track Madeleine Wackernagel : TAKING STOCK Mahathir Mohamed, the Malaysian premier, was right in criticising the currency speculators at this week’s G15 meeting, but for the wrong reason. Since the crisis first struck in Thailand in July, the economies of South-East Asia have borne the brunt of the currency and stock-market fallout. Much of that […]

Charl Blignaut A decade ago, when South African pay channel M-Net was launched, the company had already attracted its fair share of critics. There were those who complained that the Hollywood-crazy, sport-obsessed, money-making television service was not really interested in an African broadcasting agenda and was not intending to invest in much local television production. […]

Melvyn Minnaar : Potable pleasures Despite a multitude of folkloric fixes and other frivolities – or the remedies mothers-in-law dictate over the phone when the baby needs to be fed at dawn – there is no instant cure for the hangover. If you haven’t taken enough Essentiales or Prohep (that means a handful) the night […]

Being portrayed by Brad Pitt in a Hollywood movie should have been the final triumph in Heinrich Harrer’s adventurous life, but his Nazi past caught up with him, writes Ed Douglas When the iron ore mines of Huttenberg closed in 1978 after 2000 years of continuous production, the village died on its feet. Some families […]

FRIDAY, 10AM: Dorbyl’s Chubby mine-clearing system, already sold to France, Uganda and Britain, is being tested by the US Army in Baltimore after modifications the Americans requested before committing to a substantial order. The system includes the Meerkat, a lead vehicle, and the Husky, as well as an armoured trailer called the Duisenpoot. Modifications have […]

FRIDAY 10AM: The owners of small and medium-sized businesses are “deeply pessimistic” about the cost, low productivity and general hassle factor of the low-skill labour market, according to survey results announced on Thursday by the South African Institute of Race Relations. The survey, conducted among 300 businesses, found the rate of unemployment 6% lower than […]

On the eve of the investors’ conference, Paul Jourdan puts the case for the government’s development initiatives Spatial development initiatives (SDIs) are a proven means of giving government more job-creating bang for its very limited bucks. It is too important and successful a strategy to be derailed by vested interests and narrow agendas. The furore […]

Marion Edmunds The parliamentary session ended in acrimony this week as opposition parties rallied around Pan Africanist Congress firebrand Patricia de Lille. She has become embroiled in a fight with the party after accusing some of its top officials of spying for the apartheid government. The National Party’s Jacko Maree yesterday walked out of the […]

Mungo Soggot investigates an extraordinary deal undertaken by the Central Energy Fund A confidant of two of Africa’s most notoriously corrupt leaders has landed an extraordinary R3-million-a-year contract as an adviser to South Africa’s state-run oil company, the Central Energy Fund. Former Liberian finance minister Emanuel Shaw II and his son, Emanuel Shaw III, pulled […]

Design of the Week : Shaun de Waal SABC2 deserves some kind of pat on the back for the logo that provides its station- identification on either end of the ads – the “bumper” as it is called. Indeed, it has already received a prize from Apple Mac, and got a special mention at the […]