Four weeks of trauma and triumph culminated in South Africa emerging as champions, now they have to face up to that challenge, writes Jon Swift THE euphoria will take a while to evaporate into the realities of everyday life but the bitter aftertaste of Louis Luyt’s ill-timed attempts at humour will probably take a bit […]
Reg Rumney reports on the labour market gospel according to the World Bank A World Bank report on labour warns against the the kind of amendments the union negotiators have proposed on compulsory centralised bargaining in the draft Labour Bill. Labour is the theme of the 1995 World Development Report: Workers in an Integrating World […]
Stefaans BrUmmer DEPUTY President FW de Klerk this week distanced=20 himself from post-1990 security force “dirty tricks”=20 operations, while the ANC parliamentary study group on=20 safety and security said denials were to be expected. The tete-a-tete followed revelations in last week’s=20 Mail & Guardian by former police operative Paul Erasmus=20 of his involvement in the […]
There has been an outcry over the payment of=20 traditional leaders, but there are sound reasons behind=20 the proposals, writes Ann Eveleth BEHIND the draft Remuneration of Traditional Leaders=20 Bill approved by Cabinet last week and President Nelson=20 Mandela’s long-term proposal to provide chiefs with=20 parliamentary perks lies a comprehensive strategy to=20 turn traditional leaders […]
Sam Ramsamy is now=20 on the IOC and there is other good news for=20 Cape Town’s Olympic=20 bid, writes Julian Drew AFTER several months earlier this year when the Cape=20 Town Olympic Bid seemed to be on a kamikaze course of=20 self destruction, followed by a period of quiet=20 uncertainty, South Africa’s delegation to the […]
Lynda Loxton reports on the union-backed research=20 project that has moulded the new government’s=20 industrial policy The South African government should not ape Korea in=20 the 1960s by trying to intervene to help carefully=20 chosen “winning sectors” of the economy. This is one of=20 the conclusions of a detailed study of South African=20 The study, […]
CLASSICAL MUSIC: Coenraad Visser IT was only with her last two encores, a hilarious=20 performance of Victor Herbert’s comic Art is Calling=20 for Me and a sweetly introspective rendition of a Maori=20 traditional song, that Dame Kiri Te Kanawa’s recital=20 before an overjoyed Pretoria audience came to life. Not that there wasn’t much to admire […]
Justin Pearce The South African Police Services are to face a court=20 challenge over the exclusion of people with HIV=20 infection from the force. Police unions and human=20 rights law organisations have filed papers in the=20 Transvaal Supreme Court arguing that SAPS policy of=20 pre-employment HIV testing is discriminatory in that it=20 excludes people with […]
Reg Rumney IT may be fashionable to focus on manufactured goods,=20 but commodities still earn most of South Africa’s=20 foreign exchange. Precious metals, diamonds, base metals and mineral=20 products make up 69 percent of South Africa’s exports. Indeed, rather than ignore its traditional source of=20 foreign exchange, South Africa should actually=20 diversify within its traditional […]
TELEVISION: Luke Alfred ALTHOUGH former Radio Rat Jonathan Handley is on the=20 other end of a telephone, one can imagine his eyes=20 lighting up at the magical sound of “pop”. The word has=20 special connotations for the man who, years ago, penned=20 that eerie local classic, Z-X Dan. For Handley, now in his 40s and […]
Rehana Rossouw THE Department of Foreign Affairs has been blasted for=20 “embarrassing” South Africa by not affording diplomatic=20 recognition to fellow Organisation of African Unity=20 member, the Sahrawi Republic. African National Congress executive committee member=20 Jeremy Cronin, writing in the South African Communist=20 Party publication African Communist, gave two examples=20 of South Africa’s ambiguous relationship […]
THEATRE: David Le Page ‘GOT green chillies, makooooti!” Pertulia Ramaphala’s=20 cry echoes in between sprays of invective directed at=20 the men who harass her character Gladys in the=20 Johannesburg Civic Theatre’s Got Green Chillies Makoti. Gladys is a vegetable seller with a chequered past that=20 includes a private education interrupted by pregnancy,=20 posing as Winnie […]
Reg Rumney For many small businessmen tax planning boils down to=20 declaring half of what you actually earn; employees in=20 the lower ranks of big companies don’t even have that=20 illegal option. Both would benefit from employing a good accountant so=20 that they can participate in the upper-class sport of=20 avoiding — not evading, which […]
South Africa’s input at the UN conference on the=20 extension of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty won=20 wide acclaim, writes Abdul Minty provides some=20 background to the decison THERE has been considerable confusion and=20 misunderstanding about the Nuclear Non-Proliferation=20 Treaty (NPT) Review and Extension Conference which=20 took place at the United Nations headquarters during=20 April and […]
Alan Morris and Stefaans Brummer IN the new South Africa, the military-industrial=20 complex should expect to find it a lot harder to=20 operate in the covert, money-is-no-object manner of the=20 The government set up the Cameron Commission to=20 investigate the industry after a large consignment of=20 South African rifles and ammunition was found in a=20 […]
As the Rugby World Cup reaches its peak this weekend,=20 Luke Alfred looks at a book which examines the=20 relationship between the sport and life in South Africa IN AUGUST 1992, a dark month for South Africa in=20 general and rugby in particular, a journalist from the=20 Sunday Star wrote: “It is hard to write […]
