Staff Reporter

Reg Rumney provides an indispensable guide to framers of RDP-correct policy documents RDP may spell “rape, destroy and pillage” to some cynical business people, as Minister without Portfolio Jay Naidoo has suggested. To many businessmen and women it simply spells “money”, judging by the number of opportunistic press releases that linked the RDP to all […]

Conventional logic has it that a flag with six bright colours is beyond the pale, writes Eddie Koch. So why is the new South African flag such a resounding success? VIVA condom, viva! That was the cry of a volunteer who handed out leaflets decorated with pictures of a prophylactic draped in the flowing red, […]

PRESIDENT Nelson Mandela threw out a challenge in his opening speech at the ANC’s national conference in Bloemfontein this week.

So censorship has gone? Hustler magazine editor Jeff Zerbst discovers few people want to celebrate this new- found freedom of expression with him “The cummulative (sic) effect is an important factor when a publication like Hustler is discussed.” (The censors) “We agree.” (Hustler) THE Weekly Mail &Guardian has invited me to celebrate the death of […]

At last the WM&G is able to disclose the identity of the man behind the momentous Inkathagate scandal. David Beresford reports THE Weekly Mail & Guardian can finally disclose the identity of the man behind the Inkathagate scandal, who may have changed the course of South African history. He is Brian Morrow, a former member […]

The daft, clever, stupid, witty things South Africans said in 1994, compiled by Jennifer Crwys-Williams * Nelson Mandela has so much egg on his face he needs two bars of soap to get it off. — FW de Klerk (before the election) * Mr Mandela has walked a long road and now stands at the […]

`Gauties’ who’ve been left behind this Christmas need not despair, writes Hazel Friedman: they’ve got the wildest wildlife IT’S that time of the year again and the Great Trek to trendoid holiday spots is already well under way. To those depressed “Gauties” who’ve been left behind, the only way of getting into the festive spirit […]

IT was a poignant moment: one veteran of the struggle acknowledging the contribution, over decades, of the other. Struggle-hardened cadres fought back tears as President Nelson Mandela, his own voice breaking with emotion, honoured “an outstanding revolutionary” who had “touched the lives of millions” by his example of “militant and unswerving commitment” to the ANC. […]

Reg Rumney digs through the office pile of promotional junk and remembers the invitations and press releases he might have missed AS any good PR knows, attracting the attention of journalists is not easy. It is an open question whether this is because they are overworked, don’t have secretaries to organise their lives, or are […]

AT the tail end of a surreptitious visit to South Africa, a prominent Dutch rightwinger last week declared South African rightwingers as being “too lazy to work” and “not prepared to do kaffir work”. In an exclusive interview with the Weekly Mail & Guardian, Henk Ruitenberg (47), chairman of the rightwing CD-86 Party in the […]

Arthur Goldstuck Real-life snippets from the small-town press The best of `94 JANUARY * MICHAEL ABRAHAMS, charged with theft of TV sets, tells a Durban regional magistrate he was forced into a life of crime by his wife’s constant nagging. The magistrate tells him to stop blaming his wife, and gives him two years. * […]

Now that the struggle for socialism has been fought, won and ignored, Cape Town’s beaches are hot on the heels of shopping malls, writes Justin Pearce WHEN I was a laaitie, Cape Town’s beaches were for swimming. Or at least for building sandcastles, exercising the dog and similarly wholesome pursuits. The nearest thing you got […]

Vuyo Mvoko CLARENCE MAKWETU, re-elected president of the Pan Africanist Congress, has always drawn criticism from other parties, but none has been as harsh as the criticism he got from his own party during its congress last weekend. Although wary of inflicting more wounds on their party, delegates made no secret of their dissatisfaction. Fumed […]

Vuyo Mvoko JANE HLONGWANE (28), her face exuberant with the satisfaction of pregnancy, smiled as she was asked how she felt now that she and her unborn child could take advantage of free medical care from the government. “Happy, really happy …” she said, in search of better words to describe her pleasure. Two years […]

The softest whispers are often the loudest. The meagre turn-out at the last official Day of the Vow commemorations was a thunderous condemnation of the state of the rightwing, reports Jan Taljaard AT the end of a year of turmoil, trauma and intimations of volkstaat born from apocalyptical destruction, all that remained on December 16 […]

Do you read the Weekly Mail & Guardian often enough? Write down your responses, avoiding the temptation to check them against the answers printed below. Then turn the page around and score one point for each answer you got right 1. What magazine did Nelson Mandela edit this year? 2. How many cars were stolen […]

