What with Christmas only six weeks away and the new “Unintel Inside” postal services in full delay mode, I thought it might be prudent to spend this and the next column getting in a few early suggestions for ideal Yuletide gifts. Here they are, a list of what I think are offbeat but also very […]

Andrew Muchineripi Soccer The constant demands of many Bafana Bafana supporters are finally going to be met when the national team play a friendly against Germany at the Rhein Stadium in Dusseldorf on Saturday. But it is by accident rather than design that coach Clive Barker will send out a dramatically-altered team for the biggest […]

Peta Thornycroft Glen Goosen, former director of investigations at the truth commission, has formally complained about a programme broadcast on SAfm last week which contained an interview with his former boss, Dumisa Ntsebeza. In the programme, TRC in Review, Ntsebeza accused Goosen of being part of an incompetent investigation and suggested race played a part […]

Lorraine Pace It should have been a media coup. A case that has grabbed print headlines internationally and been beamed to television screens worldwide was due to set a Web precedent last Monday. But a minute before the decision was to be issued, the Web service provider had a power failure. Ironically, this resulted in […]

FRIDAY 5.00PM: SINGER Brenda Fassie jumped over the dock at Friday’s bail hearing for “people’s poet” Mzwakhe Mbuli, as she and 200 other supporters disrupted the hearings until the magistrate walked out. Before the magistrate entered, Fassie demanded — and got — permission to go down to the cells to see Mbuli, who hugged and […]

Melvyn Minnaar If it’s apple you want to drink, go for it. There’s real, virgin apple juice, there’s fabulous, world-famous Appletiser, and then there is apple cider – the hottest, coolest drink in to-be-seen-in bars this summer. The gentrification – or yuppiefication – of cider is a world-wide phenomenon. Winning more and more bright and […]

FRIDAY, 11.00AM: BAFANA BAFANA coach Clive Barker is likely to field a squad that will attack from the first whistle against Germany. He said Bafana Bafana’s skill is the only way to upset Germany. “If we are not creative we will be beaten,” said Barker. “I believe we are stronger than them in a one-on-one […]

Nkosazana Zuma and Louis Luyt are taking pep-up pills from spin doctors Ferial Haffajee It cost a lot, but the R2,8-million which Minister of Health Nkosazana Zuma splashed out on improving her image and that of her department is paying dividends. Watch her: there’s a softer touch; less defensive and more confident. The three Bills […]

A dictionary says it has found a new word to represent each of the past 102 years. As if English were so limited. David Rowan and John Ezard report One of Western youth culture’s handiest, most lethal and (till recently) most universal devices of insult happens to be dropping out of the English language. The […]

FRIDAY, 5.00PM IT was a bad Friday for shares on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange, with the all share index dropping 139 points or 2,1% to finish the day on 6374. At one stage the market was down more than 3%. The industrial index slid 111 points to 7898, while the financial index plummeted 214 points […]