Staff Reporter

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Johannesburg, Pietersburg | Friday 3.50pm THE government plans to privatise thousands of properties and fixed assets from its R120-billion property portfolio. Business Report quotes Public Works Minister Stella Sigcau as saying that the government intends to dispose of all redundant state-owned houses within the first half of this year. Sigcau is also reported […]

Reports by Marianne Merten Helicopters scampering over the blazing vineyards of Constantia became the “motif” of the Cape of Storms this week as the Peninsula burst into flames producing scenes that could have been staged for a mega disaster movie. >From the beaches of Muizenberg columns of smoke rising above the mountains behind Scarborough and […]

As the Australian Open began in Melbourne this week, the home crowds expected 18- year-old Adelaide prodigy Lleyton Hewitt to be their next hero. Stephen Bierley reports Most European visitors arriving in Melbourne at this time of year do so in the pitch dark, jet-lagged and saddle sore, with winter still in their bones. They […]

Life with the creature feature – Jack Schofield charts the rise of the robots The creation of artificial life will be one of the themes of the 21st century; it’s already helping to drive the toys and games market, from CyberLife’s Creatures to Sony’s AIBO robot dog. A generation of children is keeping “virtual pets” […]

Saturday: In the hot, dry and windy conditions various veld fires spring up in the greater Cape metropolitan area. Sunday: The fire starts in the mountain ranges around Hout Bay in the Silvermine area of the Cape Peninsula National Park. A historic house at East Fort above Chapman’s Peak Drive is destroyed. Staff from the […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Johannesburg | Friday 12.30pm. THE Volkswagen plant at Uitenhage ground to a halt on Thursday as workers went on strike protesting the suspension of a group of shop stewards by the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa. The strike, affecting about 300 workers, took place after Numsa’s succesful application for a Labour […]

ANGRY demonstrators demanded the return of the death penalty outside the Port Alfred Magistrate’s Court when two brothers appeared in connection with the murder of Brenda Fairhead and her daughter, Kia. Bongani and Zolani Tom, 21 and 22, were not asked to plead and they refused the services of a lawyer. They will remain in […]

Channel vision Some long years back I got trapped in an aircraft window seat by a young Pik Botha. I think he was then at the World Court in The Hague. We were on a flight from London to Johannesburg and the more Pik banged on to all around him about the moral certainties, the […]

Scotch Tagwireyi and Connie Selebogo Will it be a group of talented players who click together or a well-drilled and determined team that does the trick when 16 African countries meet in Ghana and Nigeria this week for the 22nd African Cup of Nations? The 16 nations have gathered their best local- and foreign-based players […]

Chris McGreal A triumph of nature over technology has left a multimillion-rand World Bank scheme to combat giant weeds clogging Lake Victoria trailing behind an army of small bugs. The release of weevils into Africa’s largest lake has dramatically reversed the all-consuming spread of the water hyacinth, dubbed the “Aids of the water” in Uganda […]

Heather Hogan The number of HIV/Aids-related deaths outstripped the number of births in KwaZulu-Natal last year, according to a report released by the South African Institute of Race Relations. In the report, Professor Alan Smith, head of the virology department at the University of Natal, warns that the rest of South Africa will eventually follow […]

BAFANA Bafana completed their local preparations for the African Nations Cup with a 8-0 drubbing of lower division club Arcadia Shepherds. Pollen Ndlanya and Siyabonga Nomvete scored two goals each.

FRENCH clubs will be hardest hit by the biennial showcase of African football with more than 40 first and lower-division players getting national team call ups for the African Nations Cup.

Bob Woolmer >From the Pavilion The changing of the guard is a daily ritual outside Buckingham Palace. Unfortunately, although I suppose inevitably, it also have to happen to the national cricket side. It is an unsettling feeling; the side has performed brilliantly and have become loved by the whole of South Africa. The announcement of […]

bombings Ivor Powell New evidence of police involvement in Cape bombings has come to light in the questioning of police informer Deon Mostert by the Independent Complaints Directorate (ICD). Top police sources told the Mail & Guardian that Mostert has identified a Cape policeman, who he alleges was involved in planting bombs, as part of […]

Andreas Vinciguerra (Sweden) Age: 18 Ranking: 96 Prize money: $121122 Vinciguerra jumped 541 positions last year to a high of 96 – the third-youngest player to finish in the top 100. The left-hander has yet to win an ATP Tour title, but is an outstanding junior who considers his forehand his best shot, and clay […]

The Kruger Park and a local community are locking horns over an extraordinary deal that allows commercial hunting in the country’s top game reserve. Fiona Macleod reports Barely a year after the Makuleke community regained ownership of 24E000ha in the Kruger National Park, it has signed an agreement with a Northern Province hunting outfit to […]

GOALKEEPER Alain Gouamene, who kept five blank sheets sheets when Cote d’Ivoire won the 1992 edition, will be making his seventh consecutive appearance at the finals of the African Nations Cup.

