SARAH BULLEN, Johannesburg | Friday 5.00pm. LOCAL stock dragged through Friday to close slightly softer ahead of the welcome weekend. Dealers described the day as dull and directionless, with under R1-billion volume traded. Dealers said the calm is fairly typical after a futures close-out, and most dealers were squaring their position ahead of the weekend. […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Johannesburg | Friday 8.30pm. THE three year talks between the European Union and South Africa over a sweeping free trade agreement fell through on Friday over the issue of concessions for agricultural products. The failure comes just days after both sides expressed hope that the three years of tough talks would be wrapped […]

CHRISTIAN FIGENSCHOU, Johannesburg | Sunday 8.30pm. ROBERT McBRIDE will brief the Cabinet and African National Congress leadership about what he was doing when he was arrested in Mozambique in March, according to ANC legal chief Mathews Phosa. Phosa said on Saturday that the Cabinet has assigned Safety and Security Minister Sydney Mufamadi to deal with […]

Richard Cornwell and Jakkie Potgieter Propaganda claims to the contrary, there appears to be a relative lull in the fighting in the Democratic Republic of Congo, as the various forces regroup and resupply, while the deteriorating weather makes the large-scale movement of mechanised troops increasingly difficult. This provides a breathing space in which the region’s […]

Tony Twine According to the cautionary tale, Goldilocks may well have been the archetypal consumer who fell foul of a bear trend. In search of that elusive economic entity, a free lunch (or was it breakfast?), she unleashed a sequence of events which left her at the mercy of the bears – quite a depressing […]

Demutualisation hopes have lost their shine in the wake of turmoil in the financial markets, writes Belinda Beresford You could be forgiven for confusing the huff and puff over demutualisation with the sound of the gravy train pulling in for a lucky few. Since last year, the financial world has been talking up the conversion […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Cape Town | Thursday 9.00pm. A NEW special investigating unit is to be set up to concentrate on gangs and organised crime, Justice Minister Dullah Omar announced on Thursday. A unit focusing on gang-related activity and violence in the Western Cape will begin operations immediately, he told a press conference in Cape Town. […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Maseru | Friday 7.30pm. ANTI-GOVERNMENT protesters in Maseru reportedly occupied government offices on Friday, forcing out state workers who obeyed an order on state radio to return to their jobs. Public servants who stayed away from government offices in Maseru for three days due to pressure from opposition parties were ordered back to […]

David Conn : English Soccer English football has been transformed so rapidly in the last few years, from a game millions paid cheaply to watch on ramshackle terracing, to an activity which can make 100-million for one man like Martin Edwards, that it is difficult at times to make articulate sense of isolated developments. So […]

Alan Henry : Formula One Last weekend Italy was on strike. For two hours on Sunday afternoon the entire nation was infected with an epidemic of scarlet fever, rendering them unable to move away from their television and radio sets. The focus of the nation’s devotion was Monza, a 5,76km loop of tarmac in the […]