Mpumalanga’s Economic Empowerment Corporation (Meec) this week backtracked on a public pledge by suppressing a damning forensic report on fraud and corruption at the corporation. Meec chief executive Ernest Khosa, who is being probed in connection with a series of irregular multimillion- rand loans, instead ”questioned” board directors on aspects of the report’s findings.

The government plans to use microchipping and special enforcement agents to stamp out ”canned” lion hunting — but there are concerns about the ability of provincial officials to curtail this industry. If regulations published on Friday become law, all large predators kept in captivity will have to be microchipped and recorded in a database.

The National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) is suffering a haemorrhage of senior staff — including its gung-ho public face, spokesperson Sipho Ngwema, and Travelgate prosecutor Ben Avenant. Ngwema and Avenant are among a rash of senior NPA members who have resigned in the past three months, or plan to do so soon.

White snow and black iron, white birches and black stone, white hair and black hats of the last witnesses: Auschwitz on Thursday was a monochrome tableau drained of colour except for the brown brick of the barracks where hundreds of thousands waited to be murdered.

<i>Presentation: Each board should be clearly marked in the top right hand corner with the entrant’s name, the page number (eg. “pg 1 of 5”) and the category name and number. Entry forms (originals or photocopies thereof), as well as letters of motivation for journalism entries, should be pasted flat on the reverse side of the first page of the entry.</i> Kafka, himself, would have been floored by such foetidity of bureaucratic flatulence.