THURSDAY, 6.00PM: POST, Telecommunications and Broadcasting Minister Jay Naidoo released his long-awaited White Paper on Broadcasting Policy on Thursday, outlining a vision to turn South Africa into a global multimedia hub. The 46-page White Paper proposes that the the country’s signal distribution network should be opened to competition by 2000. Concluding that the digital route […]

THURSDAY 6.00PM: The Truth and Reconciliation Commission has begun a closed hearing into the 1986 air crash in which Mozambiqan president Samora Machel was killed. TRC spokesman Vuyani Green said that there was evidence linking the crash to activities of the former Suth African Defence Force. Several witnesses, including members of former South African military […]

WEDNESDAY 12.00NOON: THE former commander of the United Nations observer force in Angola says there is evidence in the country of a military build-up that “indicates preparations for a possible return to war”. Zimbabwean army Major-General Phillip Sibanda, who has just returned to Harare from a two-and-a-half-year command of the formerly 7000-strong UN military monitoring […]

WEDNESDAY, 2.15PM: APARTHEID’s chief assassin Eugene de Kock, known by his colleagues as “Prime Evil”, claimed on Wednesday that former president PW Botha ordered the 1987 bomb attack on Cosatu House, headquarters of the country’s largest trade union federation. Testifying at Botha’s trial for ignoring a Truth and Reconciliation Commission subpoena, De Kock told the […]

WEDNESDAY, 6.00PM: ETHIOPIAN troops, tanks and heavy artillery crossed the border into Eritrea at dawn on Wednesday morning, the Eritrean foreign ministry said on Wednesday. The invasion, which has not been confirmed by independent sources, is an escalation of a tense border stand-off that has seen at least 100 people killed or wounded since Sunday. […]

TUESDAY 11.00AM: THERE are still a large number of troops belonging to the Angolan rebel movement Unita in several provinces, in spite of its claims to have demilitarised its forces, according to a United Nations official. Quoting a report by the commander of UN forces overseeing the peace process, UN representative for Angola Alouine Blondin […]

MONDAY, 4.00PM: IN an unexpected turn in the Lusaka High Court on Monday, the state dropped all charges against former Zambian president Kenneth Kaunda, after which Judge Japhta Banda declared Kaunda a free man. “It’s great, it’s great,” declared Zambia’s 74-year-old founding father as hundreds of his supporters broke through a police cordon to celebrate […]

MONDAY 6.00PM: FORMER Zimbabwean president Canaan Banana has denied allegations by three policemen, two air force officers, two secret service agents, a cook, a jobseeker and a hitchhiker that he either forced or attempted to force them to have sex with him. Banana, 62, a former Methodist minister, was appearing in the Harare High Court […]

Charl Blignaut investigates the fives rules for how to become a South African pop icon. (Don’t be scared to perform from the back of a truck) In 1985, six months after Lucky Dube’s fourth mbaqanga album had turned to gold – sales in excess of 25 000 units – the recording studio was again booked […]

Greg Bowes Johannesburg nightlife Suddenly on Saturday nights in Johannesburg there’s a welcome and regular alternative to the usual mundane mega- raves – and one that’s showcasing local talent on the fringes of live music. And I’ll be damned, people are still dancing! The Stylus Lounge takes place every weekend at the stunning but seldom […]