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/ 13 November 1998

Taking a stand, but how could the ANC

deliver? In the second report of his seven-part series on transformation, John Matisonn looks at the financial problems that confronted the ANC when the party took over government The South African Airforce helicopters flew past the Union Buildings bearing the new flag in salute to President Nelson Mandela. Jet fighters streamed through the sky trailing […]

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/ 13 November 1998

No half measures

Alex Brown The 1998/9 Spier Summer Festival opened last week with a bit of a bang, and a bit of whimper. The bang was the sold-out amphitheatre, and the big name Spier scooped: David Helfgott, the Australian pianist on whose tormented life the film Shine was based. The whimper was some patchy play from Helfgott; […]

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/ 13 November 1998

`Sorry I killed your brother’

Charlene Smith General Andrew Masondo, an African National Congress political commissar in Angola in the 1980s, this week apologised to the brother of the man whose execution he ordered in 1981. Masondo and Mzwai Piliso, the ANC head of security at that time, have widely been held responsible for letting conditions in Angolan camps get […]

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/ 13 November 1998

Mbeki keeps job creation on track

As the next election draws closer, and in preparation for the resignation of The Great Mandela, it is stimulating to watch Thabo Mbeki as he patiently welds and rivets himself into position. Renaissance and other long-term projects, like getting shot of Professor Sibusiso Bengu, aside, Mbeki is showing great imaginative tenacity in virtually every field […]

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/ 13 November 1998

Lonrho faces board takeover

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Johannesburg | Friday 12.45pm. A SHOWDOWN between diversified African industrial group Lonrho Africa and its largest shareholder, emerging markets fund Blakeney Management, is looming as Blakeney is vying for control of the board after accusing it of giving a dismal performance. Lonrho annouced on Thursday it has scheduled an extraordinary general meeting for […]

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/ 13 November 1998

Beneath the rising sun

Andrew Worsdale : Movies of the week `Tis the season for film festivals, and the latest celluloid treat is the Japanese Film Festival. This year’s festival is a tribute to auteur Akira Kurosawa, with five of his films included in the line-up. There are also many contemporary films on show, including the enchanting Village of […]

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/ 13 November 1998

Rebels slowly gaining on Kabila

Howard Barrell Armed rebels are making skilful use of rainy season in the jungles of the Democratic Republic of Congo to push back President Laurent Kabila’s army and allied Angolan, Namibian and Zimbabwean forces, say intelligence sources and security analysts. The rebels, familiar with local conditions, have been pressing forward mainly on foot in the […]

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/ 13 November 1998

`Women mere labourers on their own farms’

Sharon Hammond Driving south of Malelane, in Mpumalanga, into a land of sugar cane fields and burnt- out minibus taxis, you enter a world where women own nothing and get little respect or recognition from men. “Even if you work and buy something with your own money, it’s not yours, it’s your husband’s,” explains a […]

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/ 13 November 1998

Good reception

Review of the week : Brenda Atkinson Roger van Wyk, all Capetonian cool and soft round vowels and mad professor hair, has had two espressos, and he’s on a roll, his lucid rapid-fire monologue dragging my morning brain into foreign terrain. In Van Wyk’s world, the world of Transmission – his show at the Rembrandt […]

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/ 13 November 1998

Animation invasion

Spielberg has done it again. This time with an animated TV series that will keep young and old at home on Wednesday nights. Alex Dodd reports The Japanese might have been churning out magnificent manga for years, but – make no mistake – when Steven Spielberg puts his name behind an animated series for TV, […]

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/ 13 November 1998

Where there’s smoke, there’s money

The furore about the new anti-smoking legislation is not about individuals’ rights, argues Michael Metelits Minister of Health Nkosazana Zuma’s Tobacco Products Control Amendment Bill fired up a huge controversy as tobacco firms, lobbyists and unions squared off against the government and anti-smoking groups over sport sponsorships, smoking in public and advertising bans. It’s tempting […]

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/ 13 November 1998

Preparing for the storm

The Springbok onslaught has already drawn blood in the UK. Will Wales be able to stop the flood? Andy Colquhoun reports from London New coach Graham Henry has been portrayed as Welsh rugby’s “great redeemer” in a controversial advertising campaign which borrows from the words of a popular hymn. But the bright young things in […]

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/ 13 November 1998

The age of the interest rate cut

Donna Block : Share World For the past few weeks, my four-year-old son, an addict of British satellite television stations, has been driving me crazy, jumping off the sofa and the walls singing a jingle from a United Kingdom toy advert. In a loud, off-key voice he proclaims over and over how, “It’s a great […]

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/ 13 November 1998

ANC used tax money for congress

Justin Arenstein The African National Congress used taxpayers’ money to fund at least one of its provincial congresses in Mpumalanga in 1996. The party also appears to have actively courted the Mpumalanga Parks Board for cash donations totalling more than R105 000 and sponsorship of T-shirts, caps and satchels. The allegations, which are being probed […]

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/ 13 November 1998

The big boys meet again

Andrew Muchineripi : Soccer It was not a pretty sight for those wearing black and white. Orlando Pirates, who had not lost to Kaizer Chiefs since the Premier Soccer League was formed two years ago, were being teased and tormented. There were 15 minutes left in the first leg of the Rothmans Cup semi-final, Chiefs […]

