THURSDAY, 12.30PM: WORLDWIDE demand for gold rose 16% last year as falling prices led to a higher demand for gold in jewellery, electronics and coin production. Total demand rose to 4 025 tons from the 1996 figure of 3 477 tons. The rise, however, was offset by record sales of above-ground gold by central banks, […]
Marion Edmunds The government is considering taking disciplinary action against an Eastern Cape public health specialist who last year suspended the use of a cheap Korean hepatitis B vaccine in 14 East London clinics because he doubted its efficacy. The head of the department of public health at Cecilia Makiwane Hospital, Dr Costa Gazi, said […]
FRIDAY, 4.30PM: THE Johannesburg Stock Exchange ended Friday 1% down amid continuing fears that Asian markets have not yet seen the end of their financial crisis. Dealers said sentiment was bearish, not only in South Africa, but on around the world, as investors are getting to grips with the impact on corporate earnings of the […]
He’s a white Californian with an internationalist musical style. Janet Smith speaks to guitarist Ry Cooder about his Cuban recordings An old man is dressed for the superb Havana afternoon: dazzling white shoes like ice- creams peeking out from his trouser bottoms; shimmering white hat slithered low over his brows. He lifts his hand to […]
Andrew Muchineripi : Soccer After the carefully selected, diplomatically correct words of Clive Barker, new Bafana Bafana coach Jomo Sono has hit the scene like a bolt of lightning from the blue. Sono resembles those gunslingers we worshipped as children at the bioscope. He walks with the same self-belief and is ready to let rip […]
Everyone involved in educating this country’s children, from Minister of Education Sibusiso Bengu to the most junior teacher, should be forced to sit an exam this week, a test containing a single question: define the word responsibility. If they can define it, they might wantto consider how the word applies tothemselves. For these people together […]
Robert Kirby : Loose cannon The Christmas hols done with, it’s time once again to reflect on how we did as a nation honouring this fine occasion. As of going to press, South Africa’s extermination road network was doing quite well in its disciplined attempt to outstrip last year’s carnage. With but a day or […]
FRIDAY, 4.30PM: SRI Lankan spinning pair Muttiah Murilitharan and Jayanatha Silva on Friday ripped apart the Zimbabwe batting in the first Test, keeping the visitors to a paltry 140 runs. This leaves the Zimbabweans with a deficit total of 329 runs. The woes of the Zimbabweans did not end, however, and at the close of […]
Mahluli Mngadi : In your ear Is Fine Music Radio (FMR) just a cosy club for white classical musical lovers masquerading as a community radio station? Station manager Leslie McKenzie vehemently disagrees. He tells me about the ”more handsome, genuine, less automatic sound” that FMR has been striving for. He quotes the station’s mission statement […]
The transistor was invented 50 years ago. Joanna Bawa reports on the significance of the device There were only nine days to go to Christmas but the two physicists had other things on their minds. Huddled secretively in a corner of their laboratory, John Bardeen and Walter Brattain were building a primitive device whose impact […]