Mary Benson’s new book celebrates Athol Fugard and Barney Simon, writes MATTHEW KROUSE THE present era of truth and reconciliation is marked by recollections of tragedy, as well as tales of great accomplishment. It can even be amusing, in hindsight, to hear some of the stories of the “struggle years” – stories such as the […]
WEDNESDAY, 6.30PM THE Independent Broadcast Authority failed to allocate resources effectively “and with probity” and there was evidence of a serious lack of financial controls, the Auditor General’s damning report to parliament said today. (Wednesday) The report says a fundamental review of the way the IBA conducts its finances is required. The report confirms widespread […]
John Sturrock HOW PROUST CAN CHANGE YOUR LIFE by Alain de Botton (Picador, R126) THE montage on the jacket of this slim volume is ominous: why should the gloomy Marcel Proust pictured there have a lurid bird clawing at his shoulder? Is it perhaps a parrot, echoing the unfortunate claim in the blurb that How […]
WEDNESDAY, 11.30AM JOHANNESBURG Consolidated Investments’ MD Bill Nairn resigned yesterday after compromising his position by publicly backing Cyril Ramaphosa’s New Africa Investments Limited in the race for a stake in the mining giant by black empowerment investors. As it turned out, Nairn backed the wrong horse, as Nail’s African Mining Group failed to raise the […]
Barbara Ludman QUITE UGLY ONE MORNING by Christopher Brookmyre (Little, Brown, R59,75) THERE’S a certain attraction to a book which clearly sets out to be the most disgusting read of the year. Investigative reporter Jack Parlabane, hiding in Edinburgh from contract killers out to get him at his most recent port of call, Los Angeles, […]
WEDNESDAY, 6.30PM THE French aid group Medecins sans Frontieres (MSF; Doctors Without Borders) has reported continued heavy fighting in the town of Kenge, 200 kilometres east of Kinshasa. Some 200 civilians and 100 goverment soldiers have been killed, but rebels have not yet taken the town. The MSF sources have refuted claims by rebel spokesman […]
SOUNDTRACKS ON CD: Shaun de Waal MOVIE soundtracks – the compilations of miscellaneous pop/rock tracks, not the original film scores – are highly favoured by record companies because of their commercial potential. Nine of them are sitting on this week’s Billboard Top 100. Such collections can often spark interesting juxtapositions between songs one might not […]
WEDNESDAY, 12.30PM: RESPONSIBILITY for a spate of “fund-raising” robberies in the Eastern Cape in the early 1990s has been claimed by the Pan Africanist Congress in amnesty applications by PAC members to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Most of the applicants are in prison, many of them jailed for robbery. Among other attacks PAC members […]
Even though JOE QUEENAN is annoyed by Spike Lee, he thinks that, with the release of Get on the Bus, it’s time to show respect I DON’T know any white people who like Spike Lee. I know white people who used to like Spike Lee, but that was before his anti-white tirades, his going to […]
RUGBY:Steve Morris IT is a sad state of affairs when the top sides in this country are left to fight it out among themselves for the scraps of the Super 12 semi-final berths. But, as things currently stand in the maelstrom of the three-nation provincial competition, this is indeed the case. With the Auckland Blues, […]
WEDNESDAY, 11.00AM: THE SA Football Association has given up trying to meet its Zairean counterpart to discuss the threatened Zairean withdrawal from the World Cup because of financial problems. Safa boss Danny Jordaan said every effort had been made to contact the Zaireans, but to no avail. It would now be up to Zaire to […]
BONGANI NDODANA on a local composer who left the country to pursue his craft THE grass is certainly much greener in Europe, where a generation of classical composers from Southern Africa have been exiled by their craft and formed what seems to be a musical diaspora. Unlike their predecessors Priaulx Rainier and John Joubert, who […]
WEDNESDAY, 6.30PM FORMER defence minister Magnus Malan told the Truth Commission today that murdered Swapo lawyer Anton Lubowski was a paid agent of South African Military Intelligence, which therefore had no reason to kill him. Malan first made the allegations soon after Lubowski’s murder. “What I said in Parliament then I stick to. Check the […]
Andrew Higgins in Hong Kong IN the dying days of British rule, all eyes in Hong Kong are fixed on a corpse. Around it crowd dozens of television cameras and a throng of mud-slinging mourners. The cause of the controversy is the death of a philandering, opium-smoking and much loved Cantonese opera star. Tang, best […]
Jonathan Romney THE word “epic” has been rather devalued in cinema ever since they revved up the chariots in the original silent Ben-Hur. This week, however, epic cinema returns to its classical roots, with the release of Ulysses’ Gaze, the latest film by Greek director Theo Angelopoulos. Over three hours, Harvey Keitel’s modern Homeric hero […]
If the South African Football Association was a soccer team, it would be facing relegation, but new CEO Danny Jordaan is hoping to make some changes SOCCER:Julian Drew AFTER the revelations of the Pickard Commission of Inquiry and the subsequent removal of South African Football Association (Safa) president Stix Morewa, public confidence in the administration […]
