There was occasion for thanksgiving this week, on the release from Mozambique’s Machave prison of Robert McBride, although there is something of a puzzle as to who should be thanked. Not the African National Congress, few members of which turned up at Johannesburg International airport to welcome him home and thereby claim the credit. Under […]

Julienne du Toit There are few things that strike fear into the heart of an environmentalist faster than high-speed industrialisation in remote, beautiful areas. Spatial Development Initiatives (SDIs) have been planned on and near some of the finest beauty spots. So the response of many environmentalists and environmental organisations has ranged between outrage and mistrust, […]

Ferial Haffajee The production house Urban Brew will not take its new-look breakfast television show for SABC2 to air as planned. The launch date has been delayed by at least a fortnight, reportedly because Urban Brew is not yet ready to broadcast. The breakfast contract is the SABC’s most lucrative. Worth R40-million, the pitch for […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Pretoria | Tuesday 3.20pm. A TELEPHONE conversation between apartheid spy Craig Williamson and suspended foreign affairs official Robert McBride on Friday dominated Williamson’s Truth and Reconciliation Committee’s amnesty hearing in Pretoria. In a bizarre turn of events, a tape submitted by counsel for the Slovo and Schoon families contained, alongside a recording of […]

Tony Twine According to the cautionary tale, Goldilocks may well have been the archetypal consumer who fell foul of a bear trend. In search of that elusive economic entity, a free lunch (or was it breakfast?), she unleashed a sequence of events which left her at the mercy of the bears – quite a depressing […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Cape Town | Thursday 9.00pm. A NEW special investigating unit is to be set up to concentrate on gangs and organised crime, Justice Minister Dullah Omar announced on Thursday. A unit focusing on gang-related activity and violence in the Western Cape will begin operations immediately, he told a press conference in Cape Town. […]

The United Nations last week called for urgent action to raise the living standards of the world’s poor after disclosing that a billion people have been left out of the consumption boom of the past two decades. In its annual Human Development Report, the UN said gross inequalities between rich and poor countries were getting […]

Max Hamata and Thokozani Mtshali The flesh trade has found a niche on campuses across South Africa, but not because students are impoverished and battling to pay fees. Peer pressure to wear the latest brand of clothing and carry the smallest cellphone has prompted many young women into selling their bodies. A 23-year-old third-year business […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Cape Town | Friday7.00am. WESTERN Cape attorney-general Frank Kahn on Friday indicated he would not accept assault charges laid by either of the two MPs involved in Thursday evening’s punch-up in Parliament, because he has no jurisdiction over the institution. Speaker Dr Frene Ginwala has full jurisdiction over any offence committed in Parliament, […]

Alan Henry : Formula One Last weekend Italy was on strike. For two hours on Sunday afternoon the entire nation was infected with an epidemic of scarlet fever, rendering them unable to move away from their television and radio sets. The focus of the nation’s devotion was Monza, a 5,76km loop of tarmac in the […]