Stefaans Brummer CREDIT card giant MasterCard International has infuriated local police by flying a self-acknowledged South African crook overseas in a botched cloak-and- dagger operation intended to entrap members of a powerful South African fraud syndicate. Now MasterCard stands accused of bypassing South African police, withholding information and obstructing local investigations. MasterCard denies the charges, […]

Simon Segal WITH cellular telephones now virtually passe, satellite television is set to become the next yuppie symbol. Behind the scenes an intriguing corporate battle is unfolding between M-Nets Multichoice and SABC. There is potential for substantial losers and winners. The big question is whether SABCs decision to go analogue makes commercial sense in a […]

Participant PETER KLATZOW reports on the highlights of Africa’s first International Composers Workshop SOUTH African composers have learned to accept the fact that there are fat years and lean years. The feast or famine syndrome is dangerous, primarily because the ingestion of so much new music in so short a time can lead to cultural […]

A one percent party has taught the Inkatha Freedom Party a lesson of biblical proportions, writes Ann Eveleth When push finally came to shove it took a political David to bring Goliath to his knees and turn KwaZulu- Natal’s interminable constitutional process on its head. Holding out for a controversial clause prohibiting abortion, the minuscule […]

THE SABC’s launch of three new television channels on Sunday night complete with jumbo jet, lasers, Stevie Wonder and Nelson Mandela was the most spectacular launch this country has seen. If it was the national broadcaster’s intention to show self-confidence and razzmatazz, it was a great success, with 150 minutes and R3,8-million of often-breathtaking extravaganza. […]

Nicole Fritz Television critics at South Africa’s largest daily newspapers have generally given the thumbs-up to the SABC’s new programme line-up on its three television channels. But Beeld’s critic Andries Cornelissen is critical of the continued use of dubbing. If the SABC wants to reflect South African society, it musn’t look to dubbed programmes. Afrikaans […]

BALLET: Stanley Peskin IT would be silly to expect any ballet (or, for that matter, film or stage play) based on Leo Tolstoys majestic Anna Karenina to be Tolstoyan in impact. In fact, Andre Prokovskys adaptation of the novel for ballet in 1979 (now a standard work in Pact Ballets repertory) owes more to Clarence […]

Stefaans Brummer THE media are under renewed attack in some African countries, if a recent spate of arrests and bannings, and an apparent assassination attempt are anything to go by. The Post of Zambia, long a thorn in the side of President Frederick Chiluba, this week came under the strongest censure from government yet, when […]

Business believes it has the answer to marketing tourism in South Africa, reports Karen Harverson South Africa is the fastest-growing tourist destination in the world but this is due more to its flavour of the month status initiated by the 1994 elections than its marketing activities overseas. With a shoe-string budget of R48-million for 1996 […]

Hazel Friedman Peter Mancer must have been born with rhinestones in his eyes and wings on his feet. As he drapes himself over his chair with a foppish swirl of his cape part Hollywood mogul, part song’n’dance man I can almost see him cocking an imaginary top hat, twirling his cane and tap-dancing his way […]