Bryan Rostron Returning home after many years, I have discovered a rudimentary litmus test for gauging how the political land lies. Mention the name Robert McBride. A litmus test, you will recall, produces simple either/or results. In this case: a hero or villain. The reaction seldom has anything to do with McBride. It’s like holding […]
Matthew Krouse On stage in Johannesburg It’s not difficult to fathom why Andr the Hilarious Hypnotist is one of the biggest hits in town. Like Candid Camera and America’s Funniest Home Videos, his unselfconscious humour appeals to the lowest common denominator, showing the foibles of ordinary people in absurd situations. Andr’s spectacle parades as an […]
fi Amelia Gentleman Music lovers could soon be free to dispense with cumbersome multi- stacking CD players in favour of pocket-sized devices smaller than credit cards, christened the My-fi. Promoted as the world’s smallest hi-fi, the British-designed machine can play music downloaded from a CD player or direct from the Internet. The music is stored […]
The level of government pension funding may be cause for concern, writes Mike Metelits The level of funding of government employee pensions, along with the method of paying for these obligations, may be distorting how foreign investors look at the level of indebtedness of South Africa, and thus how they rate our future prospects and […]
As `sell-thru’ video takes off in South Africa, the complete Tintin series has been released on video. Charl Blignaut spent 20 hours in front of his TV Everyone has their favourite Tintin moment. Permanently etched in my memory are those huge red and white mushrooms in The Shooting Star exploding into life on a small […]
The winds of change that have blown through the SABC seem to have bypassed the commissioning department, writes Ferial Haffajee It is 1976 and television has just hit our shores. The Broederbond has decreed that it be a totally bilingual operation. But the problem is there is nary an Afrikaans producer in sight. The commissioning […]
Economists may need a crash rethink of the basic tenets of economic orthodoxy, writes Larry Elliot Another normal week for the global economy. Russia’s on the point of financial meltdown, the Chinese government is battling to stave off devaluation, bankruptcies are up 35% in Japan, stock markets are down almost everywhere, the biggest industrial merger […]
scoundrels? In the course of researching this article, I telephoned a former colleague in London who is responsible for organising much of the foreign coverage on an international financial publication. I have often used him as a sounding- board for ideas and arguments, and I asked his thoughts on the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM). He was […]
South Africans are embroiled in both sides of the war in Congo. Khareen Pech, William Boot and Ann Eveleth report South African mercenaries and private military companies swooped into strife-torn Central Africa this week to clinch deals and sharpen the Angolan-led military front in support of the embattled Congolese leader, Laurent Kabila. A Mail & […]
KZN fraud probe Wonder Hlongwa Senior government officials in KwaZulu- Natal could soon face prosecution for their alleged involvement in a fraudulent cheque scam involving millions of rands. The province’s deputy attorney general, Chris de Klerk, said the police investigation into the matter is finished. Police have told him they will hand him the docket […]