Staff Reporter

Mail & Guardian reporter Sipho Seepe, one of South Africa’s leading political commentators and academics, has joined the Mail & Guardian as a columnist and associate editor. A physicist by training, Seepe, who is principal of Vista University’s campus at Sebokeng, has emerged in recent years as one of the sharpest analysts on South African […]

POLICE have confiscated one million Mandrax tablets, with an estimated street value of R40m, at a Durban warehouse and arrested five suspects, aged between 14 and 37. The tablets were found concealed in soft animal dolls imported from China.

The Independent Communications Authority has called for oral and written submissions on the review of local content quota, currently at 20% for radio.

THE Nigerian army chief has defended recent life jail sentences imposed on 25 wounded soldiers accused of mutiny for complaining about their conditions. The soldiers, who were injured while serving in ECOMOG, a west African peacekeeping force, were sentenced to life imprisonment at the end of last month for protesting against conditions surrounding their medical […]

Khadija Magardie On a late afternoon in December, four years ago, Ncele Kgadima * locked herself inside a long-drop toilet on a rural plot in Ga-Maribana, Moletji, outside Pietersburg in the Northern Province. The heavily pregnant woman, 20 years old at the time, gave birth in the fetid, dank and poorly lit toilet. Then she […]

At the end of last year the ANC relaunched its journal, <em>Umrabulo</em>, a word used to inspire political discussion and debate on Robben Island.

MUNGO SOGGOT, Johannesburg | Friday THE brother of a senior official guiding South Africas controversial R43bn arms package has been a director of a local offshoot of one of the winning foreign companies from as early as 1996 – winning contracts worth at least R400m in the process. Shabir Shaik, the brother of Shamin Chippy […]

SOUTH African residents who were compelled by the Nazis to work as forced labourers in Austria during World War II should contact the Austrian embassy because they stand to benefit from a new reconciliation fund, which will make payments to former slave and forced labourers. The Austrian embassy said about one million foreign citizens were […]

Thuli Nhlapo In a bid to cling to power, the now-defunct Hartbeespoort white conservative local council has rendered the newly elected council dysfunctional with the help of a controversial Pretoria High Court judge. The new Hartbeespoort/Brits local council, referred to as NW372, has been barred from using any assets, making staff changes and touching the […]

SOUTH African smart card company Aplitec has given financial services group Nedcor an option to raise its stake to 50% from 25.1%. It will also waive the mandatory offer which may be required to be made if there is a change of control as a result of Nedcor exercising the option.

Kevin Mitchell darts It’s hard not to be rude about the town of Purfleet. Well, the bit of it between the railway station and the Circus Tavern. Out the station and south down Railway Cottages. Turn left across the road from Cheggie’s hairdressing salon and plough on through the sludge past the bulk containers, the […]

Nkosi Johnson is among the children to have survived longest with HIV, but this determined 11-year-old is now helpless Belinda Beresford They come to praise him. And to mourn him, although the skeletal 11- year-old child lying unmoving in his bed is still doing the thing that brought him worldwide fame living. For 11 years […]

Pick of the week was the Sunday-evening 8pm movie, Jack Frost.

Bafana Bafana will field a weakened side against Mauritiius but some of the players will not be missed Andrew Muchineripi South African football supporters can be an annoyingly arrogant bunch at times, especially when the national team is playing one of the so-called minnows of Africa. This weekend is a case in point with many […]

The African National Congress won resoundingly in the Tshwane Metropolitan Council election last month.

According to the Rationalisation of Local Government Affairs Act road closing and access restricting measures can be granted by a municipality under the following conditions: l The applicant must justify a need for such closure by providing crime statistics in the area concerned. l The applicant must outline security measures that have been used (bobbies […]

Jill Waterman DANCE The Dance Factory in the Newtown Cultural Precinct, Johannesburg, is a buzzing dance centre for 26 aspiring young artists. The December vacation has been a special dance training time for this youth group, as they have been working daily on a contemporary dance production of Oliver. The dance theatre work is based […]

The likes of Springer have built empires by exposing the exhibitionist in all of us and <em>Survivor</em> was no different.

What a delight to commence a couple of years without elections and put our energy into transforming the country.

Riaan Wolmarans CDs OFTHEWEEK Christmas always brings a glut of greatest-hits compilations as record companies cash in on the time of giving. Most actually boil down to three hit singles off the artist’s measly two albums plus a few others that received radio play, rather than a showcase of an accomplished career. Two welcome exceptions […]

AMNESTY International has demanded that a report by the UN and Organisation of African Unity (OAU) into claims that hundreds of people were murdered and their bodies dumped in the sea after the June 1998 presidential election in Togo be made public. The human rights organisation also demanded steps to ensure the protection of any […]

MALAWI’s fiercest political rivals have united in a rare show of solidarity to mourn the death of the country’s champion for the disabled. Minister in the President’s Office George Claver died on Monday while campaigning for the economic rights of rural disabled people. Claver, himself physically disabled, single-handedly spearheaded the battle for recognition of economic […]

THE SA mint has won a tender to supply low denomination euro currency coin blanks to several European countries. William du Plessis, GM of SA Mint’s marketing circulation coins department, said yesterday the mint had obtained fixed contracts with the Netherlands, the Republic of Ireland and Portugal. Du Plessis could not disclose the value of […]

PHILLIP NKOSI, Pretoria | Thursday FIVE Pretoria businessmen accused of selling more than 340 dud computers to Mpumalanga schools in a R3,7m scam allegedly used their loot to buy plush mansions in the capital and at Plettenberg Bay. The five men, all linked to Keystone Information Systems, are also believed to have sold an additional […]

SEVERAL churches and beer parlours were burned down by hundreds of Muslim youths, who went on the rampage after sighting the lunar eclipse in a northern Nigerian state. “While the people were going around chanting incantations of repentance to God, they ran amok and attacked beer parlours, setting them ablaze,” he said. Several churches were […]

BRIAN LIGOMEKA, Blantyre |Thursday MALAWI has purchased its first 244 hectares of land for an ambitious US$25m land resettlement programme in an attempt to avert Zimbabwe-style land invasions. Land minister Thengo Maloya said the two lakeside estates in Malawi’s southern Mangochi district would help relieve mounting pressure for agricultural land by an estimated 21_000 landless […]

GHANAS new President John Kufuor has named a series of ministers to his government. Hackman Owusu-Agyermang was given the foreign affairs portfolio, Kwame Addo-Kufuor was nominated as defence minister and Alhaji Malik Yakubu Alhassan received the interior portfolio. Yaw Osafo Maafo was named finance minister, Nana Akufo-Addo justice minister and Kofi Apraku trade and industry […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Johannesburg | Thursday BETWEEN 16% and 20% of all teachers in South Africa are HIV/Aids positive, according to a report commissioned by the education department to probe the impact of HIV/Aids on education. The study, conducted by Abt Associates, suggests that Aids related deaths will also be the main cause of death among […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Johannesburg | Thursday LEADERSHIP and organisational weaknesses within the ANC, and the steady erosion of minority and youth support, will be high on the agenda when the partys top decision-makers gather for a four-day strategic meeting. Also expected to be a major talking point will be how to deliver on promises of basic […]