United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan will this week put a former leading ”Moonie” in charge of the UN’s biggest humanitarian aid agency after vigorous lobbying by the Bush administration. Josette Sheeran is to be appointed executive director of the UN World Food Programme (WFP), according to diplomatic and UN sources.

Hazel Friedman IRMA STERN: A FEAST FOR THE EYE by Marion Arnold (Rembrandt van Rijn Art Foundation, R197,99) IN these earnest, multi-culturally correct times, it’s not merely fashionable to trash artist Irma Stern. It’s downright obligatory. She is variously called the female version of Tretchikoff, a mediore modernist whose paintings are but poor imitations of […]

Marion Edmunds A MASSIVE task of re-evaluation and restructuring lies ahead for town, city and rural councils, now that the elections have taken place in most parts of South Africa. While local government has been in a state of flux since the April elections last year, real change in priorities and service delivery can only […]

Judith Matloff South African company Mechem can now start clearing 7 000km of landmines in Angola under a lucrative United Nations contract — after negotiations cleared the way for equipment to be offloaded in Luanda harbour. Political or bureaucratic delays have cost Mechem, a subsidiary of state-owned weapons manufacturer Denel, thousands of rands weekly, if […]

Old attitudes die hard in Ventersdorp, as Justin Pearce discovered VENTERSDORP looked as if it were hosting a foreign correspondents’ convention on Wednesday. The town of the AWB had a date with the new South Africa. It was surely a story to make soundbites throughout the world, and the media were there to tell it. […]

The SABC has successfully completed nationwide coverage of the local elections, writes Hazel Friedman ‘What the hell is going on in the Northern Cape and Mpumalanga?” asks a senior South African Broadcasting Corporation television staff member, his voice thick with tension and fatigue. It’s like watching the finals of nine ping-pong matches as the television […]

A local entrepreneur is confident he will be able to break the CNA’s stranglehold over foreign magazine distribution. Neil Bierbaum reports South Africa could soon see a plethora of imported titles in corner cafes and petrol station shops if plans by former Intermag operations director Butch Courtney pay off. Imported titles have hitherto been available […]

The cinema is considered by many, especially the French, who practically invented it, to be the key art form of the 20th century. Now a century old, its 100th birthday will be celebrated by a special presentation of films beginning at the Seven Arts in Norwood on Wednesday November 8. The season, organised by The […]

Philippa Garson THE debacle around Wits University’s “great black hope”, deputy vice-chancellor William Makgoba, represents a crisis on several fronts for the institution, including a battle for the top job. Clearly, a concerted attempt to discredit the man tipped to be the university’s next vice-chancellor by a group of senior academics, who presented current vice- […]

There is only one route open to General Magnus Malan if he wants to avoid the trial which is ahead of him. He and his co-accused can ask the court in Durban for a stay of proceedings because they wish to take their case to the Amnesty Committee within the Truth and Reconciliation Commission when […]