With the latest recall of millions of unsafe toys by the world’s biggest toy company, Mattel, a stark truth has come home to roost for the $60-billion global toy industry: you cannot have dirt-cheap production thousands of kilometres away from home in China without incurring huge risk. It is a truth that could cost the industry dearly, not just in immediate costs.
Imagine a telephone company that pays you money to receive calls — sound like pie in the sky? Well then you haven’t heard about Vox Telecom, the new Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) teleÂphone services, which offer a real, cut-price alternative to Telkom’s fixed-line offering.
I have been using Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) — or more specifically voice over broadband — services for a long time and the usual culprits on my list are the free messenger programs, such as Skype, MSN Messenger or Google Talk. These are available online for free and they provide a great way to keep in touch with family and friends, writes Rudolph Muller.
Khalid Rashid — the Pakistani whose 2005 deportation from South Africa sparked a media furore and a court challenge to the government — has broken his silence. And his account, in a telephone interview from Pakistan, flatly contradicts the Home Affairs Department’s repeated claims that he was deported as an illegal immigrant in terms of standard procedure.
The decision about whether to re-charge Jacob Zuma may be taken only after the African National Congress’s watershed leadership conference in December, sources close to the National Prosecuting Authority have told the Mail & Guardian. Legal and political considerations mean that National Director of Public Prosecutions Vusi Pikoli may postpone his decision until after the first round of the succession battle is settled.
Suspended South African Communist Party member and former treasurer Phillip Dexter confirmed this week that he could find no bank statements reflecting at least R1,1-million cash, allegedly given to the general secretary of the party, Blade Nzimande. Dexter said that ”on the face of it there appears to be a connection” between his suspension and the missing funds.
A notorious security policeman, retired Lieutenant General Sebastiaan ”Basie” Smit, might soon rue the day that he turned down an offer from the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) to join former law and order minister Adriaan Vlok in the dock recently. Speculation about whether Smit will be prosecuted has been rife.
Strict conditions placed on the merger of two giant publishers of school textbooks have not eliminated concerns that the market still fails to provide schoolchildren with reasonably priced, high-quality books. The Shuttleworth Foundation, which strongly opposes the merger, has recommended that the government investigates the whole school textbook
Bertin Wafio sits in a village clearing sipping tea from a flask, his teenage bodyguards self-consciously examining their ancient rifles and wearily scanning the horizon. ”We have been in the bush for two years now, fighting to bring peace and security to our country,” said Wafio, one of the leaders of Central African Republic’s Popular Army for the Restoration of the Republic and Democracy.
The Sunday Times legal team plans to counter legal action by the health minister on the grounds that her right to privacy is overridden by the public’s right to know whether she is competent to exercise her duties. At the core of the newspaper’s defence is debate over whether she is fit to hold office in the Cabinet.