Gerry Adams is one of the most prominent political figures of our time, yet the man behind the beard and spectacles remains an enigma. What did he actually do in the years before he swapped his Armalite for a negotiating suit? And will he ever be able to tell the truth about his past? asks […]
‘We have not for some time seen anything like the Watergate caper now unfolding in weird and scarcely believable detail, right down to the taped locks, the rubber gloves, the tear gas pens, the array of electronic equipment and the crisp new hundred dollar bills in the hands of five men who stole into Democratic […]
SOUTH Korean Trade Minister Hwang Doo-Yun called in Pretoria on Wednesday for closer economic ties with South Africa, saying both countries could benefit from increased bilateral trade. He said South Korea suffered a $450m trade deficit with South Africa last year. In 1999, the deficit was $810m. “Certainly we wish this imbalance to be corrected, […]
OWN CORRESPONDENT, Johannesburg | Thursday THE South African central bank’s net open forward position (NOFP) dipped $400m in April, buoyed by inflows from a E500m bond issue, figures on Thursday showed. The NOFP – a measure of the central bank’s uncovered exposure to its forward foreign exchange commitments – dropped to $9.0bn, beating market expectations […]
DIAMOND magnate Nicky Oppenheimer has no plans to raise any higher the buy-out bid for De Beers. “This is a take-it-or-leave it offer,” De Beers chairman Nicky Oppenheimer has told the Johannesburg newspaper Business Day. Oppenheimer is driving the move by the bidding consortium, DB Investments, to turn De Beers into a private company run […]
US based Human Rights Watch called on the Democratic Republic of Congo to spare the lives of four child soldiers, who were aged between 14 and 16 when they were sentenced to death by Congo’s Court of Military Order. The rights advocacy group said the DRC has executed at least one child soldier, a 14-year-old […]
OWN CORRESPONDENT, Johannesburg | Friday CYRIL Ramaphosa, chairman of the Black Economic Empowerment Commission is to suggest that an Act be promulgated for the economic empowerment of blacks, which will force companies to invest 10% of their assets in areas of national priority, Sake Beeld reports. Beeld said that according to an article on the […]
SECHABA KANKOSI, Johannesuburg | Friday PRESSURE is mounting on African National Congress leaders and, in particular, Minister of Safety and Security Steve Tshwete to publicly withdraw claims that some senior party members are involved in a plot to overthrow President Thabo Mbeki. Members of the partys national executive committee (NEC), Cabinet ministers and senior MPs […]
Ntuthuko Maphumulo South Africa fared very well in a report on the state of media freedom in Southern Africa, where Zimbabwe led the charts with the highest number of violations. Thursday was World Press Freedom Day, and the Media Institute of Southern Africa (Misa) released its report on the Southern African region titled So This […]
Ntuthuko Maphumulo hockey The Italians arrived in good spirit just 28 hours before the first match in the five-Test series against South Africa hoping to emulate their soccer counterparts, who beat Bafana 1-0 last week. The visitors’ young squad coped with the drizzle and the altitude but not the home side’s stickwork and hunger for […]