SOCCER: Andrew Muchineripi SOUTH AFRICA staged the Rugby World Cup last year, the leading cricket nations will gather here in 2003 to battle for supremacy and Cape Town wants to host the Olympic Games one year later. Football has also got in on the act to a lesser extent, successfully staging the 1996 African Nations’ […]
Justin Pearce Tensions between Free State Premier Patrick “Terror” Lekota and provincial ANC members are not over yet. A new storm is brewing which will see provincial MPs’ loyalty to the premier tested in a vote in the Free State legislature. This follows the suspension of five senior officials from the province’s Department of Trade […]
Local is lekker for casino operators as they concentrate on making their money in the cities, writes Justin Pearce FORGET the tourists — it’s local money we’re after. That’s the prevailing view among prospective casino operators, with the result that no one is going to try and build another Sun City. A report by consultants […]
Everybody wants Keanu Reeves. But is it a case of great body, shame about the brain? ADAM SWEETING investigated while Reeves was in London with his rock group, Dogstar NOT even Keanu Reeves’s best friends think his rock group, Dogstar, is much good, but that hasn’t hindered it. It has been the support band for […]
Judith Watt THE Grande Arche de la Defense is not a practical venue for a fashion show, but anything is possible during the Paris shows — and last Friday Belgian designer Dirk Bikkembergs presented his 1997 menswear collection there. As about 20 briefly clad male models marched on like automata, the final boot was given […]
THERE was a touch of irony about the goal which signalled the end of a long unbeaten run by Orlando Pirates last weekend and effectively handed the Coca-Cola Challenge Cup to arch-rivals Kaizer Chiefs. Vaal Professionals are the Wimbledon of South African football, a Route One team who play it long and straight and hard, […]
Blanket RUGBY: Jon Swift TO ANY thinking follower of rugby, the margin between South Africa and the All Blacks at Christchurch this Saturday must be at least two tries. It is an interesting hypothesis if weighed against the perspective of national coach Andre Markgraaff, who has pinpointed a lack of success from the Springbok goalkickers […]
South Africa is well on its way to developing a child-sex tourism trade which could rival Thailand or the Philippines, child-care workers warn. For as little as food for their family’s pots, children as young as eight can be bought in the Cape — and very little is being done to stop the burgeoning trade […]
Justin Pearce MPUMALANGA launched its provincial gaming board on Wednesday, putting itself months ahead of the other provinces. The result is Mpumalanga expects to issue its first casino licences by March next year, says Andre Wilsenach, the board’s chief executive. Most other provinces are talking of issuing licences in the first half of next year, […]
To justify all the plaudits, Ernie Els needs to win a second major — and this week’s British Open would do just fine GOLF: David Davies ERNIE ELS was standing on the practice putting green at the Augusta National Golf Club last April when he heard a familiar, high-pitched voice call over to him. “Hey, […]
Charlotte O’Sullivan is gobsmacked by London’s Underground movement YOU’RE in a tube station in London and you see someone chewing gum maniacally, staring at a poster of Liz Hurley. Suddenly, he spins round and slap! There goes the gum, on to the end of Liz’s nose. What have you seen? Not an act of vandalism […]
Madeleine Wackernagel At the Johannesburg launch of the Human Development Report, the South African United Nations resident representative, David Whaley, stressed the need for a national approach to economic growth and development. This theme was highlighted by President Nelson Mandela in a special contribution to the report: “We need a national vision to lift us […]
Stefaans BrUmmer and Marion Edmunds THE auditor who “exposed” mismanagement of R7,8- million by the former leadership of the ANC Women’s League (ANCWL) is an old contact of Winnie Madikizela-Mandela — and was embroiled in the controversy surrounding Hazel Crane’s failed “gift” of a luxury Cape Town house to Madikizela-Mandela. ANC spokesman Ronnie Mamoepa this […]
Has Reserve Bank Governor Chris Stals given contradictory accounts of two similar rescue packages? DETAILS of an extraordinary secret hearing presided over by a former chief justice have thrown fresh light on the Reserve Bank’s controversial rescue of two struggling banks over the past five years. The hearing was an arbitration of a dispute arising […]
Jacquie Golding-Duffy Capital Radio, a former homeland broadcaster, is up for sale, but no bids have yet been received as the station’s financial books are in disarray. Investec Bank is handling the bidding process, as it did for the sale of the SABC’s six radio stations. According to sources at the Independent Broadcasting Authority (IBA) […]
Gareth Patterson The Mail & Guardian last week published a story about 11 lions in a forgotten Ethiopian zoo that experts believe may be related to either of two extinct African subspecies — the Cape lion of Southern Africa or the Barbary lion of North Africa. The lions are descendants of a group kept by […]
