Marko Saravanja THE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF SOUTH AFRICA: FROM MINERALS-ENERGY COMPLEX TO INDUSTRIALISATION by Ben Fine and Zavareh Rustomjee (Witwatersrand University Press, R89,95) If you want to know the present you must understand the past. Ben Fine and Zavareh Rustomjee (the director of the centre for economic policy for Southern Africa at the University of […]
THURSDAY, 4.00PM: ANGOLA’s Unita rebel movement has seized the small town of Piri on one of the main roads north-east of the capital, Luanda, raising the spectre of renewed civil war. The government reported on national radio that the Unita fighters took Piri on Tuesday, killing five people, following an initial assault on Sunday. The […]
WEDNESDAY, 4.00PM: THE investigation into the circumstances surrounding the air crash that killed Mozambican president Samora Machel 12 years ago took a new twist on Wednesday when a Mpumalanga scrapyard owner claimed that wreckage in the possesion of police did not come from Machel’s plane. African Eye News reports that Greg Duffey, of Duffey’s metal […]
MONDAY 6.30PM THE trial of former state president PW Botha, in the dock for refusing to respond to a subpoena from the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, was adjourned until August 17. Judgment is expected on August 18. At the resumption of the trial on Monday after a few days’ ajournment, the state prosecutor, Bruce Morrison, […]
FRIDAY, 5.30PM: THE Mozambican judge handling the case of detained foreign affairs official Robert McBride has been threatened by people he believes to be South African agents who have ordered him to nail McBride or ”otherwise you’ll be in trouble”. A reliable source has informed the Mail & Guardian that Judge Carlos Caetano, who has […]
MONDAY 6.30PM: THE rebels fighting in Guinea-Bissau said on Monday that they would be willing to end the revolt if President Joao Bernardo Vieira resigned. The rebellion broke out last week, triggered by the dismissal, for trafficking guns to Senegalese rebels, of Brigadier Ansuman Mane as defence force chief of staff. A spokesman for the […]
Our young sport stars have become role models for their fans, writes Bongani Siqoko They may not be big stars and big names in the league of Ronaldo, Mike Tyson or Tiger Woods yet, but they are certainly riding the crest of the wave in their chosen sports. They are still young and have a […]
In the hierarchy of crimes it is the murderer who is regarded with particular distaste and in the pantheon of murderers there is none who evokes quite as much horror as the poisoner. There is, therefore, something inevitable about the Truth and Reconciliation Commission winding up its work with the disclosure of a poisoning conspiracy […]
Bongani Siqoko Drunken men and women’s voices rise from the beer hall in Monyakeng township, Wesselbron, about 45km from Kroonstad in the Free State. Life seems normal, but the truth is the exact opposite. This community is grief-stricken and angry over the death of Lethusang Mohloane – whose only sin was to shoot birds on […]
Carlton Centre in downtown Johannesburg is flooded by hundreds of young people during weekends. They file around the circular ring at the entrance on the first floor where they peer admiringly at displays of shiny new BMWs two floors below. Others mill around the corridors, visiting shop windows and restaurants. The scene is repeated in […]