OWN CORRESPONDENT, Glasgow | Sunday 8.00pm. CASSIUS Baloyi successfully defended his World Boxing Union Featherweight world title in Glasgow on Saturday night in an impressive fashion. Challenger Brian Carr failed to come out for the tenth round after receiving extensive punishment in rounds eight and nine. “This is a warm-up for Hamed.” said Baloyi before […]

SOME 250 National Union of Public Service and Allied Workers’ members marched on two government departments in Pretoria to demand a revised salary offer on Tuesday. Nupsaw, which claims to represent about 65000 public servants, is demanding a 10% increase, compared to an offer of 5,7%.Other demands included an unconditional moratorium on retrenchments, and “transformation […]

THE office of President Thabo Mbeki referred all media queries on Mpumalanga premier Ndaweni Mahlangu to the African National Congress in a statement on Sunday. Mbeki’s office said Mahlangu was appointed by Mbeki as an ANC official, and sub-Premier posts were matters for the party. With this reasoning, Mbeki pushed media inquiries toward the ANC […]

ADRIAN WARNER, Cardiff | Saturday 9.00pm. WALES pulled off one of the biggest shocks in international rugby in recent years when they beat world champions South Africa 29-19 on Saturday. It was their first victory over the South Africans and it came appropriately in a match played to mark the opening of the Millennium stadium, […]

NIGERIA’S teachers union has called off its two-month-old strike following payment of a new minimum salary approved for public sector workers. Last week, the Nigerian government released 4,5-billion naira ($47-million) to settle the arrears of the new monthly minimum of 3000 naira ($32) agreed in March. The decision to end the strike was taken after […]

BRYAN PEARSON, Cape Town | Friday 3.00pm. PRESIDENT Thabo Mbeki on Friday announced measures to increase the competitiveness of the South African economy, boost job creation and promote foreign investment in the country. Addressing parliament in his maiden state-of-the-nation address, Mbeki also committed his government to continuing the liberal free-market macro-economic policies of his predecessor, […]

DAVID LE PAGE, Johannesburg | Friday 2.00pm. A BROAD and sweeping plan for South African development was laid out on Friday morning by President Thabo Mbeki in his state of the nation address to a joint sitting of the National assembly. Covering every issue from crime to the humiliation of the Bushmen, and announcing a […]

FORMER apartheid-era hitmen Abraham “Slang” van Zyl and Leon “Chappies” Maree have gone to court to demand the banning of a book which says they plotted to murder former Tollgate chairman Julian Askin. The two former policemen, whose names featured in Truth Commission hearings, want the book “Dangerous Deceits – Julian Askin and the Tolgate […]

A PRETORIA English teacher resigned on Thursday after angry parents called him a “racist” for setting an exam based on a Herman Charles Bosman extract containing the word “kaffir”. The short story, “Unto Dust”, deals with a quarrel over the skeletons of a “boer soldier” and a “kaffir”, making the point that no-one can tell […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Johannesburg | Thursday 10.15am. THE South African Reserve Bank cleared local banks on the Year 2000 problem, saying there is “no reason whatsoever” for massive withdrawals ahead of the millenium. Registrar of Banks Christo Wiese said banks have been prepared for potential millenial problems because of extensive Reserve Bank pressure. He was speaking […]