Mungo Soggot and : Andy Duffy A fraud and theft docket has been opened against the financial director of a South African mining company that sat on crucial information about its dismal performance on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange. The JSE suspended the listing of Amalia Gold on Thursday as details of the company’s woes began […]
The political mud-slinging that erupted this week between the Democratic Party and the African National Congress over the so-called “Aids treatment” Virodene has served to obscure the real issues, and significant dangers, associated with the Virodene project. Minister of Health Nkosazana Zuma’s fierce response seems to indicate that the tenacious minister has not yet given […]
Mungo Soggot Central Energy Fund chair Don Mkhwanazi tried to crush government opposition to his appointment of Emanuel Shaw II with a string of threatening letters to the civil servant who raised the alarm. The Mail & Guardian is in possession of two letters Mkhwanazi wrote to Deputy Director General of Minerals and Energy Gordon […]
Njongonkulu Ndungane: UBUNTU When liberation came to South Africa in 1994, people rejoiced that at last there was freedom. Indeed, in the years just prior to the 1994 elections, we saw a surfeit of freedoms of expression that we had previously only known to exist in democracies like the United States. Not all these were […]
Chris Roper: On stage in Cape Town It’s a little weird that none of the press releases for Old Wicked Songs mention that one of its defining concerns is Jewish identity. It’s almost as if the PR is mimicking the actions of Stephen Hoffman, the young piano virtuoso played by Paul du Toit, when he […]
Belinda Beresford There’s something sensual about the feel of a fat wad of crisp new banknotes. The rippled paper is a small piece of attempted perfection which took a month to forge and contains dozens of security devices. All South African paper money is printed by the South African Bank Note Company (SABN), although the […]
Robert Plummer WRITING SOUTH AFRICA: LITERATURE, APARTHEID, AND DEMOCRACY, 1970-1995 edited by Derek Attridge and Rosemary Jolly (Cambridge University Press, R100) NOVEL HISTORIES: PAST, PRESENT, AND FUTURE IN SOUTH AFRICAN FICTION: by Michael Green (Witwatersrand University Press, R120) Just over a decade ago, in a South Africa drawn in stark chiaroscuro rather than rainbow nuance, […]
Jack Schofield Plastic television and computer screens could be printed out by the yard using technology from Cambridge University and its development partner Seiko-Epson, a large Japanese manufacturer of computer printers. And because plastic screens can be flexible, TV sets could be hung on the wall and rolled up afterwards. The new screens are based […]
FRIDAY, 6.00PM: SHARES on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange staged a late rally after a dull day on Friday, much to the consternation of dealers who were at a loss to explain the recovery. The all gold index slipped 2,1 points to 742,7. The industrial index rose 69,9 points to 8187,2, and the financial index, 103,3 […]
Timothy Ryan: A SECOND LOOK The Minister of Welfare and Population Development has asked the Drug Advisory Board to formulate a drug masterplan for South Africa. This masterplan will ultimately direct the government’s response to the use, distribution, manufacture and cultivation of illicit drugs. The decriminalisation of dagga is one of the controversial issues facing […]