Maria McCloy `THAT’S not the exact history, it has to be corrected,”says Margaret Dongo of Flame, the movie exploring the part played by women – particularly combatants – in Zimbabwe’s war of liberation. Flame opened in South Africa in April. It has already won six international awards, been screened at Cannes and has broken box […]
WEDNESDAY, 11.30AM HOUSING Minister Sankie Mthembi-Mahanyele yesterday announced a plan to force builders using government subsidies to register, in an attempt to prevent consumers from rip-offs by imposing acceptable construction standards. The registration plan, which has drawn flak from major builders, involves the granting of statutory powers to the national Home Builders’ Association to impose […]
GWEN ANSELL profiles Brice Wassy, `king of makossa’ and one of the performers in the Afrika Oye! concert performers CAMEROONIAN music found its international fame with Manu Dibangu and Soul Makossa. So, initially, did the imported star of tonight’s city hall rhythmfest, drummer Brice Wassy. But there’s rather more to Cameroonian music than makossa, and […]
Maria McCloy SOUTH AFRICAN pop star Brenda Fassie has often been referred to as the “black Madonna”. But a local music magazine has taken the comparison a bit too far. The May 1997 debut issue of e’Vibe, “the only specialist pop magazine in the country”, has run an interview with Fassie titled Talking with Brenda […]
WEDNESDAY, 11.00AM: SOUTH African cricket captain Hansie Cronje’s blistering 85 off 96 balls was not enough to save Ireland from a six-wicket defeat against Glamorgan in the B&H Cup yesterday. Cronje, on loan as skipper of the Irish side hit a cracking innings including three sixes and six fours to help Ireland to 202/9. But […]
TUESDAY, 9.00AM TRANSPORT Minister Mac Maharaj and Mozambican public works minister Roberto White yesterday signed the three contracts to begin construction of the R3 million toll road from Witbank to Maputo. The road will give Gauteng access to the sea 150km closer than Durban. Building will start in November and take four years. The road […]
TUESDAY, 11.00AM: SOUTH African tennis star Wayne Ferreira, plagued by a string of first-round knock-outs in international tournaments in Estoril, Madrid, Monte Carlo and Hamburg, is looking for a new racket to change his luck before the French Open in three weeks. His search has been going on for some time now, and suppliers Dunlop […]
MONDAY, 11.00AM The troubled livestock industry will commission analysis of the entire feed chain from farm lots to mills to increase efficiencies and cut costs in the face of foreign competition. The analysis follows a study by the consultancy Agrimaker Trends which warned that such sectors as livestock production, animal feed production and abattoirs are […]
TUESDAY, 3.30PM: TRANSKEI attorney-general Christo Nel today told the National Assembly’s justice committee that he dropped his bribery prosecution of casino king Sol Kerzner and former Cape Town mayor David Bloomberg because one of his key witnesses had died and another, former Transkei prime minister George Matanzima, was “belligerent, unreliable and obstreperous”. Nel said Matanzima […]
TUESDAY, 11.00AM: UNITED States soccer authorities have invited SA to an international friendly in Miami, Florida in September, Safa CEO Danny Jordaan said yesterday. However, Bafana Bafana’s tight schedule for the rest of the year might mean them turning down the invitation. The team has still to play 10 international matches this year, and September […]
TUESDAY, 11.00AM: THE SA Football Association is to hold an urgent meeting tomorrow with its Zairean counterpart to seek clarity on Zaire’s threat to pull out of the World Cup competition. The Zairean Leopards have been forced to play all recent matches on neutral territory due to the Zairean civil war, which has sapped their […]
TUESDAY, 9.00AM ENERGY Minister Penuell Maduna yesterday accused the multinational oil companies of exercising a stranglehold on the local oil industry. He suggested instead a government-backed national oil distributor, with a black empowerment share, which would redistribute its profits inside the country. Maduna said the oil industry benefitted from sanctions-era agreements to encourage multinationals to […]
TUESDAY, 9.00AM The price of housing has fallen for the eighth successive quarter, says the latest Absa housing review. The price of housing has fallen by six percent in real terms since January 1, allowing for inflation. The weak housing market has also slowed down a rise in building costs, which grew by 4,3%, compared […]
TUESDAY, 3.30PM: A FORMER Bophuthatswana policeman today confessed to shooting dead three Afrikaner Weerstandsbeweging members during violence preceeding the downfall of former Bop president Lucas Mangope on March 11 1994. In a written submission to the Tebbutt commission investigating the violence, Ontlametse Bernstein Menyatsoe, now a constable in the SA Police Service, admitted firing the […]
TUESDAY, 3.30PM: TRUTH commissioner Richard Lyster said today that there is no evidence that the murder and secret burials of anti-apartheid activists in KwaZulu-Natal was the work of hit squads, but that the practice was “commonplace” among security police. “The more we investigate this sort of thing the more we find out that this was […]
NEW FRONT IN DRUG WAR A GROUP calling itself “Soldiers of Islam” today claimed responsibility for last night’s firebombing of a house in Lenasia, near Johannesburg. An anonymous caller said Soldiers of Islam will continue to bomb houses belonging to drug dealers. The firebombing adds a new twist to the ongoing war between Cape Flats […]