Tebello Radebe Extensive new capital investments in South Africa have been part of lengthy discussions between the Japanese giant, Toyota Motor Corporation (TMC) and its local affiliate, Toyota South Africa (TSA), which has become embroiled in a controversy over the National Empowerment Consortium (NEC) bid for Anglo’s stake in Johnnic. Asked again this week to […]
Thabo Mbeki meets monthly with a council of advisers. Marion Edmunds names the members of this exclusive group DEPUTY PRESIDENT Thabo Mbeki has set up a secretive, 24-strong think-tank called the Consultative Council to give him political advice. All members of the group — which appears to have no constitutional or administrative status despite its […]
Penny Heyns will be first out of the starting blocks in the race for a South Arican medal at the Olympics SWIMMING: Julian Drew ON Sunday South African swimmer Penny Heyns will finally know whether all the sacrifices and hard work of the past four years have been worthwhile. The last time she appeared at […]
While Zimbabwe’s President Robert Mugabe tries to quash all discussion about a successor, there are candidates waiting in the wings, reports Julius Zava Since Zimbabwe’s President Robert Mugabe announced on television earlier this year that he will soon retire, identifying a successor has become a major topic of debate in Zimbabwe. But there is a […]
South Africa’s involvement in humanitarian assistance in Africa is still under discussion, reports Stefaans BrUmmer THE Ministry of Foreign Affairs this week gave mixed signals whether South Africa would consider contributing troops to a multi-national peace force for Burundi. Deputy Foreign Minister Aziz Pahad appeared to contradict President Nelson Mandela this week when he told […]
Duncan Mackay discovers a computer link to the tangled web of dope trafficking in sport THE Olympic athlete sat in front of his personal computer and dialled a telephone number on his modem. Within seconds, he was connected to an Internet site that offered him the most sophisticated drugs on the market. “Dear Friend and […]
Has the government gone too far, too fast in its drive to make Transnet an affirmative action role model? Mungo Soggot reports TRANSNET has one of South Africa’s most aggressive affirmative action programmes, and deputy managing director Saki Macozoma concedes it is not only hitting the company’s “Broederbond” contingent but is affecting morale and performance. […]
Unions have received a welcome R2,5-million for training to prepare for the Labour Relations Act, writes Madeleine Wackernagel While the implementation of the Labour Relations Act (LRA) proceeds at a snail’s pace, with promulgation next month now increasingly unlikely, the unions have received a welcome boost in preparing for the new order. The African-American Labour […]
THEATRE: Matthew Krouse Long ago, when words were powerful, we would wish misfortune on our enemies with the oath: “May the gods shit on you!” This was supposed to remind us of our predestiny; that we are all at the mercy of fate. Life today may have altered, but the question of relinquished responsibility — […]
Marion Edmunds A South African-born doctor — a specialist anaethetist — has had his citizenship cancelled by the Home Affairs Department while he was out of the country. The anaethetist, who has been living and working in Canada for the last six years and does not want to be named, said he discovered he and […]
Rehana Rossouw A group of Cape Town hikers are outraged by a local farmer’s wife who refused to help them after they were forced to abandon a hike on the snow-capped Overberg mountain range two weeks ago. The party of 17 had slept overnight in a hut owned by the Burger family of the farm […]
Philippa Garson PROFESSOR Njabulo Ndebele appears to be out of the race for one of the country ‘s top academic jobs — the post of Wits University vice-chancellor. Ndebele, a keen favourite among a broad spectrum of academics and students, ha s neither applied for the job nor accepted any nomination. If Ndebele remains out […]
SOCCER: Michael Walker THE flow of money and talent into English football continued at bank-bursting speed this week with Middlesbrough’s breathtaking announcement that they had signed Fabrizio Ravanelli from Juventus for 7- million. It made the 27-year-old Italian international striker, who has signed a four-year contract for a reported 1,3-million per year, the fourth most […]
THERE’S a rumour doing the rounds here that the Grahamstown Festival will be renamed the Grahamstown Dance Umbrella next year. But before you uncork the champagne, don your gumboots and organise a tickertape parade in celebration of a discipline that has finally come of age, it should be mentioned that dance wins the “flavour of […]
Antonio Ole deserves the prize for the best one- person “production” in Grahamstown. Less an installation than a poignant piece of theatre, his mixed-media opus, Breaking Boundaries, spans virtually the entire spectrum of colonial history, and simultaneously engages in the most pertinent discourses of contemporary art, without sacrificing the specifics of time, place or personal […]
Philippa Garson THE sudden death of professor Etienne Mureinik was a tragic loss to the countr y, friends and colleagues said this week. Mureinik, dean of the law faculty at Wits University, took his life by jumping from the 23rd floor of a hotel in Braamfontein on Wednesday morning, accordin g to police, after a […]