Staff Reporter

The public service is run by a code so detailed and archaic that it prescribes acceptable body weights for job applicants and provides endless blockages to government progress, reports Anton Harber ONE issue, more than any other, will determine the extent to which President Nelson Mandela’s government succeeds this year in its ambitious mission. It […]

A senior official in the safety and security secretariat stands charged with child molestation, reports Philippa Garson A top official in the safety and security secretariat has been suspended, pending the outcome of a court case against him involving charges of indecent assault against two female minors. Etienne Dirk Marais, chief director of liaison and […]

THEATRE: Hazel Friedman Isnt poverty, illness and death worse than waiting for a boy to ask you to dance? The answer is NO! This plaintive soliloquoy, spoken against the backdrop of the Greek Cypriot Club in Bedfordview, encapsulates the agony of Mira (Irene Stephanou) and just about every other teenager who wishes to be everything […]

After the stunning display against Ghana South Africa have to lift themselves once again to take on the wily, talented Tunisians SOCCER: Paul Mandelson JOHN MOSHOEU, Mark Fish, Lucas Radebe and Clive Barker must have had countless dreams — asleep and wide awake — about crucial tackles, glorious goals and winning the African Cup of […]

This week Africa’s largest banker, Absa, decided to reassure its perplexed staff about the `Bob Aldworth’ affair.

With the revival of foreign tourism to South Africa, an enterprising businessman has initiated bureaux de change shops, reports Lynda Loxton Free-standing foreign exchange `shops’ have been a common sight for South African travellers abroad, but something foreign exchange-strapped South African authorities have definitely not encouraged. All of that changed this week when it was […]

Bronwyn Jones finds more brilliant and bizarre inventions in her monthly look through the Patents Journal DON’T let the thousands of expected redundancies at Anglo American’s Freegold fool you; if the Patents Journal is anything to go by, South African mining is going from strength to strength. There are 15 major new mining patents this […]

Sam Shilowa, Cosatu secretary general, in The Mark Gevisser ONE of Sam Shilowa’s previous employers tells the story of meeting him across a picket line and being so impressed by his performance in negotiations that he suggested he be groomed for management. Sorry, said Shilowa’s immediate boss: nice enough chap but he really doesn’t have […]

Lynda Loxton The Katz Commission was slated last week for not going far enough in recommending a special tax dispensation for employee share ownership programmes (ESOPs). Msele Corporate and Merchant Bank joint managing director Litha Nyhonyha told the parliamentary joint standing committee on finance that the commission had missed a unique opportunity to promote ESOPs, […]

Marion Edmunds A black female SABC employee, Hope Zindle, has been charged with assault and intent to commit grievous bodily harm after she grabbed a white colleague, Janet Szabo, around the throat. The matter is being heard in Brixton Magistrate’s Court where Zindle has pleaded not guilty to the charge. The case has provoked a […]

Karen Harverson Once exchange controls are lifted, the South African investment community’s interest in offshore opportunities will snowball, says Syfrets Group chief executive Christopher Beatty, speaking at a launch this week of new international investment products. However, he cautioned that investors need to react quickly to changes in the international economy and understand the risks […]

Education in the new South Africa: While apartheid still rules on the platteland, Soweto schools stand half empty as pupils move to the suburbs The week after white parents barred black pupils from Potgietersrus Primary, Justin Pearce found apartheid to be a fact of life at many Northern Province schools Grey-haired, bespectacled headmaster Hennie Berg […]

Karen Harverson The development of a positive enterprise culture is not solely the responsibility of the government but also of the private sector. South African Breweries (SAB) recently hosted a prize-giving function for the winners of its Kick-Start programme, a joint initiative set up in May last year between SAB and youth business organisations. The […]

The National Party has replaced the Freedom Front as the ANC’s sweetheart, reports Marion Edmunds The African National Congress has jilted its Afrikaner sweetheart, the Freedom Front, and is courting the National Party, not out of love, but political need. Over the past few weeks, the ANC has realised more than ever that it needs […]

Gaye Davis A POLITICAL wrangle is looming over who will succeed deputy speaker of the National Assembly Dr Bhadra Ranchod, who has made himself available for a diplomatic post. There is no constitutional provision for power-sharing when it comes to parliamentary positions. The overwhelming majority of committee chairs are held by the African National Congress […]

When Ulysses is unavailable, the ordinary mortal who gets to work on one corner of the Augean Stables is to be commended, puny though his or her efforts may be seem relative to the task at hand. It is in that sense that we offer our congratulations to Sydney Mufamadi’s Ministry of Safety and Security […]

