Pat Sidley THE mortuary at GaRankuwa Hospital has no drainage for its 66 “fridges”, its inadequate power supply is strained by having to cool too many bodies and its floor is “in a noticeably poor condition”. For those still alive at the hospital complex, things aren’t much better, according to a report after a visit […]
Dr NS Kekana SOUTH Africa needs a foreign policy which will allow it to emerge as the leader of Africa. It is now a year since a Minister of Foreign Affairs was appointed, but he has yet to point out the direction that should be taken in foreign policy. The failure of the minister to […]
Hugh Masekela, Pact assistant CEO, in The Mark Gevisser ‘Seventh floor!” shouts a voice in campy, elevator-lady pitch as the crowded State Theatre lift bumps to a halt. Its occupants lower their eyes embarrassedly as a grim Pretoria cultural apparatchik pushes his way forward and the voice continues, “ladies underwear and apparel!” As the lift […]
SOCCER: Lungile Madywabe COFFEE is the only instant thing Orlando Pirates’ new coach, Joe Frickleton knows. According to him, football is about hard work, patient development of the team, formulation of a winning combination and finding good strikers to put the ball into the net. Frickleton recently came back to Gauteng after nine years with […]
CLASSICAL MUSIC: Coenraad Visser AS so often in the past, this year’s Glaxo season of the National Symphony Orchestra has contained much to delight classical-music lovers caught idle between the main seasons. Even more refreshing is the fact that most of the outstanding performances have come from local artists. Peter Jaspan gave a sparkling performance […]
FINE ART: Ivor Powell THE Johannesburg art world is in a condition which might be compared with a crisis in the stock market — where bullshit leads to bearishness. The centre of gravity has shifted; the game is no longer being played inside this country. Our art is increasingly perceived and marketed as an export […]
According to the as yet unreleased IBA report, the SABC will be divested of one of its channels, to be sold to private interests, reports Justin Pearce The South African Broadcasting Corporation will lose one of its three television channels at the end of 1997, to make room for South Africa’s first privately owned, free […]
Eddie Koch It took the Pondo sangoma, Mercy Manci, exactly 40 minutes after walking through a thicket of thorn trees at the entrance of the Klipriviersberg nature reserve south of Johannesburg to locate a plant called ugobo whose root bulbs are used by members of her profession to treat sexually transmitted diseases and to collect […]
Marion Edmunds Labour Minister Tito Mboweni lobbied all political players this week — from National Party leader FW de Klerk to the African Christian Democratic Party — in a bid to save the Labour Relations Bill from unravelling in Parliament. The round of meetings with political parties came in the wake of a decision by […]
White doctors spoke out vociferously against the ‘Deeble plan’ for national health insurance. Black doctors, however, are upset that this plan is being diluted, reports Pat Sidley JOHN Deeble’s virtues, or lack of them, are in the eye of the beholder. To many general practitioners in this country, the Australian health care expert’s original ideas […]