Maureen Freely: A SECOND LOOK As anyone who has ever tried to join it can tell you, the Mile High Club is not all it’s cracked up to be. It’s almost impossible to get into position without letting at least one fellow passenger in on the secret. You have to be prepared to stop writhing, […]
Alex Duval Smith in Casamance A quarter of a million West Africans fleeing on foot from fighting in Guinea-Bissau without food or water are heading north into another civil war where they face landmines, hostile Senegalese troops and swamps. As this human emergency advances on Casamance – the region of Senegal where a 16-year independence […]
Robert Kirby: Loose Cannon As the Cold War faltered and ended, the civilised world breathed a sigh of cautious relief. At incredible expense in lives and hope, rampant socialism had been put back in its box. Before that it had been Hitler, just as expensive to crate and pack away. And so the list goes […]
Adam Haupt On show in Cape Town Schisstrrer Saves the Planet! takes its audience into the Willoughby world of schizophrenia. The show is framed by Guy Willoughbys familiar character, Major Schisstirrer. The retired and decidedly demented South African Defence Force character arrives to pitch his right-wing security plan, Bloed Rivier. This time he proposes the […]
Ian Jack BEYOND BELIEF by VS Naipaul (Little, Brown R89,95) In 1979 and 1980, VS Naipaul made a tour of Iran, Pakistan, Malaysia and Indonesia and reached the conclusion, in Among the Believers, that Islam was a poor receptacle for political needs; it couldnt teach people how to run a modern state. Fifteen years later, […]
David Shapshak Bill Gates meets Hugh Grant at a party and gets Divine Brown’s phone number from him, goes the joke doing the e-mail rounds this week. After a night-long romp with Brown, Gates says to her: ”Now I understand why you use the name Divine.” ”Having spent the night with you,” comes the response, […]
Steven Robins: CROSSFIRE Claudia Braude recently criticised Antjie Krog’s much acclaimed book Country of My Skull, for endorsing a postmodern sensibility that celebrates the slippery and subjective character of truth claims (Friday, June 12 to 18). The book, based on Krog’s personal experiences as an Afrikaans radio journalist covering the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, raises […]
THURSDAY, 1.30PM: ENVIRONMENTALISTS are worried that 17 lions being sold by Mpumalanga game owner Roy Plath may be destined for the “canned lion” industry in Mozambique. “Canned” hunting refers to the practice of confining or drugging lions to make shooting them easier for hunters who do not have the skill, strength or time to track […]
THURSDAY, 11.00AM: THE Ngobeni commission into corruption in the Mpumalanga government on Wednesday produced documentary evidence showing that suspended deputy speaker Cynthia Maropeng deposited legislature cheques worth over half a million rand into her own bank account, after requisitioning the funds for a consultancy. Maropeng was left dumbstruck when commission chairman David Ngobeni produced documents […]
TUESDAY, 4.00PM: FORMER Zimbabwean President Canaan Banana finally took the stand in his defence in the Harare High Court on Monday, and swore that he never sexually assaulted any men. Banana, who faces 11 counts of sodomy, attempted sodomy and indecent assault, told the court he has no explanation for why all nine complainants might […]