks to “bulk mail e-mail lists”, millions of users of the Internet can be hit at once with unwanted mail, selling anything from porn to more bulk e-mail lists. Sellers […]