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/ 13 November 1998

TRC report reflects badly on judges

Sergeant at the bar Now that the dust is beginning to settle on the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC), probably because critics have begun to read the actual text of the report, it has become clear that the work of the TRC holds much of consequence for the future of our society. To take but […]

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/ 13 November 1998

Prosecutors pursue Krappies

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Johannesburg | Friday 11.50pm. THE Transvaal attorney-general’s office is currently investigating possible tampering with evidence from the plane crash that killed Mozambican president Samora Machel by former security police chief General Krappies Engelbrecht. The investigation could lead to a prosecution. Engelbrecht is one of several apartheid-era generals being scrutinised by the special investigation […]

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/ 13 November 1998

Boom time in Pretoria

Friday night : Charl Blignaut It’s Friday night and you’re driving through Pretoria – the new, improved Pretoria. If it weren’t for the lingering scent of Jacaranda blossoms, you’d hardly recognise the place. There are trendy cafs and happy, shiny people where once were butch Tukkies engineering students with bad hairstyles. (Once I witnessed a […]

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/ 13 November 1998

EXCHANGE FROM THIRD TO FIRST WORLD

The David Gleason Column Is the Johannesburg Stock Exchange (JSE) on the verge of becoming more like a First World bourse than one which has the characteristics of an emerging market? Well, it looks that way to me – and, I might add, to more than a handful of investors and analysts. Here is what […]

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/ 13 November 1998

Time is right for SA to twist US’s arm

John Stremlau : A Second Look Democratic gains in this month’s congressional elections should enhance South Africa’s leverage in dealing with the United States on issues of importance to Africa. The unexpected defeat of Republican conservatives has given moderates in both political parties a stronger hand in foreign policy. And this new majority is likely […]

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/ 13 November 1998

Mother of the sick and abandoned

Angella Johnson : VIEW FROM A BROAD Sophia Jardim was trawling the aisles of her local supermarket, one of her “children” precariously balanced on her hip, when a woman approached and lobbed a gob of spit at her. It was just another in a string of unpleasant attacks this 43-year-old divorcee has had to endure […]

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/ 13 November 1998

I sing the body electric

Mercedes Sayagues `I sing the body electric,” wrote Walt Whitman. I am reminded of this line as I watch the bulging biceps, palpitating pecs and throbbing quads of Vaughan Carl, Mr Zimbabwe Bodybuilder 1998. Harare’s 700-seat Seven Arts theatre is half-full for the finals of Mr and Ms Zimbabwe Bodybuilder. Mr Zimbabwe 1996 is the […]

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/ 13 November 1998

Stop The Spam Sharks

Philip Machanick Just when you thought it safe to use the Internet, junk mail sharks have started to bite. What’s more, they’re made of spam. Thanks to “bulk mail e-mail lists”, millions of users of the Internet can be hit at once with unwanted mail, selling anything from porn to more bulk e-mail lists. Sellers […]

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/ 13 November 1998

Bok to the future for young hero

John Perlman Nick Mallett doesn’t look worried. “It’s a very nice problem I have,” says the Springbok coach of the fact that his back row, widely seen as the finest in rugby, currently excludes a 22-year-old more and more people regard as potentially the finest loose forward in the world. Bobby Skinstad doesn’t seem too […]

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/ 13 November 1998

TRC head vying for state diamond contact

MUNGO SOGGOT, Johannesburg | Friday 3.30pm. A CONSORTIUM headed up by head of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s reparations committee Hlengiwe Mkhize is tipped to win a major government diamond valuation contract. The Diamond Board has yet to announce the winner, but rival bidders, who have expressed misgivings about the tender process, claim Mkhize’s consortium […]

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/ 13 November 1998

Diamonds are a truth commissioner’s best

friend Mungo Soggot Hlengiwe Mkhize, the truth commissioner tipped to win a major government diamond contract, this week likened her prospective job of assessing the value of rough diamonds to that of compensating torture victims. Mkhize chairs the local arm of a consortium masterminded by a Belgian diamond broker which is the favourite in the […]

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/ 13 November 1998

Shopping and shocking

Lauren Shantall A B-grade Barbie-rella babe in a yellow polka dot rubber bikini steps s on to the stage. Armed with a hairdryer-cum-ray gun she begins to blow up a flaccid yellow blob while the soundtrack blares a kooky, surreal mix of Plan Nine From Outer Space meets Mars Attack on an operating table. As […]

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/ 13 November 1998

Why women don’t cruise

Joan Smith : First Person Why don’t women go cruising? When the media is full of the shortage of single men, why is this method of finding partners, briefly at least, unthinkable for women? The simple answer is danger. It is unthinkable for lesbians and straight women alike because we are so accustomed to recognising […]

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/ 13 November 1998

It’s time to reel and deal

Whether it’s buying or selling, Sithengi is the place for film-makers or wannabes. Andrew Worsdale report The biggest film industry gathering on the continent forges into its third year next week, and with the arrival on the stock exchange of major players like Primedia and African Media Entertainment (AME), it seems that this year’s Southern […]

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/ 13 November 1998

Call waiting: Technology and truth

Douglas Rushkoff : Online `I’m getting a call, hold on,” my friend explained before clicking off our phone conversation to check on another incoming call. He was the one who had called me – just seconds earlier, in fact. After hearing his voice on the machine (which I use as a filtration device) I figured […]