Ebrahim Harvey left field On the eve of the local government elections political analysts are, again, not sure which party will win the hotly contested and crucial coloured majority vote in the Western Cape. The fluctuating and complex political sentiments, moods and psychology of coloureds make electoral analyses and predictions, and identifying the subterranean motive […]

DAVID JONES, London | Friday SOUTH African Breweries reported a 6% fall in half-year profits this week, weighed down by the weakness of the rand and a domestic beer market hurt by surplus cheap wine. The company, which brews two-thirds of Africa’s beer and earns over half its profits in rand, showed a strong performance […]

THE US pharmaceutical giant Pfizer is to unveil plans to provide the South African government with a two-year supply of its Aids medication Diflucan at no cost, a company spokesman said. Diflucan – known generically as fluconazole – is an anti-fungal drug used to treat cryptococcal meningitis, a potentially fatal brain affliction, as well as […]

RENAULT South Africa has clinched a six-year contract involving the export of catalytic converters worth R11bn to Europe. Andre Caussimon, Renault’s vice president for sub-Saharan Africa, said the project would begin in February 2001, and 14 million catalytic converters will be exported during this period. The converters are found in the exhaust systems of vehicles […]

NAMIBIA’S bar council warned this week that the country’s rule of law was being undermined because a high-ranking judge refuses to force the government to free an ailing Angolan rebel. The case is pitting the Namibian judiciary against Home Affairs Minister Jerry Ekandjo over the fate of Jose Domingos Sikunda, UNITA’s representative in Nambia. The […]

RWANDA wants to settle border disputes with Burundi, Tanzania and Uganda which it says arose through colonial powers having moved border markers. Rwanda has had frontier problems with Tanzania concerning a peninsula in the river Akagera which marks the border; with Burundi in the region of Busesera-Kirundo and the forest of Nyungwe/Kibera, and with Uganda […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Johannesburg | Thursday THE South African agricultural industry is teetering on the brink of disaster after the discovery of a second outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease in Mpumalanga Province. Afrikaans daily newspaper Beeld reported that the newest outbreak of the disease, which has already taken on epidemic proportions in KwaZulu-Natal, was discovered in a […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Johannesburg | Thursday NEXT week’s municipal elections in South Africa could be closer than previously expected in most cities, with the ruling party and the opposition neck and neck several major metropolitan areas, according to a new poll. The elections, which will change the face of local government, setting up 284 “mega-councils” to […]

A SOUTHWEST Nigerian state has dismissed more than 5 000 staff, or one quarter of its workforce, to pay for an increase in salaries. The government of Osun State said those dismissed had either already reached retirement age or had a bad record of service. The decision to cut the workforce was taken after the […]

A CONDOM for women has gone on trial in Rwanda as a measure to fight sexually transmitted diseases after similar tests in neighbouring Uganda proved relatively successful. The condom, introduced by Population Services International (PSI), a US-based organisation, consists of a fine polyurethane membrane that covers all of the user’s genitalia. The condom usually sells […]