Mukoni T Ratshitanga A senior Gauteng transport department official is facing 10 charges of misconduct after an internal probe found he held a taxi permit despite his position as the province’s chief negotiator with taxi associations. In April, the former MEC for transport ordered that Lennox Magwaza be suspended pending the outcome of the investigation, […]
Fashion fiend turned house hunk Jeremy Healy is the latest big name DJ to tour the country. Charl Blignaut calls him up in London on the eve of his visit Theres a measure of reassurance in that little peep that sounds just as the call connects Johannesburg to London. Multinational fingertips. A cheery Hello? crosses […]
Ed Vulliamy Baseball Before he pitched his first ball from the mound at Yankee Stadium earlier this month, Orlando Hernandez paused and looked around at the crowd with an expression that mixed disbelief, joy, awe and a little pain. It was the end of a rainbow, and of a six- month journey, for the Cuban. […]
Tony Twine A tailpiece to a news bulletin a few years ago reported that a young child had lost his first milk tooth and had been instructed on how to liquidate his asset via the tooth fairy market. Much to his delight, the tooth disappeared overnight, to be replaced by a shining R5 coin it […]
Wally Mbhele An African National Congress statement this week conceding that detained foreign affairs official Robert McBride was framed by agents of the former government came after weeks of differences in the party about its approach to the issue. It is understood the matter came to a head recently when a briefing document on McBride […]
Tangeni Amupadhi The Truth and Reconciliation Commission has decided that people responsible for human rights atrocities in African National Congress detention camps will not have to testify publicly about their deeds. Dumisa Ntsebeza, head of the commission’s investigative unit, said this week public hearings on Quatro and other camps will not fit into the commission’s […]
fossils Ellen Barlett James Kitching is really retired now, he says his days in the field are over. As he says it, he looks across the room, toward his wife. They exchange glances in the accommodating way of the long- married, then she sighs. One gets the feeling neither believes it. Moments later – talking […]
clues The Karoo is the richest repository of therapsid fossils, the group that gave rise to early mammals, writes Ellen Bartlett To the average motorist passing through it, generally at an unconscionably high rate of speed, the Karoo is that barren bit of infinity that must be crossed to get to Cape Town or Johannesburg: […]
Phillip Kakaza Zimbabwean master drummer Jethro Shasha, well-known on the South African music scene, died at the age 46 last Sunday, having suffered for many years from diabetes. He played with many top musicians, including Malian Salif Keita. He was due to do a live recording with pianist Paul Hamner this weekend. Touched by Shashas […]
A black commercial farmer in the Free State claims to have been sabotaged by some of his white counterparts, writes Ann Eveleth The vultures started descending on Isaac Khumalo’s Vredefort farm soon after he took the plunge into commercial agriculture in December 1995. Thirty-one-year-old Khumalo, the Free State vice-chair of the Emerging Red Meat Producers […]