EDUCATION: Shattered school windows and poor relationships … PWV MEC for education Mary Metcalfe faces a tough task. But she is not daunted. By Gaye Davis SATURDAY morning at Mapetla Secondary School, Soweto. Parents, teachers, pupils and members of community organisations sit in the stifling heat of the cramped classroom. No one bothers to open […]

Scientists are unanimous that culling Namibia’s seals this year makes no sense. But the government is persisting . Fiona Macleod reports AN urgent appeal has been made to the Namibian ombudsman to intervene in the government’s plan to cull thousands of seals this year, which scientists have warned threatens to wipe out the country’s entire […]

CINEMA: Stanley Peskin CONCEIVED as a television film, the Emmy Award- winning And the Band Plays On is a painstaking but sometimes flawed docudrama based on the book by Randy Shilts. The transposing of 664 pages of rigorous investigative reporting into a 140-minute film clearly posed a tricky problem of adaptation – – screenplay writer […]

Farouk Chothia THE Zulu prince who sparred publicly with Chief Mangosuthu Buthelezi on Sunday night’s Agenda television programme charged this week that the minister of Home Affairs has his own secret agenda: he wants to be king of the seven-million-strong Zulu nation. In his first in-depth interview since Buthelezi interrupted his appearance on the SABC, […]

A little-noted post-election building boom provides valuable lessons for the recovery of our injured economy, writes Terence Moll ‘IF you’re a small builder and aren’t working every day,” the salesman said, “then you must be either lazy or fast asleep.” He should know: he works for a firm which sells precision saws, drills and concrete-cutting […]

Trevor Steele Taylor EMINENT French documentary filmmaker Marcel Ophuls, renowned not only for his extraordinary exposes of Nazi war crimes but also for his volatile lawsuits against producers, has withdrawn from the South African International Film Festival. Ophuls, who was due to arrive yesterday for the opening of the festival, cancelled his visit at the […]

CRITICAL CONSUMER Pat Sidley CONSUMERS are being endangered by lights which should not be installed near water, but are being sold to them as bathroom fittings. The manufacturer believes it is not his problem. And some specialist retailers, who ought to know better, are selling the equipment as safe for bathroom use. The South African […]

Elana Meyer has just completed the most successful four weeks of her career ATHLETICS: Julian Drew ELANA MEYER, South Africa’s most successful athlete, finally struck gold last weekend to put the cherry on the top of a highly rewarding season. Her victory in Oslo in the International Amateur Athletic Federation (IAAF) world half-marathon championships provided […]

SENIOR National Union of Metalworkers members are to meet on Saturday to investigate claims of “serious sexual harassment” by two of its delegates during the Cosatu national congress. Numsa general secretary Peter Dantjie said national office- bearers would meet to weigh the allegations. Cosatu’s press officer, Neil Coleman, would not comment on the alleged incident. […]

NATIVE TONGUE Bafana Khumalo IT started on Friday afternoon when he came over to my desk and said I should go to the City in the Sun to cover the Miss South Africa beauty pageant. My first response was to get down on my knees and beg for mercy. “Oh exalted editor,” I said, hands […]