Marital problems, greedy relatives, difficulties with the law? Wilson Mugwegweni can put an end to your troubles, writes Sam Zulu He is so respected and feared that people in his village pay him protection money, criminals have fled his district and the Zambian national soccer team probably owe their international reputation to his ministrations. Former […]

places Andy Capostagno Golf The Alfred Dunhill PGA Championship returns to Houghton Golf Club in Johannesburg this week and, festive season ennui and geographical impossibilities notwithstanding, it marks the beginning of both the Vodacom Southern African and the Volvo European PGA Tours for 1999. This is the fourth year that the event has been co-sanctioned […]

Belinda Beresford A landowner’s public battle to give half of his farm to black families has spurred other farmers to follow his example and face head-on the simmering issue of land redistribution in South Africa. Roger Roman’s plan to give away his land to its black inhabitants has caused conflict with his neighbours and local […]

ABOUT 415 people killed in fighting last month between government forces and militiamen were buried in southern districts of Congo capital, Brazzaville, city hall said on Thursday. “The operation of collecting bodies is almost finished, although there are probably a few left inside homes,” city hall official Senga Petie said. Residents of the Bacongo and […]

Mark Milner Soccer Ajax, the Dutch football club, this week claimed a world first with the purchase of a South African soccer club with the aim of nurturing young talent. Under the terms of a franchising agreement, Ajax, which is quoted on the Amsterdam stock exchange, is taking a 51% stake in Ajax Cape Town, […]

Friday night: Khalo Matabane `Where should we go?” This became the most popular Friday- night question of 1998. Every Friday we moved from sushi bars to kwaito bashes, lefty parties to restaurants and clubs. Driving back home, we complained about the lack of entertainment for young black professionals to such an extent that Tumi decided […]

SOUTH African boxer Soon Botes is angry after being notified from Germany that WBU super middleweight champion Norbert Noriega has refused to meet him in a return bout. Botes lost a disputed decision against the German with the vacant WBU title at stake in Dortmund last year, and was assured by WBU president Jon Robinson […]

Peter Conrad A MAN IN FULL by Tom Wolfe (Jonathan Cape) The brash, skyscraping egos of America love to build monuments to themselves. In his second novel, Tom Wolfe surveys the skyline of Atlanta, the country’s latest mushroom metropolis, and notes that those spires of ghostly, uninhabited glass are sustained by nothing more than speculative […]

Mungo Soggot The Northern Province has quietly started repaying most of the 92 000 pensions and disability grants it froze last year on the grounds it wanted to check recipients’ bona fides. The province’s decision to restart the pay-outs comes after it was hit with scores of lawsuits. These included a class action which asked […]