trial Dumisani Khumalo Top Zimbabwean politicians and officials are expected to testify in the sodomy trial of former president Canaan Banana, one of the most sensational cases in Zimbabwean criminal history which got under way this week. The witness list includes Vice- President Simon Muzanda; Minister ofEJustice, Legal and Parliamentary Affairs Emmerson Mnangagwa; two former […]
FRIDAY, 6.30PM: Ethiopian aircraft have bombed the Eritrean capital, Asmara. Two aircraft twice bombed an air force base, hitting workshops and hangars. No injuries were reported. The attack comes a day after Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi told reporters he would accept a peace plan brokered by Rwanda to end the escalating border conflict between […]
John Reader’s Africa: ABiography of the Continent is one of the titles shortlisted for The Sunday Times’s Alan Paton Award for Non-Fiction, the winner of which will be announced on Friday June 5. The other shortlisted titles are From Protest to Challenge, Vol V, by Thomas Karis and Gail Gerhart, Mokoko: The Makgoba Affair by […]
in Swapo death camp Melissa Jones and Michael Gillard Recurring nightmares of torture have haunted Emma Kambangula for the past nine years. “In one, I am naked and being beaten with bundles of sticks by three men, while two others are restraining my daughter, Freda, who is crying, screaming and trying to run to me,” […]
Peter Makurube When Allen Kwela lost his beloved Gibson, the whole nation was up in arms. The daily paper Sowetan ran an article appealing to the muggers to return that national treasure. The criminals returned the guitar to the paper’s offices – intact. Kwela had been out drinking and was staggering home when a gang […]
Suzy Bell On show in Durban Eduoard Manet would have been proud. Reclining Olympia-like for the opening of her exhibition at Durban’s NSA Gallery was post-modernist babe – and seriously talented artist – Carol- Anne Gainer. With her deep penetrating gaze, this sensual and spiritual young artist successfully claimed her own private space in a […]
Mukoni T Ratshitanga The African National Congress in the Northern Province this week met one of its allies, the Congress of South African Students (Cosas), in a bid to iron out differences between Cosas and MEC of Education Joe Phaahla. Relations between Phaahla and Cosas hit an all-time low last week when the provincial chair […]
Andy Duffy Sibusiso Bengu hates the spotlight, and it’s not hard to see why. Pinned down last week on prime-time TV, the minister of education resorted to pathos to get himself off the hook. “It isn’t my fault,” Bengu pleaded, after being confronted with yet more evidence that education is going down the tube. It’s […]
The prospect of state schools closing their doors to the nation’s children next week is undoubtedly the biggest crisis this country has faced in four years of democratic government. The signs are everywhere that education has come off the rails; should there be a strike now, this schooling year might just as well be written […]
Mungo Soggot The state tea company has quietly axed its managing director after a disciplinary inquiry headed by a retired high court judge found him guilty of financial impropriety. Sapekoe suspended Mike Cherry three months ago and fired him last week. The low-profile company has clung to its apartheid-era penchant for secrecy and sought to […]