DUMISANE LUBISI, Belfast | Friday A WIDOW who allegedly forced her young children to perform sexual acts with two men in return for payment appeared briefly in the Belfast Magistrate’s Court this week. The unidentified mother of the two children, a 13-year-old boy and 10-year-old girl, was unable to raise R 1_000 bail and has […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Goma | Friday HEAVY fighting erupted early on Friday at Bunia in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, as the country began 30 days of mourning for slain president Laurent Kabila, a UN source said. “There have been clashes in Bunia since 5:00 this morning. It appears that Lendu (local ethnic) groups are attacking […]

SIX months after ending a three-year funding freeze to Kenya, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) said it had put the brakes on a new programme because of “serious setbacks” in the fight against corruption. “It’s not a suspension, it’s more or less a delay in disbursement because of setbacks in the critical aspects of efforts […]

THE recent birth of two wildebeest calves on the slopes of Table mountain are the first in at least two years because the bulls are too busy fighting each other to woo the cows, says the Cape Peninsula National Park. Representative Philip Prins said last year 35 animals were kept in the camp at the […]

Robert Kirby CHANNELVISION If it proves anything other than the fact that even drivel can be very gaudily wrapped, M-Net’s Cosmo Show has secondary merits. Anything which displays the incomparable Jane Raphaely touch, however remotely bestowed, is always good for a snigger. Cosmopolitan magazine is run by Raphaely’s daughter, Vanessa, and along with the television […]

Peter Robinson cricket It’s not a question likely to have kept Shaun Pollock or Graham Ford awake at night, but there will have been times during the past few weeks when the South African captain and coach have wondered how well their team has been playing. Well enough to take care of most Test-playing nations? […]

Nigel Williams The Constant Gardener by John le Carr (Hodder & Stoughton) John le Carr’s novels may go on the shelves next to Tom Clancy (and sell as many copies) but if his popularity is due to a belief that he adheres to the Boy Scout code of fiction, then his public are reading him […]