Dawie Roodt South Africa has certain serious economic shortcomings, such as a lack of sufficient savings, investments, job creation and economic growth in general. It is widely accepted that governments should provide a social safety net and redistribute income. However, the extent of this redistribution in South Africa is so large that it may affect […]

Andrew Muchineripi Soccer National soccer coach Trott Moloto faces another no-win situation on Saturday in Gaborone where Botswana host Bafana Bafana in a Castle Cup Southern Africa championship first-round match. Given the lowly stature of the home team, who lie 133 places behind their opponents on the world rankings, Moloto will be expected to return […]

Ferial Haffajee These are some of the back-room budgeteers behind Minister of Finance Trevor Manuel’s budget this week: l Deputy Minister of Finance Gill Marcus: plucked from her role as the chair of Parliament’s standing committee on finance to serve as Manuel’s deputy, she has worked primarily to improve revenue collection. The changes at the […]

EIGHT people including a Briton, an Australian and a Lebanese were arrested in Liberia on Wednesday for “collaborating” with Sierra Leonean rebels. The arrests occurred at the offices of a local company, Red Deer International, in the capital, Monrovia. The company’s general manager, Richard Ratcliffe, a British national, was among those arrested. Military uniforms, communication […]

THERE is a link between the El Nio weather phenomenon and deadly horse epidemics in South Africa, British scientists said this week. In an article published in the journal Nature on Wednesday, researchers from the Institute of Animal Health said that climate changes resulting from El Nio caused a population explosion of the biting midge, […]

FIVE builders from Britain who volunteered to build a school in the remote Kenyan village of Watamu, were rewarded by being made tribal elders, the British press reported on Friday.The men, who worked 15-hour shifts for two weeks without pay, were appointed elders of the million-strong Girimia tribe at a ceremony attended by 5000 people. […]

SHOPRITE, one of the largest retail chains in southern Africa, will invest an initial $25-million in Zimbabwe this year as part of a regional expansion plan that will see the supermarket giant using this country as a base to supply goods to other African countries, Shoprite official Toby Wieser said this week. Wieser said the […]

Ferial Haffajee:TAKING STOCK `Sjoe! I gave it to him,” says Nocwaka Lamani in an interview at her parliamentary office. The man she gave it to was former law and order minister Adriaan Vlok, whose forces had arrested Lamani’s son, Tango. “I told him, `I am demanding my son back by May 11 1989 because I […]

The assumption that anyone who does well in one area of public life is some sort of “renaissance man” – able to turn their attention to any other field and succeed – is a fallacy to which South African society has recently shown itself unfortunately prone. Mr Justice Johann Kriegler performed admirably on the Bench, […]

The municipal demarcation board is a milestone for local democracy, writes Minister of Provincial Affairs and Constitutional Development Valli Moosa The president appointed the municipal demarcation board, chaired by Michael Sutcliffe, on February 1. It is charged with probably the most critical task in the transformation of local government. An independent selection panel, chaired by […]