Staff Reporter

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Cape Town | Monday, 10.30pm. COMMONWEALTH silver medallist Brendon Dedekind held out against strong-finishing Roland Schoeman to win the men’s 100m freestyle Monday, posting his fourth African record of the Telkom SA short course championships in Cape Town. Deaf Durbanite Terence Parkin annihilated his personal best time to set a continental mark in […]

SHARRON HAMMOND, Nelspruit | Tuesday 8.00pm. MPUMALANGA’S suspended parks chief, Alan Gray, refused to answer written questions about his business dealings with government or government contractors on Tuesday and instead threatened to sue reporters. Gray said in a lawyer’s letter that elements within the media were conducting personal crusades and vendettas against him and had […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Pretoria | Monday 7.00pm. APARTHEID security police killed Ruth First because they were unable to catch SA Communist Party leader Joe Slovo, Gillian Slovo told the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s amnesty committee on Monday. Gillian Slovo, along with her sisters Robyn and Shaun, is opposing the applications for amnesty by apartheid agents Craig […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Pretoria | Tuesday 6.45pm. THE South African hitsquad en route to plant a bomb in the African National Congress offices in London ran into numerous predicaments that almost blew the entire operation, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission heard in Pretoria on Tuesday. Former Vlakplaas commander Eugene de Kock told the amnesty hearing that […]

SARAH BULLEN, Johannesburg | Tuesday 5.45pm. LOCAL stock had a disappointing day on Tuesday, closing flat despite expectation that the latest bull run will roll on into the week. Dealers said the pullback was surprising, as all major indices except gold ended in negative territory. Markets were influenced by a both international and domestic factors, […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Johannesburg | Sunday 9.45pm. SOUTH Africa’s 1998 Davis Cup record crashed to an embarrassing 10 played and ten lost after they were annihilated 5-0 by the Czech Republic in their World Group promotion/relegation tie on Sunday. The South Africans were already 3-0 down in the best-of-five-sets tie when captain Danie Visser decided to […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Johannesburg | Sunday, 9.45pm. WESTERN Province’s hopes of reaching a semi-final berth on the Bankfin Currie Cup rugby table went for a dive on Sunday when they were beaten 24-17 by the Free State Cheetahs at Newlands. The match did not live up to expectations as both teams fell into boring patterns for […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, New York | Monday 11.30pm. THE United Nations Security Council held preliminary discussions Monday on an Arab-sponsored draft resolution demanding a UN investigation into the bombing of the El Shifa pharmaceutical factory in Sudan by the United States last month. In particular the resolution demands an investigation into the US claim that the […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Maseru | Monday 10.00pm. SOUTHERN African troops will remain in Lesotho until order is restored in the country, the defence ministers of Zimbabwe, South Africa and Botswana said in Maseru on Monday. Speaking at the Lesotho government complex, the ministers maintained that the military intervention in Lesotho last week by troops from South […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Kigali | Monday 11.30pm. THE rebels fighting to oust Democratic Republic of Congo President Laurent Kabila have requested international humanitarian organisations to help shift about 20,000 Tutsi Banyamulenge from south-eastern Katanga province. Rebel-controlled radio Bukavu, monitored in Cyangugu across the border in Rwanda, said on Monday that the deputy governor of South Kivu, […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Johannesburg | Monday 10.00am. KENYAN athletes dominated at the World Half Marathon Championships in Zurich on Sunday, with defending champion Tegla Loroupe and Paul Koech claiming the men’s and women’s titles, giving the nation a sweep of gold for the second year in a row. Loroupe covered the 21,1km course in 1:08:29 to […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Libreville | Sunday 10.00am. THE Danish Minister for International Development, Paul Nielson, has warned African states with forces in the Democratic Republic of Congo that Copenhagen will cut off aid to them if a regional conflict ensues. “Should the countries involved get into a face-to-face confrontation my country will have no option but […]

There’s a growing sense that in an unstable world, Libya’s `Brother Leader of the Revolution’ has some attractions, writes Ian Black Moammar Gadaffi was busy this month, embracing African leaders as they flew in for the lavish celebrations, held each year, of the coup that brought him to power in 1969. Without his customary comic-opera, […]

Mail & Guardian reporter Apart from pornography, keeping up with the news, and monitoring the latest on Zippergate, the Internet can also provide a playground for a budding George Soros. Local and international financial service websites are rapidly expanding. Their offerings range from basic financial information to trading a portfolio on the Web. Internationally people […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Kampala | Friday 9.30pm. A PROCESS of selection forced by poaching and hunting has resulted in elephants in western Uganda becoming “tuskless”, a scientist with the Uganda Wildlife Authority, Eve Lawino Abe, said on Friday. Some 15% of the adult female elephants in the Queen Elizabeth National Park are being born without tusks […]