FORMER security policeman Paul Erasmus has given the=20 first explanation of what happened to Mamelodi activist=20 Stanza Bopape, who disappeared without trace in 1987. Erasmus never dealt with Bopape, but he was told by two=20 of his colleagues that Bopape was beaten to death=20 during interrrogation on the 10th floor of John Vorster=20 Square in […]
Durban’s fledgling centre for the arts is preparing to=20 fly, reports HUMPHREY TYLER MAYBE they should hire lifeguards for the official=20 opening in a few weeks of the Bat Centre beside the=20 water in the harbour in Durban. Vusisizwe Mchunu=20 (mostly known as Vusi), the centre’s project manager=20 and a prize-winning poet, shook his head […]
Anne Eveleth Land Affairs Minister Derek Hanekom rejected reports=20 that legislation he proposed to Cabinet this week was=20 aimed at privatising tribal land rights, and said the=20 draft Bill would instead provide legal security to=20 millions of impoverished black rural South Africans=20 living on tribal land in the former homelands. Hanekom said the proposed Interim […]
Writing stories on the sex lives of presidents has become a dangerous occupation for Southern African journalists, writes David Lush Just last month, the publisher and two editors of Zimbabwe’s Financial Gazette were arrested, interrogated and charged with an offence which has hardly seen the light of day since the fall of Ian Smith’s Rhodesia […]
Misapprehensions and misrepresentations followed the=20 Irish Republican leader on his visit to South Africa,=20 writes David Beresford There was, it must be said, room for misunderstanding,=20 and misunderstanding there surely was as the Irish=20 Republican leader made a triumphant entry into the=20 Transvaal shanty town of Phola Park on Sunday. “I don’t know who this […]
Pat Sidley dissects the profound — and controversial – – changes proposed for South Africa’s health services ‘A caring health service” is the Department of Health’s=20 slogan describing its work. And it’s been a gruelling=20 five months for its committee charged with starting the=20 The Committee of Inquiry into a National Health=20 Insurance System has […]
Most South Africans have sickened under one of the=20 world’s most skewed and inefficient health care=20 systems. It’s been in desperate need of major surgery,=20 and Health Minister Nkosazana Zuma is to be commended=20 for bringing an extensive, carefully constructed set of=20 proposals to the discussion table a little more than a=20 year after coming […]
Bronwen Roberts FARMERS in the Somerset East area are desperately=20 trying to get about 8 000kg of biltong ready for the=20 town’s Biltong Festival next weekend — but will this=20 be enough? Front page headlines in the local newspaper have for=20 weeks asked: “Sal daar genoeg droewors wees vir die=20 fees? (Will be there be […]
Justin Pearce World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF)=20 development blueprints have been lambasted by a report=20 released by the development agency Oxfam.=20 The report says the World Bank and IMF schemes,=20 introduced in the early 1980s to promote economic=20 recovery, deepen the cycle of poverty endured by the=20 citizens of developing countries. The Oxfam […]
Stefaans Brummer A SHADOWY company that was a nerve centre for security=20 police dirty tricks planning in the Witwatersrand since=20 late 1990 still exists as a police front. The company, which operated under the cover names=20 Lamont Market Research and LM Research, shed its more=20 notorious “Stratcom” component in late 1991 or early=20 1992, but […]
THEATRE: David Le Page LARA FOOT has directed a rather noisy silent movie.=20 It’s called Womb Tide, and is masquerading as theatre=20 in the Laager at the Market, complete with a little=20 boer clown, an alternatively vulgar and sympathetic=20 heroine, and a properly precocious child. The filmic elements abound. Brian Webber plays a=20 congenitally awkward […]
Does the defiantly un-PC humour of comedy duo Programme=20 Fluoride deserve a place in the new South Africa? JOHN=20 PHILLIPS reports IT’S 6pm in an Irish pub in central Cape Town and Chris=20 McEvoy and Roger Christian — the two determinedly=20 confrontational comedians who make up Programme=20 Fluoride — are poised over pints of Guinness […]
Rehana Rossouw November’s local government election could be even more=20 chaotic than last year’s national elections in which=20 the Independent Election Commission (IEC) was given=20 only three months to prepare for a poll in which 19- million people participated, former IEC chairman Mr=20 Justice JC Kriegler warned this week. “We were given three months to […]
M-Net should not hide its real results behind its=20 restructuring, argues Jacques Magliolo ELECTRONIC Media Networks (M-Net) produced poor results=20 for the third year running, and directors are hiding=20 behind the incomparability of financial statements.=20 The company’s preliminary report states: “Results for=20 the year ended March 31 1994 include businesses now=20 housed in MultiChoice and […]
A former security policeman opens his bag of dirty=20 tricks. Eddie Koch and Stefaans Brummer report THE State Security Council under former President FW de=20 Klerk created a four-year plan to undermine and weaken=20 the ANC and its allies in the build-up to the 1994=20 Details of the extensive dirty tricks plan, planned to=20 run […]
Bruce Cohen WEB FEET Aliweb’s the key The World Wide Web (WWW) browsers Netscape and Mosaic=20 are the virtual keys to the virtual world — but they=20 only unlock the door to cyberspace. Once you’re in,=20 where do you go? What makes the Internet truly=20 accessible are the search engines that have been=20 established around […]