THE springboks need to beef up their scrummaging weaknesses, which were exposed during last year’s Grand Slam tour, it was announced on Friday. Coach Nick Mallett, who headed strategic planning meeting this week, is considering bringing in a specialist forwards coach to do this. He is also organising a team management reshuffle aimed at retaining […]
SPAIN defeated Mali 3-1 in a World Youth Championships semi-final in Kaduna, Nigeria, on Wednesday to expel the last african team from the tournament. Spain’s Varela scored in the second and 26th minute, and Xavi netted again dead on full-time. Mali’s goal came in the 52nd minute through Dissa.
INSPIRATIONAL Andre Joubert returns for the Sharks vital Super 12 clash against the Auckland Blues on Saturday, while Warren Brosnihan comes in at number eight for injured Gary Teichmann. Justin Swart gives way at fullback, moving to the left wing in place of Stephen Brink. Charl van Rensburg returns to the side of the scrum […]
TWO women were killed and 800 informal dwellings were destroyed after a violent storm struck Soshanguve, north of Pretoria on Thursday night, northern Pretoria metropolitan sub-structure spokesman Gerhard van Eeden said on Friday. Van Eeden said the roofs of 300 formal homes were extensively damaged and about 28000 houses were left without electricity on Friday. […]
DAVID SHAPSHAK, Pretoria | Saturday 5.00pm. A LAST gasp drop goal by Andrew Mehrtens snatched victory for the Canterbury Crusaders to beat the Northern Bulls 30-28 in a thrilling Super 12 match in Pretoria on Saturday. Ruben Kruger, in his first Super 12 game of the year, captain a vastly-improved Bulls who dominated the game […]
TUBERCULOSIS is raging through Zambia, possibly overtaking malaria as the number one killer. TB cases have escalated to alarming levels and drugs in hospitals are in short supply. Observers say the government seems to have underplayed the seriousness. David Mondoka, a director of the Tuberculosis and Leprosy Trust, says the ailment is rampant in those […]
OWN CORRESPONDENT, Welkom | Saturday 6.00pm. RESCUERS were battling on Saturday to reach two miners trapped in a gold mine here since early Friday, when an earthquake caused a major underground rockfall, mine owners Anglogold said. “(Rescuers) are digging through tonnes of rock .. and their progress is continuously being hampered by aftershocks and minor […]
SAMM AUDU, Lagos | Friday 7.00pm. Japan, the first Asian side to play in the World Youth Championship final, can beat Spain Saturday if they attack from the starting whistle, coach Philippe Troussier said on Friday. “Tomorrow’s final against Spain is open,” the former Bafana Bafana coach said. “At this stage of the competition, everybody […]
FRIDAY, 3.30PM: THERE is concern in business that government is not taking a lead in creating employment. The issue came into the spotlight on Thursday as organised labour and the Democratic Party unveiled their perspectives on job creation. Saying that the long-anticipated jobs summit will happen “towards the end of the year”, Labour Minister Tito […]
CONDITIONS under which three alleged United States mercenaries are being held at Zimbabwe’s Chikurubi maximum security prison have improved, their defence lawyer said on Friday. John Lamonte Dixon, Gary George Blanchard and Joseph Wendell Pettijohn, all 35, are facing charges of terrorism and espionage following a discovery of a wide range of military weapons in […]
POLICE in eastern Nigeria seeking to end serious communal clashes have demolished a religious shrine at which a number of people were reportedly sacrificed, a spokesman said on Friday.The shrine was seized and demolished on Wednesday, along with a stock of weapons, including machine-guns and ammunition, at a house at Umuleri, in Anambra State, police […]
FRIDAY, 4.30AM: SOUTH AFRICAN allrounder Brian McMillan has been included in the National side for their upcoming tour to England. South African selectors convenor Peter Pollock’s naming of McMillan was perhaps the greatest surprise in the team, although veteran off-spinner Pat Symcox has also been included after speculation that his career may be over. McMillan, […]
A UNITED Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation report on the food outlook for Africa has described the situation in the Great Lakes region as “precarious”. Efforts to increase food production are hampered by “persistent insecurity, sporadic violence and bad weather,” FAO said in a news release on Wednesday. In Burundi, it said food difficulties are […]
>From Shopping and Fucking to Fugard in New York, director Yael Farber has been on a roller coaster ride, and she’s not about to get off, writes Charl Blignaut `It seems like insomnia isn’t just a Jo’burg thing,” says Yael Farber’s too-awake voice down the line from New York. It’s the middle of the night […]
Astronomers are excited about the discovery of the first multiple-planet solar system outside our own, writes Aaron Nicodemus Announcement of a discovery of a multiple-planet system reminiscent of our own solar system has created excitement throughout the world, offering the first suggestion that planetary systems like our own are abundant. The three planets, which rotate […]
Review of the week Brenda Atkinson Much as Sigmund Freud’s theoretical and linguistic legacy to the Western world has slipped beneath the surface of a million conscious minds, Leonardo da Vinci’s mind- boggling contributions to the scientific and cultural workings of a millennial first world find us largely ignorant of their import. The long-awaited and […]
