Staff Reporter

FORMER prime minister PW Botha “went through the roof” when he heard the radical proposals of a hand-picked team of senior civil servants whom he had mandated to find solutions to break the deadlock with the ANC in 1987. In their final proposal, the civil servants who participated in Operation Skrik Vir Niks criticised the […]

Connie Masilo-Matsunyane is one of South Africa’s hottest soap opera stars. BAFANA KHUMALO followed her trail and uncovered the real Connie SHE seems thrown by a voice on the other side of the cellular phone requesting, nay demanding with desperation, an interview the following day. But she recovers quite quickly, explaining that she can only […]

Joshua Amupadhi SOUTH AFRICANS seeking fortunes in Angola’s fabled diamond fields have fallen foul of the government’s crackdown on illegal immigrants as the ruling party, the MPLA, tries to prove it has stopped using South African mercenaries in ongoing skirmishes against the opposition, Unita. This is one reason given by the Angolan government for what […]

There are ominious warnings in KwaZulu-Natal that a major massacre could lie ahead if action is not taken, writes Ann Eveleth FOUR months since KwaZulu-Natal’s political leaders declared their 14-year civil war “over”, people continue to die all over the province for their political allegiances. And there are ominous signs that peaceful areas are beginning […]

Roger Cowe SAINSBURY and the Co-op signalled the start of a new era in British high-street retailing last week when they launched a project to transform their trading relationships with Third World producers. The two grocery groups have teamed up with the Fairtrade Foundation to develop codes of conduct that should result in improved conditions […]

FILM: Hazel Friedman THE ground-breaking local television series, Ghetto Diaries, won the award for best documentary at the 1996 Southern Africa Film Festival, held recently in Harare. The brainchild of filmmaker Teboho Mahlatsi and M&G Television Productions, the series provided a refreshingly gritty visual diary of township life and the aspirations of its residents. What […]

Ancient lore, modern art ONCE upon a time, Qauqaua, a beautiful San woman, murdered her husband in revenge for his murder of her mother. Clytemnestra, who in Greek legend killed her husband Agamemnon in revenge for his killing of their daughter, would have identified with Qauqaua. The two women are probably in some sort of […]

Ann Eveleth WARM sun chased the shadows from the hills around Mandini on the KwaZulu-Natal north coast last Sunday, but all that lit the main rondawel of the Shandu kraal was the glimmer of a single white candle burned in memory of the two young men gunned down there last week. Women mourning on straw […]

Angella Johnson THE government is to lift its two-year ban on recruiting new police officers following a public outcry over escalating violent crime and the continued haemorrhaging of manpower from the South African Police Service (SAPS). The first batch of candidates is expected to start training early next year, ending a moratorium police claim has […]

Not only did Shahid Afridi break the world record by scoring 100 from 37 balls, but he was also the oldest 16-year-old ever to play international cricket CRICKET:Neil Manthorp INTERNATIONAL one-day cricket has to produce something unbelievable these days to excite the pressbox. Generally, it’s all been seen before. And I mean genuinely unbelievable, not […]

Everything from gospel to kwaito features on Sipho Hotstix Mabuse’s first new album in five years. GLYNIS O’HARA talks to him YOU hear the name Hotstix and you think Burnout and Jive Soweto even though the songs are 12 years old. Then you say that it’s a pity, but Hotstix really hasn’t done anything to […]

ANDREW WORSDALE visited the famous African film director Idrissa Ouedraogo EMINENT film director Idrissa Ouedraogo, born in Burkina Faso and based in Paris, is currently in the sixth week of shooting his first English-language film in Zimbabwe’s Domboshawa, a rustic area outside Harare. Domboshawa has duly been dubbed “Dombowood”, location for several of the recent […]

Jacquie Golding-Duffy A CABAL of about 15 staffers at the Independent Broadcasting Authority (IBA) have hauled the management of the regulator before the public protector for an investigation into allegations of financial mismanagement and misappropriation of taxpayers’ funds. A memorandum from this group, which outlines grievances and alleged malpractices by some top IBA executives, will […]

While the UN reconsiders its mission in Angola, the SADC is rethinking its own obligations there, reports Joshua Amupadhi THE United Nations Security Council will decide this week whether to extend its costly operation to maintain Angola’s fragile peace. Meanwhile, fears that the Southern African Development Community (SADC) Organ on Politics, Defence and Security set […]

THEATRE: Andrew Wilson ACTORS Greg Melville-Smith and Karin van der Laag deserve medals, not only for excellent performances, but for coping every night for an hour and a half with visionless direction and a clich-infested script. As the first tangible production from the Civic Theatre’s 1996 New Stages project, Please Hold I’m Coming, written by […]

