Staff Reporter

Critical Consumer Pat Sidley CONSUMERS may have noticed a campaign directed at making them “more secure” at automatic teller machines (ATMs). The campaign is cunningly framed to make consumers believe that all the ATM fraud, theft and related crime in general is the consumers’ own fault. Now that the banks are kindly giving its consumers […]

African Encounters has moved to Johannesburg from Cape Town, where it received favourable reviews. Ivor Powell takes a different stand AFRICAN Encounters, presented at MuseumAfrica in Newtown under the auspices of the paragovernmental French Institute, is one of those shows that the official representatives of the old colonial governments love to treat us to: seemingly […]

Native tongue Bafana Khumalo I HATE them all. My parents, my friends, my schoolteachers and all the other scum who taught me that going to school is a two-year guarantee ticket out of the ghetto. You have gathered that this column is going to be one of those do-it-yourself psychotherapy sessions, haven’t you? “Why do […]

Vusi Khoza and Annie Mapoma HUMAN hands — burnt to ashes and mixed with herbal ingredients — are considered an effective anti-stroke remedy by muti men who use body parts in their practice. This is according to Johannesburg muti shop owner Kessavan Naidoo, a herbalist for 30 years and close observer of traditional healing methods. […]

Farouk Chothia THE ANC signalled its intention to prise support from the Inkatha Freedom Party in kwaZulu/Natal with the election last weekend of two traditional leaders to senior positions in the organisation’s new provincial executive committee (PEC). Chief Zibuse Mlaba was elected deputy chairman at a provincial conference last weekend, while Chief Elpheus Molefe was […]

CHILDREN’S THEATRE: Pat Sidley PLATFORM shoes are hazardous to the health at the best of times, and Janice Honeyman’s Aladdin (in China) proved the point one evening last week, when the empress fell off hers during a dance sequence. The mishap resulted in some ad libbing — and presumably a sore ankle. It was the […]

Some R14,5-million of the kwaZulu/Natal budget for school library books is unaccounted for, reports Ann Eveleth AS much as R14,5-million earmarked for the purchase of school library books in kwaZulu/Natal is unaccounted for, prompting an official investigation by the provincial government. The Weekly Mail & Guardian has established that the province’s new library director, Sally […]

The first opportunity to introduce substantial change to the Appellate Court presented itself this week as the Judicial Service Commission interviewed candidates for three vacancies in that decrepit institution. What do we find? That all the candidates are white males, and at least two are the subject of some considerable controversy. Mr Justice Kees van […]

The death of a key state witness has put the spotlight on inadequacies in the protection programme, writes Nombuyiselo Maloyi A RENEWED call for a radical change in South Africa’s witness protection programme was sounded this week by Brian Currin, director general of Lawyers for Human Rights (LHR), days after the killing of a key […]

Tension between the ANC-in-government and the ANC-outside- government must be resolved at next weekend’s national conference, reports Gaye Davis REGIONAL congresses of the ANC have sent the movement’s leadership a strong signal in the run-up to its national conference this month: members elected to government should not be charged with running the organisation. Few ANC […]

Trade and Industry Minister Trevor Manuel is pushing hard for better access for South African exports. Reg Rumney reports TRADE and Industry Minister Trevor Manuel, just returned from Brussels, says he is hopeful that South Africa will get preferential treatment for exports in terms of the Lome convention. Manuel was in Europe doing what he […]

While generally a delight, last weekend’s battle of the choirs exhibited the same mistakes that have been made for the last 17 years, argues Vuyo Mvoko LIKE the Muslim community’s yearly pilgrimage to Mecca, the annual finals of the Old Mutual National Choir Festival at the Standard Bank Arena have proved to be a major […]

The relaunch of the Afrikaner Volksfront appears to be little more than a damp squib, reports Jan Taljaard THE once-influential Afrikaner Volksfront (AVF) — relaunched last weekend after its demise in the wake of the April election — has been dismissed as “the Conservative Party in disguise”. At a press conference held to launch the […]

DONNA SUMMER: Endless Summer (Casablanca) DONNA SUMMER’S fourth greatest-hits package, no less, contains little that wasn’t on the first three, but it does serve to remind why she was the undisputed queen of what was once called disco. Her voice was enormous, and was never better than when she dropped it to a Barry White-like […]

Cry, the Beloved Country is South Africa’s first major post-election film project. William Pretorius spent a day on set THERE’S a lot riding on director Darrell Roodt’s film of Alan Paton’s Cry, the Beloved Country, produced by Anant Singh. It’s the first major post-election film production. A new beginning? Yes, thinks Roodt, when you can […]

A video shows another side of this week’s eviction of illegal squatters in central Johannesburg, reports Mduduzi ka Harvey A VIDEO cassette in the possession of the Weekly Mail & Guardian strongly supports claims by squatters forcefully evicted from Claridge Court in central Johannesburg this week that police played a part in the trashing of […]

