FRIDAY, 2.30PM The truth commission Friday made an impassioned final plea to former apartheid defence minister General Magnus Malan to apply for amnesty before Saturday’s deadline. TRC deputy chairman Dr Alex Boraine said the commissione noted Malan’s decision not to seek amnesty with “deep concern”. “It is my opinion that he would be well advised […]
Luisa Dillner in London BRITAIN’S Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents (RoSPA) is thinking twice about banning drivers from using their mobile phones while on the road. But lobbyists there want cellphones off the road, whether hand-held or mounted on a car kit. Is there any evidence that mobile phones actually cause accidents? “There’s […]
FRIDAY, 4.00PM: HEALTH Minister Dr Nkosazana Zuma may be taken to court over the Health Department’s proposal that medical students and interns have their training extended by two years of vocational training. Students and interns appointed attorneys to study the legal implications of Zuma’s scheme, which they say was announced unilaterally, with no chance of […]
hoax Jack Mullen THERE are lots of ancient burial shrouds in existence today, but only one of them bears a body imprint. It is, of course, the shroud of Turin, which has been venerated for centuries by Christians who believe that the imprint is that of the crucified Jesus Christ. Undoubtedly one of the most […]
In a novel empowerment deal, an investment company will double your shares provided you meet a few criteria. Ferial Haffajee reports IT’S an offer you can’t refuse … if you’re a bona fide woman, and you can prove it by affidavit. Women Investment Portfolio Holdings (Wiphold) is offering to double the shares bought by women […]
Peta Thornycroft A GABLED mansion in the heart of Kensington, the eastern Johannesburg suburb, served as a “safe” house for intelligence operatives in the Security Police. It was at this house in the late 1970s and early 1980s where reports submitted by journalists who were informers were scrutinised before being consolidated and sent on to […]
FRIDAY, 2.30PM AS the state presented its closing argument in the Mxenge trial, state advocate Chris de Klerk conceded there is insufficient evidence to prove beyond reasonable doubt that ex-security cops Johan van der Hoven and Andy Taylor were involved in the 1981 murder of human rights lawyer Griffiths Mxenge. Van der Hoven, Taylor, former […]
A FAR cry from the upper-class conditions and surroundings at Tara is the Zola Clinic in Soweto. Established ten years ago, the Zola clinic looks from the outside like a small shopping centre. A three-metre high brick-wall with razor wire running around the top surrounds the building. A few faded graffiti, mainly old political slogans, […]
Trout may be the favourite fish of South African anglers, but they are dangerous interlopers who wreak havoc on our ecosystems, argues Jim Cambray BETWEEN 1850 and 1950, there was a dramatic increase in the rate of animal extinctions, which coincided with European colonial expansion. Many alien plants and creatures were introduced to colonised territories, […]
The government plans to release psychiatric patients from state hospitals into the community, writes Stuart Hess THE government is planning to shunt thousands of mental patients out of state- run institutions and into the care of their families and friends. The Health Department said this week its fledgling, community-care programme involved closing hospitals and wards, […]
Kader Asmal has quietly lifted South Africa’s embargo on arms to Turkey, which has killed thousands and displaced millions of Kurds. Marion Edmunds reports SOUTH AFRICA has quietly lifted its embargo on arms sales to Turkey. Minister of Water and Forestry Affairs, Kader Asmal, who presides over regulation of government arms sales, said this week […]
FRIDAY, 11.30AM The value of SA’s gold reserves increased by R251-million to R5,3-billion last year, despite the gold price falling over R27 over the year to R1 363,30 an ounce, according to latest Reserve bank figures. Foreign exchange reserves increased by R1-billion to R9,1-billion, bringing total gold and exchange reserves held to R14,1-billion. Foreign credit […]
De Beers has lost another lucrative source of African diamonds. This time to a new contender linked to mercenary group Executive Outcomes. Chris Gordon reports BRANCH Energy Angola, the company linked to South African mercenary operation Executive Outcomes, has received a new mining concession from the Angolan government, making it one of Angola’s most significant […]
The citizens of Kinshasa, the sprawling capital of Zaire, await the outcome of the Mobutu-Kabila peace talks with mounting fear. Chris McGreal reports LEOPOLD MUANDO’s first venture into futuristic art sits among his realist paintings of Zairean soldiers tearing Kinshasa apart and the ever-present trauma of Aids. Muando’s imagination has conjured up a vision of […]
censored Andrew Worsdale THE Publications Control Board has banned a movie already flighted several times in South Africa and, for the first time ever, a poster for a film. Caligula, produced in 1980 by Bob Guccione of Penthouse magazine and directed by Tinto Brass, tells the story of the decadent Roman whose rule was characterised […]
Ann Eveleth KWAZULU-NATAL has been forced to re-employ 230 senior teach- ers, including 60 principals, who had been given hefty retrenchment packages under the state teacher redeployment programme. The province said this week the teachers have been re-employed at their previous salaries, many until the end of the year, because there were no immediate replacements. […]