MUSIC: Bafana Khumalo LAST weekend’s Soul Invasion Tour at the Johannesburg Stadium was a memory lane affair rather than a young-and-with-it bash where the latest trends in dance and music ruled the night. What with Randy Crawford leading the pack of late Sixties and early Seventies crooners; The Stylistics; those kings of funk Kool and […]

One of the greatest things the local science and technology industry has going for it is its people. Lesley Cowling reports STATISTICS released this month confirm what South African scientists and engineers have long suspected: they work in difficult circumstances, no one understands them and they are brilliant. The Foundation for Research Development’s recently published […]

Joshua Amupadhi SOUTH AFRICA’S youngest national student organisation believes it has discovered a pool of support among campus students weary of “struggle” politics. Oddly, for South Africa, it is a mainly white organisation with a black leader. The South African Liberal Students’ Association (Salsa) promotes individualism, as opposed to collectivism. This, says its newly elected […]

India believe South Africa have a weakness when facing spin, and have loaded their bowling attack accordingly CRICKET:Jon Swift IT IS of more than passing interest that India, the country which took the first step towards rebuilding this country’s cricketing strength by becoming South Africa’s debut opponents in the new, democratic era, should have focused […]

The escape of nearly 1 000 prisoners this year highlights fault lines in the over- burdened criminal justice system. David Shapshak reports THE parlous state of the South African Police Service was underlined yet again this week with the release of figures showing that more people escaped from police custody this year than from all […]

Marion Edmonds POLITICAL parties are anticipating a review of the Constitution next year, leading to future amendments to the text, finalised by the Constitutional Committee this week. Both the National Party and the Democratic Party say they will take the opportunity of a review next year to change the clause which prohibits parliamentarians from crossing […]

With the South African selectors choosing two touring teams, and with their eyes firmly on the 1999 World Cup, young players have the chance to prove themselves RUGBY:Jon Swift ANDRE MARKGRAAFF, our national rugby coach – though this is perhaps too simplistic a title given his new exalted status – has made no secret of […]

Ann Eveleth The state’s case against General Magnus Malan crumbled as the judge branded chief witness Captain JP Opperman a liar and acquited six Caprivi trainees. In the Durban Supreme Court on Thursday, Judge Jan Hugo in his judgment said former Military Intelligence operative Captain JP Opperman’s evidence was often contradictory, improbable or absurd. He […]

Stefaans Brmmer SOUTH AFRICA has joined the body of nations agitating for a complete ban on the production, stockpiling, transfer and use of anti-personnel landmines – but campaigners say South Africa should prove its bona fides by legislating a complete ban locally. Jackie Selebi, South Africa’s ambassador to the United Nations in Geneva, last week […]

Britain is once again eyeing South Africa as a market for some major defence machinery, reports Stefaans Brmmer SHOULD Cabinet decide to buy four second- hand submarines from Britain – at the bargain price of R2-billion – it may well find the deal to be a sweetener. London is hoping the cheap subs will soften […]

Shirley Kossick THE MATCH by Ben Temkin (New Millenium, R65) BEN TEMKIN is the author of several non- fiction works, mainly in the field of finance. This is his first venture into comic fiction, but his sense of humour can be glimpsed in the witty title for his study of two stock exchange swindlers – […]

Chris McGreal in Nairobi PAUL MUITE has been accused of a few things in his time. There was the conspiracy to recolonise Kenya and the plot to overthrow the government. But the opposition leader and other members of Kenya’s elite are braced for a new charge: consorting with the devil. And the government has an […]

consultants Lynda Loxton THE government is finding that trying to get to grips with the booming consultancy industry is as difficult as wrestling with an octopus. This emerged in the Parliamentary Public Accounts Committee when it considered the special report by Auditor General Henri Kluever on consultancy services. The committee heard this week that although […]

and terror Rehana Rossouw EVERY morning, the mother of a seven-year- old girl watched her daughter leave their Khayelitsha shack to walk to school. Most mornings, the child left home with an empty stomach. For the past few months the child hadn’t reached school. Instead, she had been going to a house nearby where she […]

THIS new weekly section in the Mail & Guardian will highlight the scientists, technicians, researchers and engineers whose work will decide whether South Africa forever lags behind the global economy, or can move to the cutting edge. Statistics released by the Foundation for Research Development (FRD) this month show that South Africans score badly in […]

Coverage of the Dunblane tragedy – a massacre of children in a small Scottish town – raised serious questions about media intrusion. But a new report casts a gentler light on the old Grub Street image, writes Peter Preston THE newshound of myth and legend has a soft smile and a hard heart, a grey […]

Eddie Koch EUGENE DE KOCK’S autobiography, hand-written in his cell, is being kept under wraps by the colonel and his lawyers because it contains deeply personal details about the man who became apartheid’s most ruthless killer. It describes his upbringing in a right-wing family on a plot near Springs. He attended the Baanbreker Primary School […]