Barbara Ludman EIGHTY percent of black South Africans and about 40 percent of whites cannot read or compute at a Standard Five level, according to a report released this week. In the first-ever nationwide study of literacy, Indian respondents showed the highest average literacy levels. Coloured participants scored, on average, between black and white literacy […]
The Volkstaat Council has concluded that its dream is not practicable, reports Jan Taljaard After 44 council meetings, 60 committee meetings and more than R3-million in salaries for its 20 members, the Volkstaat Council (VC) has abandoned the idea of an Afrikaner homeland — for the time being. The VC, a council of rightwingers investigating […]
ANDREW WORSDALE separates the intelligent and stylish from the Dumb and Dumbers in his best and worst of 1995’s movies IN a year dominated by Jim Carrey at the box- office — The Mask and Dumb and Dumber were the two top-grossing movies in South Africa, earning a combined income of R16,5-million — – there […]
With the African Nations Cup finals to look forward to, it is hoped that the administrators match the success of the SOCCER: Lungile Madywabe ON the field, South African soccer has made admirable progress since its readmission into world football three years ago but this progress has not been reflected in the administration of the […]
Marino Corazza MOVEABLE FEAST=20 IT’S Sunday May 29, and I’m at Sol’s very own, charming Sun=20 City. In the Soup Bowl, to be exact. At 6:30pm, it’s=20 showtime, folks: the Loeries.=20 ‘Twas the time of year for the pulp and celluloid maestros=20 to receive their just accolades. Fiction, but nevertheless,=20 let’s not kid ourselves, this […]
A light-hearted look at some developments on the business and financial scene * The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) dismissed a complaint against a Paul Revere ad by the Tobacco Action Committee. The committee said the horse used in the ad was subjected to passive smoking, noting the rider’s cigarette was closer than a metre to […]
GOLF: Jon Swift WE are a nation of immense expectations, buoyed by the optimism which tends to flatten out the hills of the failures which are so inherently part of the human condition. In the realm of South African golf, thank heaven we We have had any number of success stories within the boundaries of […]
Last week, the Taiwanese ambassador to Pretoria was the only representative of the non-corporate world in a Mail & Guardian picture of the exclusive club of donors of R750 000 to President Nelson Mandela’s Children’s It is not unreasonable to assume that the ambassador’s generosity has something to do with the fact that his government […]
The need to create jobs has emerged as the burning issue for the government, labour and business, reports Reg Rumney Suddenly, at the end of a year in which economic growth and fiscal and monetary discipline held centre stage, joblessness has entered like Banquo’s ghost. The official unemployment rate is around 33 percent, but the […]
Bafana Khumalo Native tongue ‘Things are bad, B-man, I am telling you. They really are.” The man in the business suit took a slug of a three-finger scotch and lit me a cigarette. “White folks should not be behaving like this, productivity will be at an all-time low with this Rugby World Cup thing. “Already […]
Bronwen Roberts Thousands of Eastern Cape taxi commuters were terrified this week as they rode from one town to the next. Many sang and prayed to God to save them from the very people whose service they were using as a vicious war between rival taxi groups fighting over routes continued unabated. The slaughter has […]
Ivo Correia South Africa will kick off World Environment Week by=20 hosting the United Nations Environment Program’s Global 500=20 awards on June 5. President Nelson Mandela will host the award ceremony which =20 will be attended by environmentalists from around the=20 world. The awards are intended to reward exceptional work=20 on behalf of our planet, […]
The theme of this year’s World Environment Day, being=20 staged in South Africa for the first time, is rooted in the=20 struggle for democracy and unity Eddie Koch reports SOME years ago Albie Sachs, then the ANC guru on=20 constitutional matters, wrote that an end to apartheid was=20 the balm that would mend the scars […]
Let’s look a gift horse in the mouth, Reg Rumney suggests Promotional material the Mail & Guardian staffers received this year ranged from the sublime — a useful desktop calculator — to the ridiculous: that is, the grey concrete brick that arrived at reception for me. At first I thought it a veiled threat, but […]
The head of Avia Airlines has a shady past, reports Stefaans BrUmmer GERT de Klerk, the former airline mechanic whose Avia Airlines has made him South Africa’s Richard Branson, built his empire flying clandestine military contracts to war-torn Angola in the 1980s. Avia this month became South Africa’s first independent carrier to ply the lucrative […]
Reg Rumney=20 While the world waits for South Africa to spell out its=20 privatisation plans, next door, Mozambique has thundered=20 ahead with a far-reaching privatisation programme. By the end of February this year, Mozambique’s government=20 had privatised 21 large, strategic enterprises, and plans=20 to privatise a further 40 or so over the next two years,=20 […]