Peter Makarube Live in Johannesburg They said jazz is dead but we have yet to see the coffin. With the establishment of the South African Jazz Foundation comes ample proof that the hippest art form is still alive – and well. At a recent media launch, held at the Hyatt hotel, the foundation was introduced […]

Is Camille Paglia duffing up the right-on `feminazis’ on behalf of bad girls everywhere? Or is she peddling outdated, simplistic views completely out of touch with the Nineties? Angela Phillips on the working-class motormouth who enrages as much as she engages This should have been Camille Paglia’s week. The woman who put the sex back […]

Sarah Boseley A revolutionary device that will tell a doctor what is wrong and which drugs to prescribe from the smell of the patient’s breath is being developed by a team of top scientists at one of Britain’s leading universities. Development of the diagnostic breathalyser is being compared to the invention of the thermometer. Within […]

`justice’ When hit squads roamed KwaZulu-Natal during the early 1990s, the province’s Attorney General, Tim McNally, developed a reputation for being reluctant to prosecute alleged Inkatha Freedom Party assassins and their police accomplices. McNally’s seemingly ambiguous attitude to prosecution was once again in the public spotlight last week when the attorney general released a press […]

Ever been allowed into a movie for free and been allowed to drink beer and talk when you want to? Jean Barker visited Cape Town’s BioCafe Beers are R3, entrance is free, and everyone is at the BioCafe on Wednesday evenings long before the short film screening starts, chatting and drinking. The chatting and drinking […]

Cynthia Schoeman Are leaders born or made? What made Mahatma Ghandi a person of adulation to millions, able to lead thousands in protest actions? The debate still rages. But whether leadership is inborn or developed, certainly there are too few natural leaders to meet the demands of companies in today’s fast changing world. Therefore, organisations […]

Donna Block: Share World Until very recently Greece was considered Europe’s basket case economy, with huge public debt, an antiquated labour market, an enormous bureaucracy and a state sector reminiscent of the old Soviet bloc in its inefficiency and corruption. But signs are that the poorest country in the European Union is getting its act […]

Paul Whelan and David Schmidt Across the world, societies wrestle with the problems of how best to govern their metropolitan conurbations, so critical to national economies and the livelihoods of millions of people. Metropolitan governance is a difficult and rather messy affair. Metros are complex, they tend to concentrate major social problems, they outgrow their […]

Raymond Joseph Police say Mark Thatcher will be subpoenaed as a state witness in the fraud and theft trial of officers who acted as “bookrunners” for his failed money-lending business. Police say 11 of Thatcher’s runners have been identified. At least three runners will appear in court by the middle of next month, and others […]

Ferial Haffajee Brussels and Paarl are worlds apart. One is cold and rich. The other poor and hot. Brussels is also the site of trade negotiations between South Africa and the European Union which has 400-million consumers in 15 countries. An agreement could have a huge impact, bringing Paarl and South African industry more firmly […]

Charl Blignaut On stage in Johannesburg `Sometimes to tell a secret, you first have to teach a lesson,” reads a note in the programme for the South African premiere of Paula Vogel’s How I Learned to Drive, a mesmerising new production that took to the Market Theatre stage last week. It was the “to teach […]

Hein Marais: A SECOND LOOK Eighteen months ago, questioning the virtues of the free market was tantamount to flashing a membership card of the Flat Earth Society. Today, there’s standing room only on the bandwagon of second thoughts about laissez- faire capitalism. Minister of Finance Trevor Manuel, President Nelson Mandela, British Prime Minister Tony Blair, […]

Robert Potts SIMPLICITY by Edward de Bono (Viking) Edward de Bono’s many, many books include Conflicts: A Better Way to Solve Them; Handbook for the Positive Revolution; How To Be More Interesting; and Teach Yourself to Think. These seem to have sold extremely well, both to human beings and also to (the apparent target audience) […]

Angella Johnson VIEW FROM A BROAD There I was, happily driving my white BMW 323i series along a stretch of winding Midrand road on a balmy Tuesday afternoon. The window was down and a cool breeze blew gently on my face as, oblivious to my surroundings, I slowed at a quiet stop street. Suddenly, out […]

Wonder Hlongwa The Yeoville Community Development Forum has a dream: it wants to see the streets of greater Yeoville cleared of crime and grime. It wants to create an environment that encourages economic, social and cultural development in the cosmopolitan community in eastern Johannesburg. The forum unveiled its dream at a brain- storming workshop this […]

Howard Barrell Over a Barrel We South Africans may have scored something of a first this week in the annals of foreign policy-making. We may well be the only country ever to complete what appears to be a full-scale somersault in foreign policy and to invade a neighbouring state while our president, deputy president, foreign […]

Evidence wa ka Ngobeni Student Representative Council (SRC) leaders have boarded the gravy train at South Africa’s universities and technikons. Some are paid “honorary” salaries, while other benefits include free vehicles, cellphones, housing, meals and trips around the country. SRCs also spend tens of thousands of rands each year on student bashes. And at one […]