Krisjan Lemmer With less than a year to go before the centenary of the Anglo-Boer War, there has been muttering in the Dorsbult Bar about the belated discovery by the Brits that Lord Herbert Kitchener, the war hero, was a bit of a cad. The BBC’s Reputations series appears to have stumbled upon the fact […]
Ferial Haffajee The title might be A Grave Called Home if the homeless who make their shelters in city graveyards could sell their script to a movie-maker. Their stories range from the macabre and heart-wrenching to the downright comical – like that of the squatter couple who made headlines last week when they were spotted […]
Andy Capostagno Rugby When Geoff Cooke was England’s coach in the glory days of the late 1980s and early 1990s, he had a phrase that used to come out whenever journalists believed that a player had been unfairly discarded. “The graveyards are full of indispensable men,” he would say. It is interesting to speculate whether […]
unrest Mail & Guardian reporters The army weapon and ammunition heists in Bloemfontein may have been intended to fuel instability in Lesotho. This scenario was flighted by security experts this week as police made their first arrests. Lesotho has been racked by protests since claims by opposition parties that the ruling Lesotho Congress for Democracy […]
Phillip Kakaza Jazz A brand-new Cosac Jazz Inn, in the heart of Yeoville, Johannesburg, promises to bring back some vibrancy to Rockey Street, an area doomed as a hideout for the “lost generation”. It’s a controversial street that, through the years, saw many such clubs fading away, leaving jazz enthusiasts floating around in search of […]
Tim Radford A heredity that helps some mountaineers breathe easily at Everest heights and keeps young soldiers at peak fitness could soon answer questions about heart disease and stroke. A team of British scientists revealed last week that in life’s genetic poker game, they may have identified the Ace hand for athletes. Ace stands for […]
ruins Amid Renamo ruins At sunrise, Chief Nchiri invokes the ancestors. Sitting with the chief around a sacred pakassa tree are seven men, barefoot and bare-chested. Nchiri has a white cloth draped around his waist. Nchiri explains to the ancestors that builders from Beira want to demolish the ruined houses of Maringu. Many people died […]
Despite economic crises, there’s money to be made on the stock exchange, writes Mark Allix Following the plunge of the Thai baht in July last year, the volatility on global stock exchanges is starting to take on biblical proportions – particularly the hellfire-and-brimstone warnings of the Old Testament variety. The 10th Commandment on covetousness and […]
David Beresford It was one of those definitive moments in South African history, a moment that Eugene de Kock had long been waiting for. His five heavily armed bodyguards had taken up nervous positions around the courtroom. PW Botha was sitting in a well-padded chair, placed next to the dock in vague acknowledgement that he […]
Know your Mark Hughes from your Marcuse? With the World Cup less than a week away, even the intellectuals are muscling in on the beautiful game. Peter Lennon reports Predictably French philosophers, sociologists and literary critics are muscling in on the World Cup, peddling their cinq sous worth on the origins, motivation and significance of […]