CINEMA: Andrew Worsdale HUEY NEWTON, one of the founders of the Black Panther movement, was a great fan of Melvin Van Peebles’s 1971 movie Sweet Sweetback’s Baadassss Song. He even analysed that funky box-office smash, writing that its tale of a hustler who evolves into a revolutionary was an allegory of a `street brother who […]

M&G reporter AN investigation against South Africa’s top detective, Priority Crimes Unit head Assistant Commisioner Karel `Suiker’ Brits, has failed to uncover sufficient evidence that he neglected to bring to book police members linked to apartheid crimes. KwaZulul-Natal police reporting officer Advocate Neville Melville was asked last year by Safety and Security secretary Azhar Cachalia […]

Pro-democracy strikes brought Swaziland to a standstill. But the grip of the monarchy is a strong one to break, reports Stefaans Brmmer `PATIENCE pays’, the inscription on the back of the bus admonished would-be overtakers as it rambled over Swaziland’s hills. The legend might as well be a national motto: it would explain why Swaziland […]

an exclusive club The Davis Cup tie against Austria may be an elitist event but its success will result in many new members being able to join the exclusive club of South African tennis TENNIS: Jon Swift IT IS an inescapable fact that the South Africa-Austria Davis Cup tie which gets under way on the […]

Etienne Mureinik, one of the academics at the heart of the campus conflict, asks what has gone wrong with the transformation of Wits University A rush of words has flowed these last few months to censure Wits for not transforming fast enough. Frighteningly little of it has found it necessary to define `transformation’. Confusion about […]

Rehana Rossouw Human Rights Commission chairman Reverend Barney Pityana was due to be admitted as an attorney of the Cape Town Supreme Court on Friday– almost 20 years after receiving his law degree. His repeated attempts to enrol as an attorney earlier had been thwarted by police persecution. In an affidavit to the court, Pityana […]

THEATRE: Hazel Friedman Those who are unacquainted with Greek tragedy may yet be vaguely familiar with the myth of Medea — the woman who murdered her sons when her husband dumped her to become king. But even audiences who were struck by Pier Paolo Pasolini’s 1970 film version — with its bizarre exploration of Freudian […]

Dirk Hartford It was reminiscent of the heady mass struggles of the Eighties. For four hours last Sunday, several hundred trade unionists listened to fiery speeches from workers and trade union leaders denouncing the government and its policy of national reconciliation as a `national disaster’ between songs praising socialism as the only road to liberation. […]

The Nation of Islam leader spoke during his vist to South Africa this week of creating a homeland for more than a million black American convicts, report Vuyo Mvoko and David Beresford Louis Farrakhan, the Black American firebrand who is trying to fill the shoes of Martin Luther King, has dreamed an extraordinary dream — […]

Preserved heads found in a British museum are set to stir up a diplomatic controversy, reports Eddie Koch Hard on the heels of well-publicised plans by Chief Nicholas Gcaleka to set off for Scotland in search of Xhosa warrior king Sandile’s skull comes news of another grisly discovery: five dried-out `bushmen’ heads stored in cardboard […]

Gaye Davis and Rehana Rossouw THE policeman at the centre of the row over allegations that the National Intelligence Agency was spying on top policemen will not be undergoing a lie-detector test, police said this week. Crime Investigation Service spokesman, senior superintendent Faizel Kader, said superintendent H Moodley had volunteered for a polygraph test, but […]

Thabo Mbeki has accused the print media of a go-slow on affirmative action. Jacquie Golding-Duffy surveys the industry to see if this is true On a head count, local newspapers have not done particularly well in furthering the cause of affirmative action. With more than 80% of the local media controlled by four players, namely: […]

Stefaans Brmmer A late-night visit by Mpumalanga Premier Matthews Phosa has failed, for now, to steer Swaziland’s young monarch towards democracy, but diplomats believe the steady application of `friendly’ pressure from, among others, President Nelson Mandela, will bear fruit. South Africa’s Foreign Affairs Department remained adamant this week it would not `interfere’ in Swaziland’s domestic […]

South African import duties are preventing the sounds of music from reaching the man in the street, reports Jacquie Golding-Duffy The South African company which manufactures wind-up radios has appealed to Deputy President Thabo Mbeki to lift crippling import costs which have scuppered local sales. Cape Town-based BayGen Power Manufacturing, which launched the radio last […]

Philippa Garson To pay or not to pay? That is the politically loaded question. Whether school fees should be compulsory is being hotly debated in government circles and is holding up the implementation of new education policy for schools. If the government goes for minimum free education for all it risks losing wealthier parents — […]

Simon Segal JUST what does the Reconstruction and Development Programme (RDP) office, officially called the Development Planning branch of the President’s Office, do? Is criticism around its delivery fair? Deputy director general Bernie Fanaroff is clear that the office has three primary functions: l Development planning: This is the mobilisation of resources to match societal […]