FIRDAY, 11.00AM: JOANNE Norton and Cherry Moulder will face each other today in the Bell’s SA Ladies Amateur matchplay golf championship at Killarney Golf Club. Both have been cutting through the opposition in the past few days — Norton beat Colet Viljoen 5/4, while Moulder beat Yvonne Pelser 2/1. In a unexpected twist, current SA […]
FRIDAY, 11.00AM: THE Gauteng Lions rugby team are to discuss injured Springbok flyhalf Hennie le Roux’s position in the team at a meeting on Monday night at Ellis Park. Le Roux recently denied rumours of his transfer and reports that he had a fall-out with GLRU president Dr Louis Luyt in New Zealand. Le Roux […]
The fight between Pagad and gangster groups has political ramifications for the Western Cape, reports Stefaans Brmmer PAST links between political parties and the antagonists in the Western Cape’s escalating violence between vigilantes and gangsters have come back to haunt government and security agencies. This week, a year after People Against Gangsterism and Drugs (Pagad) […]
Jacquie Golding-Duffy puts faces to the names of the applicants vying for the private television licence and gives a sneak preview of the IBA’s final policy paper on private television INDEPENDENT producers will be displeased with the Independent Broadcasting Authority’s (IBA) final private television discussion paper as it proposes that the new television channel, to […]
FRIDAY, 10.30AM KWAZULU-NATAL-based food group Illovo Sugar has acquired 94,25% of Swaziland-based Lonrho Sugar for R13,90 a share in a R1,6-billion deal to create the biggest sugar producer in Africa. The bulk (R1,1-billion) of the deal will be financed by a new rights issue of 129,8-million Illovo shares at R8,50 each. CG Smith Foods, which […]
FRIDAY, 1.30PM ZIMBABWE’S industrial index registered a record one-day loss of 254 points on Thursday under selling pressure from small investors. Analysts said the pressure stemmed mainly from fears that treasury bill interest rates, which have been rising since the beginning of the week, could rise further than the 22.41% at Thursday’s daily auction session. […]
FRIDAY, 11.00AM: THE South African National Defence Force has suffered huge losses due to theft in the past year, Defence Minister Joe Modise told Parliament on Thursday. Modise estimated the value of the thefts at R6,4-million. He said 116 firearms, 10 688 rounds of ammunition and 110 vehicles were stolen from the SANDF and 187 […]
THREE years after the changing of the guard in Pretoria, the ease of South Africa’s transition relative to revolutionary upheavals elsewhere in the world is testimony to the remarkable political skills of President Nelson Mandela. It also shows the fundamental solidity and decency of ordinary South Africans of every hue. Yet, for all the talk […]
Tom Lodge IN the kind of civil war which South Africa’s liberation struggle represented, what constitutes a human rights violation? Testimony to the truth commission has ranged from evidence from newspaper editors concerning their publications’ degree of complicity with apartheid oppression, to submissions from criminals and torturers. Of course, any action which infringes upon another […]
The women of Arabia are emerging from behind Islamic restrictions to take their place in the corporate world. Kathy Evans reports from Doha IT was not an auspicious start to the first ever conference on the rights of Arabian women in the workplace. “No cameras, no recording equipment,” said a veiled policewoman, guarding the conference […]
Trying to broker a peace treaty in Zaire was not plain sailing, reports Ivor Powell from the deck of SAS Outeniqua THE score or so of journalists who had been quartered on the fo’castle of the SAS Outeniqua for three days – exotically studded in among the winches and anchor cables and miles of rope […]
Gustav Thiel ONE week after staging a mock wedding ceremony with Cape Town’s most notorious gangsters, the city’s Olympic Bid Company is quietly muttering about irreconcilable differences. The two sides signed their Olympic Peace Initiative late last week, in a carefully managed show – complete with priest – designed to persuade the International Olympic Committee […]
FRIDAY, 8.30AM ANC martyr Chris Hani allegedly ordered his men to kill an ANC official he suspected of being a police agent, the truth comission heard on Thursday. Brothers Joe and Conrad Nkuna, both ANC members, jailed in 1995 for the attempted murder of ANC official Johannes Shabangu, are applying for amnesty on the grounds […]
Despite denials and much dissension, a merger between two black media forums appears set to get the go-ahead, reports Jacquie Golding-Duffy THE Black Editors Forum and the Forum of Black Journalists are planning to merge in a bid to preserve what they see as their common interests. However, the plan is causing dissension in the […]
profits Developed countries may have learnt that environmental friendliness pays, but South Africa still lags far behind Roger Cowe in London THE “greening” of business has received a boost from research which shows that British companies taking environmental issues seriously have better financial performance than their non-green rivals. In the first substantial study of this […]
ANC Jim Day AN African National Congress decision to back away from efforts to put Bushbuckridge in the Northern Province under the control of neighbouring Mpumalanga sparked the rioting that is rocking the area. The ANC decision, according to local residents, was taken at a meeting in the middle of last month attended by representatives […]