Mungo Soggot The offshore branch of embattled mining company Amalia is still enthusiastically punting the company’s London listing, trumpeting its exclusive deal to exploit Liberia’s mineral wealth – despite the fact Liberia has threatened to kill the deal. “It’s a $750-million deal – their main asset. It’s theirs unless there is a coup. Nobody can […]
with the times People who got themselves classified coloured in the old days are switching back – to black, writes Angella Johnson Once upon a time in the old South Africa it was considered infinitely preferable to be coloured rather than black. At least that was what Frank Makoba’s family thought when they opted to […]
Brett Davidson William Smith’s Learning Channel on SABC3 is probably one of the best-known educational programmes on television and one of the most controversial among educators. In its early days on TV, Smith’s channel incorporated hundreds of hours of recorded material, aimed at enlivening the learning experience, and helping students see the relevance of what […]
Bongani SiqokoHuman Rights Day Speech-making politicians and music groups turning air into sound will compete for attention in Sharpeville at this weekend’s commemoration of the Sharpeville massacre in 1960. Youth development and cultural education are firmly on the Human Rights Day a genda of the township-based Ideas Exchange International (IEI). IEI executive director Nicho Ntema […]
Mungo Soggot Don Mkhwanazi, the state oil chief under investigation for receiving “kickbacks”, enjoyed special acknowledgement from Deputy President Thabo Mbeki at a public gathering last weekend. Mbeki’s office has confirmed he turned to Mkhwanazi during his speech and said the businessman was “looking good despite what the Mail & Guardian has written about him”. […]
Mungo Soggot The Pretoria High Court has slapped a temporary interdict on Klerksdorp police who allegedly beat and tortured a robbery suspect. Eric Tshabalala, who has been awaiting trial since his arrest in January, says he was beaten and tortured with electric shocks. His lawyers from the Wits University Law Clinic say he has visible […]
Martin Kettle in Washington The city of Louisville in Kentucky boasts possibly the world’s only statue of Louis XVI of France – in honour of the man from whom it takes its name. It is doubly odd to find a statue of the last of the Bourbons in the middle of a mid-western state becau […]
FRIDAY, 6.00PM: THE Johannesburg Stock Exchange ended down on Friday, pressured by futures trade and profit taking. The all gold index wound down 6,4 points to 679,9, the industrial index 51,7 points to 8515,2, and the financial index 122,9 points to 13234,1. The all share index finished down 64,8 points at 7179,7. Around 130,328-million shares […]
‘Ma’am,” said John Edas with a dramatic pause, “motor racing is lily white. At Motor Sport South Africa there is only one person of colour – and that’s me.” The members of the parliamentary committee on sport and recreation looked on grimly as they pondered the difficulties of making motor racing a sport befitting the […]
Robert Kirby: LOOSE CANNON I see The Great Professor Jay Naidoo is up to his Indian rope tricks again. Should racist-bashers bulge to the previous sentence, let rest. I use the term, Indian rope trick, in its flattering sense. As a part-time magician, I have only praise for illusi ons that both delight and confuse. […]