Secret documents handed in at the Malan trial last week link two current cabinet ministers to violent raids into Lesotho in the 1980s. Minutes of the State Security Council (SSC) show Minister of Mineral and Energy Affairs Pik Botha was authorised – along with three other ministers in the National Party government – to use […]
Mungo Soggot RESERVE Bank governor Chris Stals said this week he feared lifting exchange controls because of the heavy “pent-up demand” in South Africa to invest abroad that had built up in the past 30 years. Talking about the rand’s meltdown and the Reserve Bank’s relationship with the government, Stals rejected the view that the […]
Evita Bezuidenhout would have loved these designs for a national costume, writes HAZEL FRIEDMAN THE designers might have been billed as the Young Lions of local fashiondom, but some of the creations spawned by the finalists of the South African Fashion Designers Association (Safda) competition would have been more deserving of disaster-relief aid than a […]
Graham Hopwood THE managing director of Namibia’s most controversial parastatal has been sacked by the TransNamib board of directors. The board issued a statement saying that Francois Uys was retiring from TransNamib at the end of April by mutual agreement. Speculation is rife that Uys was given a package of nearly N$3-million in exchange for […]
Telkom has five years to connect four million lines. Can it meet the challenge of universal service without a substantial restructuring? Aspasia Karras reports Telkom is probably the most vilified of South Africa’s parastatals. Seen as inefficient and bureaucratic, consumers’ greatest frustration is the lack of an alternative. While cellular technology promised to provide an […]
A BRITISH spy, held for 135 days in prison after making the mistake of coming to South Africa on holiday, was freed this week when a Kempton Park magistrate refused a United States application for his extradition. Paul Grecian was freed by magistrate Danie Oberholzer, who said the offences Grecian had been charged with in […]
Former Pact CEO Louis Bezuidenhout was given a secret “severance package” before being immediately re-employed on contract by Pact. And the amount – estimated at around R500 000 – was never reflected in Pact’s financial records. These are the findings of an investigation into the existence of a secret trust fund set up for senior […]
Luan Nel abandons his miniature landscapes and transforms concrete walls into canvases for a show this weekend. He spoke to HAZEL FRIEDMAN VISITING the site of Luan Nel’s Centre is like watching an old silent movie (in technicolour) at the Top Star drive-in. Giant, flickering images – many of them bucolic in mood – are […]
Norman Kempster AT least three Liberian gunmen were killed by Marine guards this week when they tried to invade the US Embassy compound. Monrovia was swept by factional fighting and lawlessness after the breakdown of a 10-day- old cease-fire. The Pentagon said unidentified Liberian assailants fired on the embassy on three occasions, drawing return fire […]
director Roy Paulson sees himself in the guise of Superman Jacquie Golding-Duffy Which television programmes do you watch most often and why? I find that the SABC programmes are, at the moment, in a total mess and there is very little to watch of any merit except, obviously, Business Day Tonight, and I do enjoy […]