Robert Kirby CHANNELVISION It has been fascinating to watch the recent and sometimes desperate damage control undertaken by the SABC, especially with regard to the Durban Aids 2000 conference. Not that the manipulation of public comprehension is anything new at the SABC. They’ve been doing it for as long as anyone can remember. In the […]

Mark Ouma olympics Unfazed by her late inclusion into the Olympics squad, Tania Tallie is determined to make her mark in Sydney. A full-time employee in a boat-building business in St Helena Bay in the Western Cape, Tallie has been working for three years to qualify for the Olympics. She achieved her goal just in […]

VISA and Standard Charter Bank have launched the first chip based pre-authorised, offline payment card in Ghana. Visa CEMEA president, Anne Cobb, said that their chip card should help overcome infrastructure weaknesses that have traditionally held back the introduction of payment cards in emerging markets. No telephone authorisation is required when the card is used. […]

THE King commission of inquiry, set up to probe corruption in South African cricket after Proteas captain Hansie Cronje admitted to bribe taking, is to hold a second and final round of public hearings beginning on October 2. Commission secretary John Bacon said it had not yet been decided whether Cronje would be recalled to […]

EIGHTEEN bodies, including those of five civil defence workers, have so far been pulled from the rubble of a collapsed clothing factory in Egypt’s port city of Alexandria. The factory caught alight on Wednesday night and firefighters extinguished the blaze seven hours later. The civil defence workers then went into the fire-gutted factory with their […]

Jonathan Steele A second Look Now that the furore over Zimbabwe’s election has abated, let’s draw a deep breath and admit it: Zimbabwe is an African good-news story. At about 90% the country has one of the highest literacy rates on the continent. Its race relations are excellent. The attempt to fan black hostility against […]

Gregory Mthembu-Salter The Zambian government this week secured $1-billion in funding from international donors despite pre-election political intrigue that has suggested dictatorial behaviour on the part of President Frederick Chiluba. The Consultative Group (which is the annual gathering of donors) for the first time met in Lusaka rather than Paris. The group gave the government […]

BoE believes the United States economy’s dramatic growth spurt is coming to an end Anet Ahern The global economy has continued to recover in the last quarter, but signs are emerging that world growth is beginning to peak. Global leading economic indicators are topping out, and there are initial signs of a slowdown in the […]

Thebe Mabanga Comedy lovers can brace themselves for a dose of good fun, rasping wit and downright silliness when two events bring a total of nine comedians to stages in Gauteng. The first event is the 5fm/Savannah Dry Jay Thang Heavyweight Comedy Jam, which brings together some of the circuit’s finest comics. Heavyweight Barry Hilton […]

Central Johannesburg has had the life sucked out of it by surrogate central business districts – the shopping malls David Le Page In the 1970s Johannesburg residents used to talk about “going to town”, the central business district, without contemplating the hire of an armoured vehicle. In fact, for any serious business or shopping, there […]