Rick Rubin’s American Recordings label kicks off its South African campaign with a loud, rude roar, writes Buddy Bradley YOU are a young man, only 31 years of age. Once you were fat and ugly. Then you dieted. Now you are merely large and hairy. But no matter. Nights, you can be seen in your […]

The joy of winning: A victory at last is good, but the way it was achieved is better CRICKET: Jon Swift A SOLITARY win in a dozen one-day outings in a limited overs international that will be largely unremembered in three seasons’ time, is hardly cause for celebration. But the overall manner in which Hansie […]

Skhumbuzo Miya THE Inkatha Freedom Party recently celebrated its kwaZulu/Natal election victory at Mphusheni on the South Coast by feasting on stolen ANC cattle. IFP leader Mangosuthu Buthelezi was the keynote speaker at the rally, local residents said. They said several ANC-supporting families from nearby Adam’s Mission had had their cattle stolen before the celebration […]

Military leaders usually know when to attack. Only the best of them know when to retreat. The SANDF waited too long before backing off this week from its attempt to seek judicial review of the Cameron Commission’s decision to release certain sensitive documents to the public. This newspaper had already published an earlier version of […]

Weekly Mail Reporter THE White Paper on Housing presented by Housing Minister Joe Slovo to the cabinet this week formalises agreements reached by bankers, the Department of Housing, community representatives, materials suppliers, builders and others at a housing summit in Botshabelo at the end of October. But there is one major change: the White Paper […]

Shadley Nash: Port Elizabeth THE Cradock community, still reeling from shock at recent revelations that three Port Elizabeth civic leaders were brutally murdered by the security forces, believe the bodies may be buried at the site of their torture and murder. A privately-owned holiday farm now stands where the Pebco Three were allegedly tortured and […]

THERE were times during the Million Dollar Challenge when Dennis Bruyns must have been the most disliked man at Sun City. For it was Bruyns, former PGA tournament director and a one-time touring professional, who was the man behind the sometimes devillish pin placements across the four days of the tournament. “My philosophy about pin […]

Mozambique’s election results reflect a practical solution to the country’s crises, not moral amnesia, argues Ross Herbert RENAMO’S relative electoral success in Mozambique is a riddle worth analysing. Yet the article by Eddie Koch and Joe Hanlon (November 25 – December 1) does more to cloud than clarify. Perplexed about how Renamo could win a […]

GOLF: Jon Swift WATCHING Nick Faldo smile is both a precious and rare occasion. So inwardly focussed is the man, so high the standards he sets himself, that this normal and outward sign of humanity has, like so many of the inconsistencies of his game, been ruled out of his professional persona. Faldo is a […]

Weekly Mail & Guardian Reporter A MAN identified as an ANC marshal was sentenced in the Grahamstown Supreme Court this week to 12 years’ imprisonment for participating in the murder of a Pan Africanist Congress member. Johnson Njinana (20) was sentenced to 12 years’ imprisonment for the murder of Patrick Buyisile Malawana (25) in Middelburg […]

Jacques Magliolo WHEN Albert Einstein said that imagination was more important than knowledge, the South African assurance industry probably thought he was talking about them. The latest Financial Services Board statistics reveal shocking figures for 1993, heralding an industry-wide investigation by the LOA. In addition it highlights how assurers develop new imaginative schemes to sell […]

Joe Modise and Ronnie Kasrils were the stars of the show at the unveiling of a new SAAF plane, writes Jan Taljaard IT was not so much the aeroplane but the new minister of defence and his deputy that were the real focus of attention. In the first public ceremony of its kind since the […]

SOUTH African businessmen have come through a tough time in the past five years. They have faced high inflation, prohibitive interest rates, political upheaval and rampant violence and crime. The general election may have changed the country, but negative factors have not entirely disappeared. Since April, we have seen strike action and violent confrontation at […]

The government’s affirmative action policy is cruel, heartless and immoral, argues Martin Brassey. Why are its victims so silent? OFFICIAL job reservation, scrapped in 1987, was reintroduced to South Africa a fortnight ago. Yet not a word has been said in protest. Where once the policy provoked uproar, now it evokes mere silence. Silence from […]

Overall leader Isabelle Autissier is up with the leaders in the first week of the second leg of the BOC Challenge SAILING: Jonathan Spencer Jones TABLE Bay put on her best with clear skies, sparkling seas and a fresh 15 knot south-westerly and over 300 craft turned out to send the fleet on its way […]

Mduduzi ka Harvey THE Police and Prisons Civil Rights Union (Popcru) has split, amid accusations that the leadership has given undue priority to police issues, misused union money and failed to resolve internal problems. The newly formed breakaway group, the Correctional Officers Union of South Africa (Cousa) — launched last week by prison staffers and […]