Mandela’s R500-million school food scheme=20 is under review, reports Marion Edmunds PRESIDENT Nelson Mandela’s primary school=20 feeding scheme, founded with great fanfare=20 in the first days of his government, is=20 under review and may face closure. The Health Department has commissioned the=20 Cape Town-based non-governmental=20 organisation (NGO), the Child Health Unit,=20 to assess the effectiveness […]

Gustav Thiel EDUCATION Minister Sibusiso Bengu admitted=20 this week that his department’s offer of=20 voluntary severance packages to teachers=20 has caused enormous financial strain to the=20 already cash-strapped public school system. In an interview with the Mail & Guardian he=20 called for “a thorough rethink of the=20 structure, specifically of severance=20 packages”. The education department […]

Pact dancers have spoken out against=20 abusive treatment, reports HAZEL FRIEDMAN `I WENT in with talent … and hope. I left=20 in extreme physical pain, emotionally=20 devastated … all my dreams destroyed …=20 Mr Joseph, I appeal to you with all my=20 heart, to make it possible for me to become=20 once again a fully […]

Lesley Cowling THE scientific community in South Africa=20 and internationally are speculating that=20 the active ingredient of Virodene is an=20 industrial solvent called dimethylformamide=20 (DMF). DMF is used in laboratories to=20 “denature” DNA, a process that releases it=20 from its double strand shape. Medical researchers say DMF is also the=20 agent used by Pretoria researcher […]

Centurion’s NP council believes it is=20 creating affordable housing, but the ANC=20 says it is separate development, writes=20 Stuart Hess TO the council of Centurion, the=20 development they are planning on 30=20 hectares of vacant land outside city limits=20 is a gesture to the new South Africa,=20 affordable housing for the increasing=20 numbers of squatters […]

Composer BONGANI NDODANA explains why he=20 chose a criminal as the hero in his new=20 opera, Broken String VILLAINS have always been the stuff of=20 opera. From the tormented Don Giovanni,=20 whom we are glad to see dragged down into=20 the portals of hell, through to the almost=20 parodic Peter Grimes, awkward and=20 misunderstood, evoking […]

Greater control over Virodene is behind the=20 premature interest of the Cabinet in the=20 Aids drug, writes Marion Edmunds =20 THE government is eyeing a direct financial=20 stake in “Aids wonder drug” Virodene to=20 guarantee it a say in its development,=20 production and sales. Cabinet insiders told the Mail & Guardian=20 this week that it […]

fizz David Gow and Dominic Walsh PEPSICO has decided that it is time to act on the American catchphrase – “food to go”. Last week the company, maker of the world’s second most popular fizzy drink, announced that it planned to dump its poorly performing restaurant business, which includes the KFC and Taco Bell chains, […]

Max Gebhardt LAST year’s crash in the rand helped South Africa’s mining houses to report higher returns in the final quarter of 1996, but unless there is a marked improvement in the gold price, the mines could face another round of retrenchments and downsizing. While the latest round of quarterly results were in line with […]

Ruaridh Nicoll in Luanda=20 AT dawn, in a hangar at Luanda’s airport,=20 blue-beret troops of the largest United=20 Nations peacekeeping mission in the world=20 stand in the rising heat. Each of them knows that the UN’s mission in=20 Angola officially finishes at the end of=20 February, but they do not expect to go=20 home. Instead […]