Government plans to stiffen immigration legislation follow warnings by Western intelligence services that illegal immigrants have turned South Africa into a top drug conduit Paul Kirk The British intelligence service, MI5, has singled out South Africa as one of the “most important” conduits for South American drugs into Western Europe in a confidential report submitted […]

There is still time for the Human Rights Commission (HRC) to avoid a train smash over the “racism in the media” inquiry. It can withdraw the “notices of intention” that it has served on a host of editors, back off from the confrontational nature of the inquiry and, in co-operation with editors and other press […]

Fumane Diseko COLOURS OF THE MOUNTAIN by Da Chen (Random House) DAUGHTER OF THE RIVER by Hong Ying (Bloomsbury) Both these books are autobiographical texts dealing with life in China. Da Chen, born in 1962 into a “landlord’s family” during Mao Zedong’s rule, suffers for the sins of his family. The roller- coaster policies of […]

Ben Ngubane Elisabeth Lickindorf’s article “SA students are scientifically illiterate”(January 14 to 20) is based on the research results of a science literacy survey conducted on first-year university and technikon students in 1994. Dr Rudiger Laugksch and Professor Peter Spargo at the universities of the North and Cape Town published the results of the survey […]

Robert Colman Gregory Vuyani Maqoma is one of the young choreographers commissioned to do a piece for this year’s FNB Vita Dance Umbrella. I sat in on a rehearsal of his work, Rhythm Blues, at the Dance Factory. At first the dancers are self-conscious, pretending not to be, of the stranger in the rehearsal room. […]

Rhoda Kadalie A SECOND LOOK I call on the editors of the selected media to defy the subpoenas served on them by the Human Rights Commission (HRC) en bloc. By appearing before the HRC, they will give credence to a discredited organisation that has failed to carry out its mandate effectively since its inception in […]

Howard Barrell The government is seeking to avoid a political train smash with public service unions by overhauling the civil service pay structure that would automatically fix most annual increases at about the rate of inflation. But these government proposals – at the centre of its plans to improve the civil service while halting the […]

Four hours from the summit of Everest, Cathy O’Dowd came across a stricken climber. She faced a brutal choice: to risk her own life in a doomed rescue – or to push on to the top. Here she explains why she left the barely breathing body I stared at the body, blinking in disbelief. We […]

Christian Figenschou In what is likely to be one of the year’s most important new car launches, Italian car maker Fiat has marked an aggressive leap into the local market with the introduction of its 178 “world car” range, comprising the Fiat Palio hatchback, the Palio Weekend station wagon and the Siena sedan. Fiat, which […]

Graham Greene’s love affair with the mysterious ‘C’ is revealed obliquely in his books and private papers. Robert McCrum has read them Graham Greene was a novelist who understood the meaning and mechanics of mystery. He patrolled with impressive vigilance the perimeter fence of his privacy, while at the same time scattering tantalising clues about […]