Staff Reporter

EGYPTIAN President Hosni Mubarak has set October 18 as the date for launching the country’s “free” parliamentary elections. Voting has been divided into three stages to ensure compliance with an electoral law adopted in July, requiring a magistrate to be present in each of the country’s 15 000 or more polling places. Voters will choose […]

THE London-listed base metals group Billiton plc has confirmed that it has offered shareholders of Rio Algom Limited CD27 (Canadian dollars), or R129,87 a share, in pursuit of its bid for the Canadian zinc and copper producer. Billiton said the company had posted the offer to shareholders on Friday. Billiton is competing for the stake […]

AT least 65 people, mostly women and children, have been killed in an attack with automatic rifles and hand weapons by a powerful Ethiopian tribe. Members of the Borena tribe attacked the smaller Garri tribe in the district of Arero, 700km south of Addis Ababa. Local authorities said at least 65 died in the massacre, […]

AFP, New York | Sunday PRESIDENT Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe said he could have decapitated Ian Smith, the country’s former white prime minister, but that he refrained from doing so because he was not a dictator. “We have not decapitated him … he still has his land, thank God we are a forgiving people. Now, […]

RANGERS from around the world, including 17 African countries, will attend the third world congress of the International Ranger Federation in the Kruger National Park next week. It will be the first time the congress is held in Africa and the aim is to focus attention on wildlife conservation on the continent in particular, as […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Cape Town | Sunday POLICE have made a significant breakthrough in their fight against the wave of terror gripping Cape Town by identifying the latest two urban terror attacks in the city as the work of the same group. The Cape Argus newspaper reported that the same stolen car – a white Citi […]

SHAMILA Batohi, who led the evidence during the King inquiry into cricket match-fixing, has been appointed head of the elite investigating unit, the Scorpions, in KwaZulu-Natal. Batohi is currently the deputy director of public prosecutions in Durban. Batohi succeeds Chris Macadam, who now heads up the human rights unit in national director of prosecutions Bulelani […]

EMELIA SITHOLE, Johannesburg | Saturday A COALITION of South African anti-Aids groups plans legal action to force the government to provide the nevirapine drug – which has been offered to the developing world for free – to prevent expectant mothers passing the virus to their babies. The Treatment Action Campaign (TAC) said its hand had […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT and REUTERS, New York | Saturday ZIMBABWEAN President Robert Mugabe has vowed to press ahead with his much-criticised seizure of white-owned farms and launched a blistering attack on the world’s powerful nations, saying they should not be allowed to recolonize Africa by stealth. Mugabe’s fierce speech to a special United Nations Millennial Summit […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT and REUTERS, Cape Town | Saturday CAPE Town’s faceless bombers have struck for the eighth time this year, blowing up a car outside the popular Obz Cafe in the suburb of Observatory, a popular student hangout. No injuries were reported and damage was minimal. The bomb exploded barely 12 hours after anti-terrorist magistrate […]

James Hall Sacking Swaziland’s most powerful and feared traditional leader, Dibanisa Mavuso, for a poaching violation after a career of seriously abusing the powers of his office may seem like the FBI finally collaring Al Capone for tax evasion. The palace never reacted when the country’s traditional prime minister sent police to round up government […]

Rupert Neethling In cyberspace privacy equals security. If websites publicly refrain from peeking secretly into their visitors’ computers – or playing hard and fast with their visitors’ personal data – then surfers are more likely to be reassured and thus more willing to supply their data (including their credit-card details) without feeling that they are […]

a round-earther These are extracts from the detailed diary kept by a member of the Presidential Aids Advisory panel May 2000 I was invited to participate on the Presidential Aids Advisory Panel which would have high visibility given President Thabo Mbeki’s famous letter to United States President Bill Clinton and his flirtation with denialists – […]

Robyn Orlin is managing to convince European audiences that she knows what she’s up to – but can she do the same at home? Matthew Krouse After years of pussyfooting around the smaller venues of the Market Theatre complex, Robyn Orlin has finally arrived on the main stage of the place where she launched herself […]

The new CD by Wyclef Jean, the dreadlocked powerhouse behind The Fugees, features ska, 41 gunshots, Pink Floyd and a rapping Kenny Rogers Dom Phillips Hip-hop makes sense in New York: the town that created it is still enslaved by it. On a muggy afternoon, the street vendors on Broadway blast out rap, selling mix […]

The government will face legal action following its failure to introduce measures to prevent mother-to-child transmission of HIV Timothy Trengove-Jones The Aids Treatment Action Campaign (Atac) has announced that it plans to proceed with legal action against the government. The campaign’s case will challenge the government’s refusal to imple- ment programmes to prevent the transmission […]

