THURSDAY, 8.30AM: SIPHIWE NYANDA, former chief of staff of Umkhonto weSizwe, is to take over as chief of the SA Defence Force in June, following the resignation of General Georg Meiring. Nyanda, who will be promoted to full general, faces the mammoth task of uniting white and black soldiers who, until 1994, were bitter foes. […]
WEDNESDAY, 1.30PM: ENROLMENTS at South African tertiary institutions have dropped some 21% this year compared to last year, with former “bush universities” worst hit, while student numbers at traditionally white universities actually rose over the same period. The University of Zululand registered a 21% fall in registration, the University of the North an 18% drop, […]
TUESDAY, 12.00NOON: THE Cabinet is set to discuss a series of proposed “legacy projects” intended to redress the portrayal of South Africa’s history, with a Freedom Park as the flagship project. The Freedom Park will focus on the themes of democracy, nation-building and the liberation struggle, and will house monuments, museums and galleries to the […]
Mail & Guardian reporter The crusading journalist John Pilger set a cat among the pigeons of South African complacency this week with his hour-long documentary Apartheid Did Not Die, on what he represented as a betrayal of the liberation cause by the African National Congress. The documentary was broadcast in prime-time by the SABC, but […]
Charl Blignaut On stage in Johannesburg It seems to me there are two particularly compelling reasons to stage a tribute to Gibson Kente in 1998. In the first place, it’s about bloody time. We need, for the record, to preserve a body of work such as Kente’s in case we forget. Secondly, it’s a rare […]
Wonder Hlongwa The widows of two prominent African National Congress leaders in the KwaZulu-Natal Midlands are seeking legal advice to sue Inkatha Freedom Party members implicated in their husbands’ murders. They say they are not satisfied with the quality of the evidence submitted to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s amnesty committee. Thobekile Maphumulo and Sbongile […]
Claire Robertson Jacques Pauw once wrote of Ferdi Barnard that his head “hopped like a rubber ball on his broad shoulders” while he smoked a crack cocaine pipe and confessed to killing Dr David Webster. That was some three years ago, when Barnard – a convicted killer, former narcotics policeman and dirty-tricks operative – was […]
Andy Capostagno Tennis It’s just possible that you may have been lured into the belief that there is a tennis tournament going on in Johannesburg this week. Six of the finest players in women’s tennis are battling it out for $200 000 in prize money and you can witness all the action for as little […]
FRIDAY, 8.30AM: LOW-KEY Gerald Morkel became the most powerful coloured person in the National Party when he defeated his flamboyant opponent Peter Marais on Thursday night to become party leader in the Western Cape, the last remaining NP stronghold. But Morkel’s first few hours of power gave him little chance to savour his success: First, […]
FRIDAY, 5.00PM: THOUSANDS of Rwandans gathered in the capital Kigali to witness the execution of four people convicted of inciting acts of genocide in the 1994 massacre of almost a million Tutsis. Another 18 prisoners were executed by firing squad in four other outlying towns. Preparations for the executions of three men and one women […]