CINEMA: Andrew Worsdale reviews Beautiful Girls EARLIER this year, “women’s movies” were a dime a dozen on circuit. From How to Make an American Quilt to Now and Then, their stories focused on women’s desires and dreams and how men messed them around. By the end of the ride you’d had a couple of chuckles […]

SERJEANT AT THE BAR The Constitutional Court is taken to task for assuming an old-style, chauvinistic attitude to international law South African courts have a long history of hostility towards international human rights law. During the apartheid era this was unsurprising, particularly because it was impossible to reconcile our domestic legal order with international standards […]

If Primus beer runs dry, Burundians will know the economy has collapsed, reports Chris McGreal from Bujumbura Perhaps the safest way to get around Burundi is to hitch a ride on a Primus beer lorry. While other vehicles run the gauntlet of Hutu rebels, and the army moves with trepidation in many rural areas, there […]

Tebello Radebe Chairman of the Association of Mortgage Lenders, Duncan Reekie, says rising interest rates and growing unemployment are the main reasons why the banks have not financed as many houses as expected. Reekie’s response follows widespread criticism levelled against the government for failing to deliver on its promises for houses. “The view of the […]

A former spy chief and transformation consultants Deloitte & Touche are connected. Mungo Soggott reports A controversial army general and former spy chief is at the centre of a row over a R50-million management consultant contract to transform the South African National Defence Force (SANDF). Rival consultants have complained about the award of the transformation […]

Vivek Chaudhary in London The British Queen, thought to be one of the world’s richest women, could increase her income sixfold under proposals to scrap money given to the royal family by the government, in return for money generated from property owned by the family. The proposal is one of five under consideration that would […]

Stefaans BrUmmer THE Department of Correctional Services this week started an investigation into former security police captain and convicted murderer Michael Bellingan’s “walkabout” outside prison in May. Bellingan, who is serving a 25-year sentence at Diepkloof Prison, near Soweto, was allegedly seen in Johannesburg’s plush Killarney Mall, in civilian clothes, on May 14. He killed […]

Mail & Guardian Reporter JUDGE Edwin Cameron was hauled into the spotlight in the Pretoria Supreme Court last week when one of his brothers, Judge Pierre Roux, took the unusual step of needling him and his recent landmark defamation judgment. While judges delight in torpedoing each other’s judgments, they rarely gun for each other’s personalities […]

Mark Milner in London British Aerospace (BAe) and Lagardere are no doubt right to claim that their decision to combine missile businesses reflects the changing nature of defence procurement in Europe. Nor is Europe the only place where the defence industry is being redefined. Look no further than the emergence, through merger, of United States […]

Stefaans Brummer reports on the mystery surrounding the Project Coast chemical weapons programme PRESIDENT Nelson Mandela and his deputy, Thabo Mbeki, this week backed Defence Force Chief General Georg Meiring in his battle to keep details of South Africa’s apartheid-era chemical weapons programme from the public. Parliament’s Standing Committee on Public Accounts on Wednesday had […]