Ivor Powell, Wally Mbhele and Wonder Hlongwa While the African National Congress is confident that there is agreement with the Inkatha Freedom Party that its leader, Mangosuthu Buthelezi, will be South Africa’s next deputy president, the IFP is still being coy. ANC sources say Buthelezi is expected to accept the position within days, with only […]
Marianne Merten Large numbers of the Western Cape’s Muslim 150 000-strong population went to the polling booths across the province despite earlier calls on them not to vote. Those who cast their votes were unanimous – it was a Qur’anic duty to vote. Two weeks ago, the Islamic Unity Convention (IUC) called on Muslims not […]
Matthew Krouse Evita Bezuidenhout and Nowell Fine, Pieter-Dirk Uys’s ostentatious, outspoken alter-egos, have been alive as long as South Africans of voting age. If Adapt or Dye – his solo piece that gave birth to them – was first performed in 1982, then today’s youth have had their political consciousness spiked by these two from […]
Anthony Sampson A Second Look How different will South Africa really be after the June 2 election? Nelson Mandela’s successor Thabo Mbeki is so opposite in style that the contrast with his predecessor seems dramatic: he is short, introverted, intellectual, preferring to deal behind the scenes rather than lead from the front as Mandela did: […]
Alex Dodd Imagine spending 25 846 hours in a prison cell anticipating a noose tightening quickly and irrevocably around your neck – punishment for a crime you did not commit. This is the nightmare that came true for Duma Khumalo, who spent seven years in prison – three of those on death row for the […]
Jacques Rautenbach It’s the staple of countless science fiction comics and movies: a flying car. Just think of Mila Jovovich’s scantily clad body against a backdrop of flying cars in the Fifth Element. But, to the surprise of many sceptics who thought it a dream fit only for Steven Spielberg and other special effects fundis, […]
Makhosini Nkosi and Wally Mbhele The ruling African National Congress celebrated its landslide victory in the country’s second democratic elections this week in grand style. The party forked out more than R180 000 to set up an election nerve centre and a celebration at Gallagher Estate in Midrand near Johannesburg. Even a bomb scare that […]
Bob Mattes compares how the parties have fared since the last Opinion ’99 survey The effectiveness of the political parties’ final four weeks of electioneering can be tested through a comparison of results from the April Opinion ’99 survey (the last opinion poll carried out before the election) with emerging election results. Assuming a turnout […]
Racist and sexist in-jokes disguised as South African flavour were the big winners at this year’s Loerie awards, writes Brenda Atkinson Despite being 21 years old and the last Loerie event of the millennium, this year’s awards were, notwithstanding technological upgrades, a mediocre rite of passage indeed. The tone for a retrogressively racist and sexist […]
Aids myths? Myths, quasi-myths and questions about Aids abound. Donald McNeil Jnr attempts to demystify the epidemic in Southern Africa Donald G McNeil Jnr Despite its size, South Africa is number one in the world in several fields: rugby, cricket, tuberculosis and Aids. One hears too little about the last two. In 1990, a New […]