Peter Robinson CRICKET Of all the mistakes made by Shaun Pollock in his first Test match as captain (and, let’s be honest, he made a few), the worst by some distance was his failure to call the toss correctly on the first morning in Galle. A lot went wrong for South Africa in the first […]
Andrew Worsdale TELEVISION I was there. At Granny Lee’s funeral in the Anglican Cathedral in downtown Johannesburg in 1989. As someone remarks in the upcoming documentary Metamorphosis: The Remarkable Journey of Granny Lee, “It was a de luxe state funeral.” I’d met him some years earlier when I used to hang out with friends at […]
Merryman Kunene SOCCER Nastasia Tsichlas started at Sundowns as club secretary. Some might think it was a ploy by club vice-chair Angelo Tsichlas to keep his wife busy while he took care of big business at the club – but her skills were soon recognised. The small job led to bigger things and when her […]
Jaspreet Kindra The Department of Public Enterprises is showing extraordinary sensitivity about possible leaks of its latest policy document on privatisation – the cause of tension between the government and its union allies. The department this week threatened to search the bags of people, when two copies of the still- confidential document circulated at a […]
Mark Ouma OLYMPICS The stringent qualifying criteria to make the South Africa Olympic team has inspired Jannie du Toit to believe he is a serious medal contender. Du Toit has posted impressive performances since last year that have earned him a place among the world’s top freestyle wrestlers in a discipline that has been dominated […]
David Le Page If ever the history of a particular technology demonstrated how human progress can be undermined by greed, power and machismo, it is that of the electric vehicle. And it is a repetitive history – a constant cycle of disappointed optimism has unfolded throughout the 20th century as the time for electric vehicles […]
Belinda Beresford There are only a couple of hundred doctors in South Africa fully trained to treat HIV-positive individuals. But thousands of other medical personnel are having to deal with HIV/Aids patients, because the hospitals and clinics can no longer cope. Anti-retroviral treatment regimes are difficult to administer because of the powerful side effects and […]
David Macfarlane A second look A woman lies on her back in a chilly-blue hospital examination room. Her stomach, genitals and legs are bare; her knees are raised and apart. Her facial expression is resigned, vulnerable – yet somehow in control. Eight or nine white-coated medical interns surround her, and one by one pull on […]
Kirk The victims of the South African Defence Force’s (SADF) weirdest experiment – biological, chemical and psychological warfare on conscripts – are many and varied. Few, however, are keen to go public with their stories. For years dark rumours circulated about how badly homosexuals were treated by the SADF and at least once the army […]
The summits have turned into expensive media fests that don’t deliver very much Larry Elliot The good news for United States President Bill Clinton, British Prime Minister Tony Blair and the other G8 leaders is that Okinawa was no Seattle. Holding their annual shindig on a tropical island, converted for a couple of days into […]