Thebe Mabanga joins the Democratic Alliance on its local government election trail through poverty-stricken Alexandra Tony Leon revels in the spotlight and looks resplendent in a pink shirt as he moves over to embrace a group of women exclaiming “re a lerata lona, retlolikissa [we love you, we want to kiss you]”. His attire, however, […]

Andrew Muchineripi soccer For many inhabitants of our beautiful land, the Olympic Games have tended to be a peripheral sporting occasion. Events would be watched in various sporting codes without a real feeling of belonging. Not any more. The Amaglug-glug are the most loved of our national football teams and although their group matches in […]

acknowledged Sechaba ka’Nkosi crossfire A close friend, Muff Anderson, last year asked me to testify in a civil suit she had instituted against a black colleague. It was a typical office disagreement where the colleague had resorted to calling her a racist. Muff rightfully felt offended. And for a person I had related to as […]

Jaspreet Kindra A remarkable feature of politics and reportage on it in South Africa is that it is dominated by two elitists – President Thabo Mbeki and the leader of the opposition, Tony Leon. Since most South Africans are poor, one would expect any self-respecting, or clever, politician to make poverty a central strategy. Instead, […]

Steven Friedman worm’s eye view Last week was a good one for those of us who insist that reality in this society is more complicated than the doom-sayers suggest. For those who insist we are on an inevitable path to authoritarianism, the national conference on racism allowed government politicians to polarise us further by demonising […]

Rupert Neethling ‘This is what the Internet should be all about,” declared a friend back in 1997 on discovering instant messaging (IM). He was already a cyber veteran, but IM finally allowed him to converse with online friends in real time. IM software allows you to see when a friend goes online, following which you […]

Thebe Mabanga theatre The name Fong Kong was made popular by a kwaito hit. It refers to the counterfeit merchandise sold by immigrants on the city’s pavements. It is also the name of an upbeat, interesting production that looks at the daily struggles of African illegal immigrants in South Africa. The piece, which was featured […]

Anthony Browne Body Language ‘So many men, so little time!” The actress and temptress Mae West jested about it, but scientists – male ones anyway – are convinced they have proved it. Women – far from being naturally monogamous – are, like men, naturally promiscuous. Biologists believe that women are genetically programmed to have sex […]

Ivor Powell In a bid to end ongoing divisions in the Mpumalanga provincial government, President Thabo Mbeki is expected to axe the province’s controversial Premier, Ndaweni Mahlangu, next week – and replace him with Deputy Minister of Edu- cation Smangaliso Mkhatshwa. Mkhatshwa was originally tipped for the premiership, when Mbeki unexpectedly announced the appointment of […]

Thebe Mabanga in your ear So Metrofm is reported to have 5,6-million listeners, making it the second-largest station in the country after Ukhozi fm (Radio Zulu), which has 6,7-million listeners. If you are a Metro listener, you are now probably drowning in a hype-induced frenzy. For that is all it is really. Here’s why. In […]

While the west is taking its first tentative steps towards Web-enabled cellphones, i-mode is walking tall in the east, writes Jonathan Watts There is a new walk on the streets of Tokyo these days. It is too slow to be a stroll and too purposeful to be a wander. In crowds it often results in […]

Olympic leaders have shied away from tests which would expose those using human growth hormones Gavin Evans Let’s say you’re a sprinter on the verge of world class. Until now you’ve played it clean – gallons of creatine, glycogen and nitrogen, obviously, but you’ve resisted offers to take the tempting banned performance-enhancers that you just […]

Howard Barrell President Thabo Mbeki is driving a R6- million project to record the history of the struggle against apartheid over the 30 years leading up to South Africa’s first democratic election in 1994. His officials in the Office of the Presidency have talked cellphone operator MTN and Nedcor, the banking group, into jointly providing […]

Peter Robinson Allan Donald, South African cricket’s prodigal son, should be welcomed back to the fold on Friday. If he isn’t, Rushdie Magiet and his selection panel deserve to have all six of their heads banged together. Donald took off the South African winter to play for Warwickshire this year. He skipped the three-Test series […]

Jane Rosenthal Die swye van Mario Salviati by Etienne van Heerden (Tafelberg) A landscape dominated by space and stone provides the setting for this novel – the Moordenaarskaroo and Weemoedvlakte (Melancholy Plains), where the “karoo wind cannot be distinguished from song”, and the past and the present coexist in a reality which is richer, and […]

A private farm watch group in KwaZulu-Natal has been accused of taking the law into its own hands Cheryl Goodenough Employees of a private farm protection organisation in rural southern KwaZulu- Natal have been implicated in a string of brutal attacks on farm labourers and rural communities that have left two dead and 16 badly […]