Shaun de Waal=20 CHEAP LIVES by Antony Sher (Little, Brown, R79,99)=20 SOME years ago, as the first buds of a new South African=20 dispensation began to open, much ink was expended in=20 speculation about what new forms our literature would now=20 take. It was assumed that the exigencies that drove the=20 apartheid-era novels of such […]
CLASSICAL MUSIC: Coenraad Visser A STRING of world-class performances — what a rare treat for Gauteng classical music With the National Symphony Orchestra, Swedish cellist Torlief Thedeen confirmed that he is one of the most exciting and proficient cellists on world stages today. His compelling and passionate performance of Shostakovich’s Cello Concerto No 1 was […]
Reg Rumney While the government is pressing on with attempts to get South Africa preferential trade access to the European Union (EU) in terms of the Lome Convention, business seems lukewarm. The Lome Convention gives products from underdeveloped countries access to European markets, and could boost sales in Europe of certain South African products, particularly […]
M-Net is planning to unbundle MultiChoice. Jacques Magliolo=20 asks whether this move will benefit shareholders=20 Electronic Media Networks (M-Net) is once again warning=20 shareholders to trade their shares with caution.=20 M-Net is proposing to unbundle MultiChoice into two=20 separate entities and has returned to the market with=20 promises that the unbundling will benefit shareholders. In=20 […]
KwaZulu/Natal’s People and Parks conference was a new=20 milestone in conservation policy, reports Ann Eveleth THE future of game reserves in KwaZulu/Natal will de-pend=20 on how the question of land reform is resolved in that=20 province. This was the central issue to emerge from a=20 landmark conference about conservation and community=20 development held in Durban […]
Age: Somewhere between angry young actor and “old fart” of South African political theatre. Claim to fame: Overcame parental prejudice that grown men should not appear in public and make fools of themselves to win a slew of acting awards including an American Tony for his Broadway performance in The Present occupation: Risking being labelled […]
Crime has taken over from politics as our country’s major source of instability, the largest brake on development, the most common reason for emigration and the greatest fear of investors. A solution requires a combination of cash, public support and involvement, and — most important of all — imagination. One of the oddities of the […]
International literary celebrities select their favourite reads of 1995 John Updike Shaken and enlightened by Galatea 2.2 by Richard Powers (to be published in 1996 by Abacus), starring a computer that holds within its circuits a little girl as tear-wrenching as any orphan in Dickens. While winging my way to England, I kept myself calm […]
CINEMA: Justin Pearce=20 THE tombstone inscriptions used as title credits in Ed Wood=20 seemed like a touch of macabre Tim Burton inspiration. In=20 fact, the credit for the credits should go to Ed Wood=20 himself, as is demonstrated by Plan 9 from Outer Space –=20 on for a short run at the Seven Arts — […]
With a new technique and a new coach, promising South=20 African javelin thrower Philip Spies is ready to take on=20 the world’s best =20 ATHLETICS: Julian Drew=20 AFEW weeks ago South Africa’s top javelin thrower was=20 training at the Rand Afrikaans University track when Clive=20 Rice called from the stands enquiring whether his South=20 African […]
Themba waKashe, chief director of the Ministry of Arts and Culture, is reluctant to identify possible candidates for the most powerful cultural positions in the land — members of the National Arts Council —“because the people will be doing the nominating”. But a glance at the present make-up of the performing arts councils, the current […]
JAZZ pianist Moses Molelekwa admits to a degree of=20 schizophrenia. “Musically, I’ve always lived in two=20 worlds,” he says. “First, there’s the jazz world of home=20 and of the Fuba Academy where I trained. My grandfather was=20 a musician, although I never knew that — or him — until=20 just before his death in the […]
Moveable Feast Humphrey Tyler THERE just has to be a rather special atmosphere about a really good curry restaurant. No, no — not sleazy. But often fairly ordinary chairs, for example, and generally inexpensive tables. Like the sort you find in cafes. Hopefully you will also see determined women in saris striding out of the […]
Eddie Koch SLEAZE, secrecy and corruption are targets of the toughest action taken in Britain this century to enforce ethical behaviour by MPs in the House of Prime Minister John Major’s cabinet last week accepted the broad thrust of the controversial Nolan Committee’s report, which laid down “seven principles of public life” to guard against […]
The Japanese will always be at a disadvantage when they clash with the giant forwards of the other nations in the World Cup RUGBY: Barney Spender THERE is the old joke: “For this week’s winner the big prize is a one week holiday in Bloemfontein, and for our loser it’s a two week holiday in […]
Angeline Oyog in Paris Industrialised nations may in the long term have more to=20 gain than lose from the rapid expansion of emerging=20 economies in certain developing countries, says the=20 Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development=20 (OECD) in a new report. Looking at long-term economic interests, the report said=20 the industrialised OECD members should be […]