Tentacles of the fraud octopus will `be chopped off with a sharp machete’, reports Justin Arenstein THE former head of one of Mpumalanga’s regional councils, Gerhard Smith, went down in history as the main tentacle of a “muddy and smelly octopus” this week after he was fingered for milking at least R3,24-million from the province. […]

Apart from six palaces — one for each wife — Swazi King Mswati III earlier this year bought a hotel, it has been discovered SWAZI King Mswati III has bought an R8-million hotel in Mbabane at a time when the homes of many of his subjects are being repossessed by Swaziland’s banks. Both the price […]

Why does photographer Ian van Coller cut off the heads of his subjects? SUZY BELL finds out IN the beginning, the gods gave all the seeds and plants to the animals of the world to grow. Mabuyu was given to the hyena, who unfortunately was very last in line, and he was so upset he […]

Team physiotherapist Craig Smith is one of the busiest members of the South African A team on tour in England CRICKET: Barney Spender THE scene has become fairly typical over the last two weeks. A small clutch of hacks, with markedly different gaits, making their way to the South African A team’s dressing room. Boolam […]

Justin Pearce Members of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission received unexpected salary increases of 25% during July, only a few months after they started work. The increase brought each commissioner’s pre-tax earnings to R28 750 per month — about R15 000 after tax. But not all the commissioners are happy about the increases, and are […]

William Bratton, who licked crime in the Big Apple, is due here next week. He describes the business principles behind his success. WHEN I was appointed police commissioner by New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani in 1994, the department was in disarray and the city’s high crime rate showed few signs of coming down. I […]

Justin Pearce The State Archives has allowed the Mail & Guardian access to cabinet memoranda, which were for years kept locked away in terms of the Archives Act. But a search through the papers revealed nothing that would have caused the collapse of the South African state — though some very telling documents do stand […]

In art-world terms, he’s not even out of diapers — but everyone wants a piece of Moshekwa Langa. HAZEL FRIEDMAN finds out why MOI? Artist Moshekwa Langa doesn’t exactly respond “But why me?” to my request for a meeting, and certainly not in French. But everything about his reaction — from the almost hysterical giggle […]

Angella Johnson A British woman’s five-year quest to discover who killed her fiance moved a step forward this week when one of two South African men being sought in connection with his kidnapping and murder was arrested in Johannesburg. Tarn Phillips, a 40-year-old London accountant, said she was delighted that William Chait (featured recently in […]

Phalaborwa, a mining town on the edge of the Kruger Park with a previously racist image, has successfully embraced the new South Africa, writes Mungo Soggot The huge trucks which ferry copper-rich rubble out of the Palabora Mining Company’s (PMC) pit around the clock stopped hauling for a few hours last Sunday morning and the […]