Charlotte Denny An Oxfam report accuses the West of double standards on trade The European Union and the United States are robbing the world’s poor of billions of dollars each year in export earnings by preaching free trade while protecting their own markets, development campaigners claim. Analysing Western approaches to trade in a report, Rigged […]
Peter Robinson On Monday evening, only a few hours after the Supersport Series final had curled up and died of neglect at Kingsmead, South Africa’s Test match sponsors, Castle Lager and MTN, held a farewell do for Allan Donald in Johannesburg. It was a low-key affair. As ever Donald was immaculately dressed in a suit, […]
Howard Barrell Electronic versions of two controversial documents promoting the dissident view of HIV/Aids carry embedded signatures suggesting that they were written on Thabo Mbeki’s computer. But computer experts have told the Mail & Guardian that this cannot be conclusive proof of authorship. The presidency on Thursday issued a guarded response to the M&G’s discovery. […]
Sarah Duguid and Vegard Veberg A spate of publications promoting dissident views of Aids has appeared in the week the government reversed its stance on the provision of anti-retroviral drugs and has turned up in the areas where Aids is most severe. Approximately 100 000 copies were printed of a 24-page supplement entitled The Pulse […]
The last days of a young mother’s life have highlighted the power and danger of anti-retrovirals, writes Belinda Beresford Sarah H died on Sunday, after suffering a rare side effect of the anti-retrovirals she was taking in an attempt to save her life, in the face of severe Aids. She had been a key public […]
Jaspreet Kindra “Anything can still happen,” said black Democratic Alliance members on Saturday, intent on electing a black leader of the party. They were pinning their hopes on national chairperson Joe Seremane. But once inside the Nasrec exhibition hall, where delegates gathered for the leadership vote, Seremane proposed Tony Leon for the position. There were […]
Marianna Gouws “We all take different paths in life, but no matter where we go, we take a little of each other everywhere.” Tim McGraw Guguletu’s more than 350 000 residents are desperately trying to shake off 41 years of neglect. They realise that the community’s future lies in its children and, to that end, […]
John Matshikiza It seems that the tentative agreement reached among the majority of participants in the Inter-Congolese Dialogue at Sun City might have been a stitch-up after all. Over $5-million of South African tax revenue might have been spent on what was already a done deal between two of the major belligerents in the Congo’s […]
Jane Flanagan |Chimoio, Mozambique Home for Johan and Kirsty Fourie is a leaking tent, two hours’ drive down a potholed dirt track in war-ravaged Mozambique. They have no electricity, their toilet is a hole in the ground and their water supply is a walk away in a field pitted by landmines. Even this, they say, […]
David Macfarlane The country’s largest channel for directing donor funds to non-profit organisations in their fight against poverty managed to disburse a mere 26% of funds available to it in the past financial year. And R48-million donated by the European Union more than 18 months ago remained undisbursed as well. These details emerge from the […]
Eleanor Poulter (Letters, April 5) says it seems I think the authorities “should let the young woman who aborted her baby alone”. Things are often not what they seem. It is perfectly possible to be anti-abortion yet allow the other woman the right to choose an early, safe, legal abortion. I am not opposed to […]
Sanity has prevailed and the real war against Aids can begin, writes Belinda Beresford The internecine strife within the government over the HIV epidemic appeared to swing towards the forces of orthodox science this week. In what looks to outsiders to be a remarkable reversal but which government spin doctors suggest is just a matter […]
Harry Pearson The former Manchester United goalkeeper Alex Stepney once dislocated his jaw by shouting at his central defender Martin Buchan. Although it is wrong to laugh at the misfortunes of others, I must confess that when Sam Snead sent his ceremonial tee shot at Augusta pinging off the glasses of a spectator I guffawed […]
Smouldering smoothly Matthew Krouse Gordon Haskell belongs on the same shelf as Roger Whittaker, Gordon Lightfoot and Kris Kristofferson. That’s the shelf for senior-citizen pop stars, where experienced idols gather to reminisce about the babes they pulled, and porked, along the way. Ageing pop stars all seem to have the same fantasy: of being the […]
DAVID MACFARLANE, Johannesburg | Friday HUGE amounts of money available for improving the plight of the country’s most disadvantaged schoolgoers remained unspent by the end of last year. At the same time spending on adult basic education continued to shrivel – and will decrease further in the next few years. Spending trends in the national […]
