AN investigation called by National Police Commissioner George Fivaz into allegations of perjury against Western Cape Assistant Commissioner Adam Blauw has been completed, Fivaz’s office announced on Thursday. The documentation has been forwarded to the Director of Public Prosecutions and will be released for discussion after the director has considered the matter.

CAMPAIGNING for the second round of Nigeria’s elections wound up in on Friday, with warnings that violence may mar the process. Millions of voters go to the polls on Saturday to elect governors and assemblies for the 36 states of the Nigerian federation. This following local government elections in December. Next up will be the […]

A NIGERIAN newspaper says the bodies of 25 soldiers serving with the West African intervention force Ecomog that were killed in Sierra Leone were returned to Nigeria in secret and buried. The newspaper said the bodies were flown into the country on Monday night and buried at the army cemetery inside Ojo military barracks in […]

million Ferial Haffajee The high matric failure rate has cost the state more than R100-million, raising questions about the efficacy of the examination system. With all the results now in, the average matric pass rate is 55,1%. The financial losses incurred stand in sharp contrast to the desperate needs of poor schools. Almost seven in […]

Loose cannon: Robert Kirby A trusty old verbal objet d’art has been given a new lease of life. Thanks to the Black Lawyers’ Association the word “subliminal” is back in fashion. The last time the word enjoyed such attention was back in the 1950s when something called “subliminal advertising” was exposed for the cheating scam […]

against Aids David Gough in Dar es Salaam Mashaka is the best-known truck driver in Tanzania, and his exploits are famous. He spends most of his time on the roads of East Africa, rarely sees his wife and has a girlfriend in every town. Mashaka became ill a few weeks ago and Tanzanians are holding […]

Adam Mars-Jones HEAVY WATER AND OTHER STORIES by Martin Amis (Jonathan Cape) Without the story State of England, this would be a dismaying volume to come from the champion British fiction writer of his generation. Unlike his tightly themed previous collection, Einstein’s Monsters, this one brings together early work (two stories from the Seventies, one […]

Andrew Worsdale Movie of the week American independent films have that intelligent edge that has been missing from Hollywood productions since the late 1970s. Not even Francis Ford Coppola has made a really decent movie since Apocalypse Now, and that was in 1979. Vincent Gallo’s Buffalo 66, which opens at cinemas this week, is a […]

poison CD of the week: Shaun de Waal One of the strangest and most interesting CDs of South African origin you are likely to hear this year -or any other – is dURBAN NOISE and scraps WORKS. On it, University of Natal composer Jurgen Bruninger, draws together 47 Durban players and any number of found […]

A SOUTH African businessman who fled to Australia four years ago to evade being tried for fraud, may soon be extradited after a Federal Court rejected arguments that a new extradition hearing should be denied. Edward Dutton, who is accused of fraud involving $37,2-million, was arrested in Australia in 1995, but escaped extradition because of […]