STEVEN MANN, Cape Town | Friday 8.45am EXHAUSTED firefighters were breathing easier late on Thursday night, as the series of blazes which have devastated large areas of the city appeared to be under control. “It’s pretty quiet. Everybody is on standby,” said Ian Schnetler of the joint operations control centre. Fires were still burning at […]

Spioenkop. The bloodiest battle of the Anglo-Boer South African War. It was little more than a skirmish, but on this dusty little stage three great statesmen of the 20th century played a role. And so did the ghost of Jack the Ripper. Gavin Foster reports Louis Botha was there. Less than three months before, as […]

`Theme funds’ have emerged to cater to specialised investment needs, writes Fumane Diseko The performance of unit trust funds based on ethics, such as the Oasis Crescent Fund, Southern Pure Specialist Fund and the Community Growth Fund, has overturned the cynical view that limitations on these funds reduce returns. According to Colin Woodin, executive director […]

Donna Block Share World Europe has got it and got it bad. What have they got? The flu? Yeah, they have that but they’ve also got “the fever”. Stock and bond fever, that is. All across the continent individual investors are getting into a frenzy over the share markets. Just a few short years ago, […]

Annalee Newitz Body Language In a quiet San Francisco neighbourhood, surrounded by views of tree-covered hills, a quaint little B&B welcomes visitors from across the country. Guests can choose from four well-appointed rooms in this refurbished turn-of-the-century house, all personally decorated by Elizabeth, the proprietor. While they’re staying at Elizabeth’s B&B – called Differences – […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Johannesburg | Thursday 7.00pm. THE National Director of Public Prosecutions, Bulelani Ngcuka, has decided not to prosecute police commissioner Jackie Selebi for insulting a Brooklyn police sergeant by calling her a “chimpanzee”. Ngcuka says it is not in the interest of the public to take steps against Selebi. He also says that prosecution […]

NORTHERN Cape provincial authorities have suspended the entire traffic department of Postmasburg until February 6. The decision was taken after a report by the Northern Cape Auditor-General found that R280000 had mysteriously disappeared from the department’s kitty. In addition, the small traffic department was unable to account for eight missing firearms. Provincial traffic officials have […]

Shaun Harris The asset management industry’s newest kid on the block, Velocity Asset Management, had a difficult birth. It was launched at the beginning of last August into a tumultuous market, and also had to cope with the hangover of the Old Mutual Asset Managers’ (Omam) court action enforcing restraint of trade agreements against some […]

Hard on the heels of the Booker, won by JM Coetzee for Disgrace, comes the Whitbread, with another South African on the shortlist. Former publisher Robert McCrum looks at prizes and the literary life Fiction, money and prizes are in the air in Britain once again. The Whitbread Prize will be awarded on January 26 […]

Howard Barrell A who’s who of the Democratic Party in Gauteng will testify before an internal investigation which began its hearings in Sandton on January 21, into allegedly fraudulent membership lists in branches in the DP’s Johannesburg heartland. Peter Leon, the former provincial leader of the DP, Jack Bloom, another of the party’s representatives in […]

SOUTH Africa and Hungary have agreed to intensify political cooperation, a Pretoria government statement said after a meeting on Friday between senior foreign ministry officials from the two countries. At the meeting, Deputy Foreign Minister Aziz Pahad and visiting Hungarian Political State Secretary for Foreign Affairs Zsolt Nemeth signed an agreement on political consultations.

ANDY CAPOSTAGNO, Johannesburg | Friday 6.30pm. ENGLISHMAN Paul Eales and South Africa’s Darren Fichardt head the field after two rounds of the South African Open at Randpark. Eales shot a three under par 69 and Fichardt a five under 67 to reach nine under par, a shot ahead of South Africa’s Don Gammon, former US […]

David Beresford Another Country Stephen Hawking discovered black holes while climbing from his wheelchair into bed which, as the great man pointed out in his much- celebrated book, A Brief History of Time, is a time-consuming process. His lead is obviously a worthy one to follow, disabled people often having much time on their hands […]

Howard Barrell Over a Barrel In response to the Mail &Guardian’s lead story last Friday predicting a “big bang” in government economic policy in the next six weeks, economist Nico Czypionka told Business Day he thought a “slightly damp fire cracker” was more likely. He may well be right. How so? Because the government may […]