FEDERAL Alliance leader Louis Luyt played on growing xenophobia in the Northern Province on Thursday by blaming the government for allowing foreigners to deprive South Africans of jobs. Addressing crowds of enthusiastic supporters in the provincial capital of Pietersburg on Wednesday and Thursday, Luyt added that the large numbers of illegal immigrants in South Africa […]
Howard Barrell THE LIFE AND TIMES OF THABO MBEKI by Adrian Hadland and Jovial Rantao (Zebra) Our political institutions in South Africa are immature and largely untested. Our system of proportional representation places parliamentary seats more within the gift of party bosses than of bodies of voters. And internal African National Congress processes allow for […]
Marianne Merten The Western Cape’s top detective and one of the key investigators of the anti-urban terrorism campaign Operation Good Hope, Director Leonard Knipe, is set to head a new unit investigating crimes against the state. His promotion was finalised last week despite criticism that Knipe has failed to effectively deal with the violence in […]
In 1835, the Xhosa King Hintsa was killed at Nqabara, near Willowvale in the Eastern Cape. The amaXhosa say that the king was treacherously cut down while escaping from a British army camp, where he had been negotiating terms of surrender after half a century of continuous war against the invading power. The British side […]
Phillip van Niekerk:FROM THE EDITOR’S DESK I received a phone call on Tuesday night from journalist Carlos Cordosa in Maputo. “How would you like to help stop the Yugoslavian war?” he raved at me. The suggestion: join an international call for the pope to take up residence in Belgrade. At first I thought he was […]
Playing his own song in a huge American stadium is one of the highlights of Big Voice Jack life – and there’s a documentary film to prove it, writes Brendan Cooper Eighty thousand people can make a lot of noise, and when Dave Matthews leans in to his mic and says to the crowd, “Give […]
Andrew Kay The 25-year-old Johannesburg Youth Orchestra (JYO), which had its annual subsidy cut without warning last year, has formed the Orchestra Company to raise funds through the private sector for the various youth orchestras affiliated to it. Judging by their full concert schedule, and the enthusiastic reception they receive at recitals, the strategies seem […]
Ann Eveleth South Africa’s “other half” – the rural poor – will descend on the birthplace of the African National Congress this weekend to thrash out a new charter demanding their fair share of the economic pie. Delegates from rural communities across the country will meet at the national Rural Convention in Bloemfontein to draft […]
Robert Heller Twenty wealthy Americans have just made off with booty exceeding a whole year’s net profit for Merrill Lynch, the world’s largest securities firm. You don’t need the FBI to track down the suspects. They head the 20 top companies, from Walt Disney to General Electric. Their combined salaries, bonuses and long-term compensation (mostly […]
The mielie-seller The mielie-seller is perhaps the most quintessential South African image. Resident of both urban and rural worlds, she is also symbolic of a growing informal economy. Thabi Chauke wakes up at 4.30am. Her day is simple: she dispatches her 14-year-old daughter into a packed minibus. These ferry the children of the newly enfranchised […]
DETAINED journalist Maha Hassan Ali was released by security officials in Khartoum Wednesday afternoon on a personal bail by the chairman of the Sudanese Journalists Union, Najeeb Adam. Adam said he and a delegation of the union had approached “a ranking security official” and secured her release. Maha and two male journalists were arrested early […]
Sarah Ryle At last an economics professor has done something useful. He has worked out that punters who chose the six least popular numbers from the British National Lottery’s list of 49 stand to make an average weekly return of 11% on their stakes. The magic numbers – 36, 41, 46, 47, 48 and 49 […]
On April 27, South Africa celebrates Freedom Day. Ferial Haffajee asked veteran South Africans how life has changed since 1994 For lawyer and local legal legend George Bizos, freedom comes contained in a little beige book. His dog-eared copy of the Constitution is a well-thumbed and living document. As the head of the constitutional unit […]
OWN CORRESPONDENT, Welkom | Friday 5.50pm. RESCUE workers have on Friday evening located two miners who went missing after an earthquake hit Welkom in the Free State on Friday morning. It is uncertain if they are alive. The men were trapped deep in the mine where drilling was taking place and there was not much […]
In 1990, the world’s economic centre of gravity was Tokyo. Share and property prices were in the stratosphere, Japanese banking, electronics, automotive and steel companies were all-victorious, and the economy seemed armour-plated. Yet the true miracle was not Japan’s economy but the delusion on which it was based – a gigantic asset-price bubble whose explosion […]
THE African Connection Rally, in which Post and Telecommunications Minister Jay Naidoo participated, ended on Wednesday at Cape Agulhas — the southern tip of the continent — after a 22-day drive through Africa. It was met by members of the Cape Agulhas and surrounding communities, as well as dignitaries from around South Africa. The rally […]