Religion has a packaging problem. It is like a supermarket with thousands of products on the shelves which really deal in two things only: calories and cleansing. Kilometres of competing packets turn a simple matter of eating, drinking and washing into a nightmare of choice when all you need is more or less to bounce […]

Howard Barrell and Barry Streek New National Party leader Marthinus van Schalkwyk may be the ultimate victor as the African National Congress’s desperate bid to exploit the firing of maverick Western Cape MEC Peter Marais fizzled out this week. A plot to give Van Schalkwyk a seat of power – the premiership of the Western […]

A Wits University professor’s admission that he faked clinical trials has rocked the international medical community, reports Khadija Magardie The University of the Witwatersrand is poised to decide on the fate of the disgraced head of its haematology and clinical oncology department, Dr Werner Bezwoda, who has been accused of misrepresenting the results of a […]

Gavin Foster Your 12-year-old daughter goes to an indoor karting venue with friends and is hurt when a wheel flies off her kart on the track. “You’ll pay for this,” you tell the manager of the track. “No I won’t,” is his response. “Take a look. Your daughter signed an indemnity.” The following day you […]

Gavin Foster MOTOCROSS Two KwaZulu-Natal teenagers have swapped the calmness of the classroom for the hurly-burly of world championship motocross racing. Grant Langston (17) goes into his third year of grand prix (GP) competition with a very good chance of winning fame and fortune, while 15- year-old Jarrett de Jager leaves for Europe next week […]

THOUSANDS of Basotho on Friday morning packed the Setsoto stadium in Maseru ahead of their king’s wedding. King Letsie III and his bride Karabo Motsoeneng, 23, from the Free State town of Ficksburg, will tie the knot before the huge crowd during a ceremony scheduled to start at 10am. Former South African president Nelson Mandela, […]

Barry Streek Minister of Correctional Services Ben Skosana has told Parliament that there were only 2E600 known HIV cases in South African prisons at the end of December last year. His figures of HIV-infected prisoners have, however, been hotly disputed by the Democratic Party. In reply to questions tabled in the National Assembly by Johann […]

Government plans to stiffen immigration legislation follow warnings by Western intelligence services that illegal immigrants have turned South Africa into a top drug conduit Paul Kirk The British intelligence service, MI5, has singled out South Africa as one of the “most important” conduits for South American drugs into Western Europe in a confidential report submitted […]

There is still time for the Human Rights Commission (HRC) to avoid a train smash over the “racism in the media” inquiry. It can withdraw the “notices of intention” that it has served on a host of editors, back off from the confrontational nature of the inquiry and, in co-operation with editors and other press […]