Barry Streek Sport, welfare, arts, culture and environmental sectors, represented by NGOs, have launched an umbrella body, the Peoples’ National Lottery Coalition (PNLC), to monitor the allocation of the proceeds from South Africa’s national lottery, which is due to be launched on March 1. The PNLC intends to engage with the government “in a proposed […]

David Martin OBITUARY:IANCHRISTIE In the days before it was fashionable to have a local accent, Ian Christie’s Scottish brogue would have been a barrier to his working as a radio commentator. Such was the reaction of Mozambique’s late president, Samora Machel, when Christie broadcast for the first time from Maputo in the 1970s for the […]

invisible’ Pityana Evidence wa ka Ngobeni Rhoda Kadalie, the former Human Rights Commissioner, this week took another swing at the Human Rights Commission (HRC) chair, Barney Pityana, for remaining aloof in Switzerland while the furore raged over the subpoenas to the country’s editors. Kadalie, who last week called on editors to defy the subpoenas served […]

This was not the week to be jobless, poor and a sinner. In the moral schema that underlay Minister of Fiance Trevor Manuel’s budget, little charity was on offer for this category among us. It was those of us in work who got the tax breaks, the rich can afford to pay cunning accountants to […]

A system of mutual aid supports the Congolese community in South Africa Evariste Katanga It’s the first day of January; the transition to a new millennium has taken just one second. The joy that erupts all around the world is the same joy experienced at the Hillbrow night club Chez Ntemba. The majority of its […]

Barry Streek The country’s poor have been the main beneficiaries of the government’s social spending, which has between 1993 and 1997 increased by an estimated 34%. This was revealed by Minister of Finance Trevor Manuel in this week’s budget speech in Parliament, where he emphasised this “significant shift in social spending from the more affluent […]

For the third year in a row, Trevor Manuel has produced a largely acclaimed budget. What does it mean for individual South Africans? Belinda Beresford The big news of the budget was the restructuring of personal income taxes, and the consequent slashed tax bill for most taxpayers. More measures to encourage savings might have been […]

Greek South African comedian Irene Stephanou reminisces about growing up in a caf Usually, having a caf on the corner meant having a relationship with the family on the corner. Well, that’s what it felt like. Every day, including Sunday, every night, there you were behind the counter. Saturday afternoons were my worst – hot […]

Marianne Merten The New National Party aborted its disciplinary action against its outspoken senior Western Cape member Peter Marais this week after his legal team indicated it would cross-examine the party’s national and Western Cape leaders at the hearing. Marais was axed as Western Cape welfare and poverty relief MEC on Valentine’s Day, apparently for […]

Donna Block SHAREWORLD I remember my first year at University and my first class, Finance 101. The professor, a wizened old curmudgeon, told us that if we learned nothing else in his class, rule one about finance was that the stock market was a crap-shoot. “You place your bets and you take your chances.” He […]