The government is still basking in the afterglow of the elections. It has delivered many bold ideas — but nothing concrete yet. Anton Harber reports

Steuart Wright: East London THE birth of the Eastern Cape province has been traumatic and the new government is sweating to curb a slide into anarchy. For the ANC-dominated provincial government its initial period in power has been a baptism of fire, with a strike by Transkei Police, a mutiny by Transkei soldiers, blockades on […]

Gaye Davis at the ANC conference BOTH Winnie Mandela and Peter Mokaba’s names were absent from the controversial list of handpicked national executive committee (NEC) nominees drawn up at ANC president Nelson Mandela’s behest but resoundingly rejected by delegates. Confronted by a potential grassroots revolt by delegates who believed the list interfered with their democratic […]

Bruce Cohen A MASSIVE European Union (EU) development package for South Africa — R500-million in 1995 — is currently being finalised in Brussels. It will bring much-needed relief to many NGOs which have been staggering through a funding crisis since the April election. NGOs, however, will have to get used to sharing the EU funding […]

FINE ART: Ivor Powell A COUPLE of weeks ago I had some things that were not exactly brimming with goodwill to say about the kind of art exhibitions one encounters in the Christmas season. Well, it turns out I have to eat my words before I get to eat my turkey or brandy pudding. Anything […]

The Katz tax commission mostly makes sense, but some recommendations seem to have been hastily arrived at, reports Reg Rumney Most recommendations of the Katz tax commission were hailed by commentators this week — with some bothersome exceptions that pointed to hasty decisions and gave the impression of tinkering with the system. Under fire are […]

Terence Moll FORMER Reserve Bank governor Gerhard de Kock once severely criticised South African businessmen, calling them inept in controlling company spending and simply not able to understand fundamental economic principles. The highly respected governor is on record as having said: “At the start of an economic upswing, our businessmen spend as if boom times […]

TRADITIONAL leaders called for land restitution claims to be considered from 1652 instead of 1913 at the conference of the Congress of Traditional Leaders of South Africa in Midrand last weekend. Contralesa president Chief Phathekile Holomisa also expressed concern over the only-partial political freedom guaranteed traditional leaders in the interim constitution. “It denies chiefs their […]

Mapula Sibanda LIKE Martin Luther King, whose poster adorns his office wall, Jody Kollapen also has a dream, and his appointment this week as national director of Lawyers for Human Rights will afford him the luxury to realise it. Kollapen’s dream is to change the confrontational relationship between the police and human rights lawyers, building […]

A new health scheme favoured by the government is likely to prove hugely popular. Pat Sidley reports THE government is actively investigating a national health insurance plan which would, if implemented, revolutionise the country’s health system and provide the funds for basic health care to all citizens. Three options are under consideration. The Weekly Mail […]

Hardliners in the IFP are planning to quit government and strengthen their majority in kwaZulu/Natal, writes Farouk Chothia A SPECIAL Inkatha Freedom Party conference early next year will consider a plan by party hardliners to quit the government of national unity (GNU) and play the role of a Westminster-styled opposition party, IFP insiders revealed this […]

TELEVISION: Luke Alfred CHRIS DU PLESSIS is a former Vrye Weekblad journalist and now director of CCV-TV’s Thursday night amalgam of local culture, Not Quite Friday Night. It contains all sorts of things — local music, off-beat interviews, comedy sketches. Last week’s programme featured one of the more bizarre forms of local subculture: a koedoebokdrolverspoeg […]

Information on outlandish research conducted by a group of companies for the SADF is being revealed. By Eddie Koch and Derek Fleming A NETWORK of companies near Pretoria developed chemical warfare equipment for the South African Defence Force and also conducted secret experiments on animals to test high tech “dum dum” bullets and heat resistant […]

Moveable Feast Marino Corazza YOU are what you eat; we’re also what we drink. But what the statement really should say is: “We are what they want us to eat and drink.” Through the passage of time, we, the human race, went and lost it — the original tree of knowledge, the magic mushroom. Terence […]

A top-secret document discloses the names of African states that bought hi-tech eavesdropping equipment from Armscor, reports Eddie Koch ARMSCOR sold hi-tech “radio hopper” equipment to African states that enabled South African military intelligence officers to monitor sensitive diplomatic and military messages passed on by the governments of these countries. A top-secret document — which […]

CRICKET: Jon Swift IT is of crucial interest that the national selectors are at last sticking to their much publicised “horses for courses” theory, one that has not meant much more than a throwaway line at times in the recent past. And equally of note is that the Man of the Match awards in both […]