Can Africa halve its poverty by 2015? This is the challenge for Nepad, says Clare Short In the year 2000, to mark the new millennium, the United Nations called a special assembly which was attended by more heads of state than have ever previously attended any UN meeting. At that meeting the leaders of the […]
Richard Meeran Calls are being heard for negotiation of a new international convention on corporate accountability in the run-up to the World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg in August. Those promoting the idea include Friends of the Earth International and Christian Aid. Their call has been motivated in part by the intensified social and […]
In his column (Contretemps, April 12) Richard Calland concludes: “Finally, let us now be honest. Who on the left did not feel a sense of Schadenfreude at the sight of the World Trade Centre towers crashing to the ground? It is the same instinct that now leads us to quietly celebrate the news of an […]
Harare | Wednesday MORE than 50 rhinoceroses have reportedly been snared or killed in Zimbabwe by cartels working in cahoots with newly resettled villagers on farms adjacent to wildlife conservancies, a state daily reported on Tuesday. The Herald, quoted Environment and Tourism minister Francis Nhema as saying that there has been an unprecedented level of […]
Matthew Krouse Afrikaans television just got interesting. Or did it? This month, in a bold move, pay channel kykNET has launched five new programmes. Their quality may be uneven, but there is a lot that is intriguing and, in some cases, relevant about this fare. Top of the list must be the 13-episode series 40 […]
Andy Capostagno An end to the Tri-Nations might not be such a bad thing for South African rugby Just three more years remain of the broadcasting contract between South Africa, New Zealand and Australia Rugby (Sanzar) and Newscorp. It was signed amid much acrimony during the final week of the 1995 World Cup and effectively […]
Niki Moore Ilimo is a Zulu word for a traditional practice of communal labour. For instance, if a man needed help to plough his field, he would ask his neighbours to help him and would offer, instead of payment, to supply copious amounts of beer. The Ilimo Network, based at the Sugar Foundation in Durban, […]
ABHIK KUMAR CHANDA, Dakar | Wednesday NIGERIAN President Olusegun Obasanjo on Monday closed an international conference aimed at obtaining funds for an ambitious African development programme, but many delegates said the event was basically a talk-shop. Obasanjo said in his closing remarks that he rejected perceptions that the continent was a risky investment destination. Obasanjo, […]
As cellphones slowly evolve into PDAs David Shapshak hits the airwaves with the latest handsets You may not know it, but your cellphone can do more than just make calls. A quick glance at the features that accompany most handsets is more like perusing a new computer than a phone. This is precisely the point. […]
Ntuthuko Maphumulo Points-deduction scare fails to derail Gordon Igesund’s bid for a third league title Santos can win the Premier Soccer League (PSL) from their armchairs on Sunday. The champions-in-waiting have no fixtures this weekend, and if Jomo Cosmos fail to beat Kaizer Chiefs in Sunday’s televised game, the league crown will be heading for […]
Richard Williams Simply the best should be good enough for sports fans At Imola and Augusta, the story was the same. The rest of them took a look, and gave up the chase. Michael Schumacher and Tiger Woods were never seriously challenged. Boring, people said, as Schumacher won pole position for the San Marino Grand […]
PETER CAPELLA, Geneva | Thursday NIGERIA has reached a landmark deal on the restitution of more than one billion dollars embezzled by the late dictator Sani Abacha, the Swiss authorities and Nigerian government lawyers said on Wednesday. Under the terms of the out-of-court settlement, the Nigerian government “has agreed to release to the Abacha family […]
Aids dissidence remains a powerful current in South Africa despite this week’s shift in government policy on the disease. Drew Forrest analyses the dissident mentality both in its Internet and its South African forms It is a wonder President Thabo Mbeki has the mental endurance to trawl the Aids dissident network on the Internet. It […]
Andy Capostagno The International Rugby Board’s (IRB) decision to award the 2003 Rugby World Cup to Australia means the New Zealand Rugby Football Union (NZRFU) can be referred to as the boy who cried “wolf”. The tournament had been due to be co-hosted by the two unions, but when the deadline for ensuring venues free […]
Khadija Magardie and Bongani Majola Monitors of the fiscus will be pleased to note that the aim of the “Moral Regeneration Movement” is “to revitalise existing organisations, and not start new ones”. As delegates met in Pretoria this week to discuss why we’ve become a nation of rapists, murderers and cellphone thieves the collective sigh […]
EMSIE FERREIRA, Sun City | Wednesday ROLLERCOASTER talks on the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) hit a low on Tuesday two days before their close as rebels and the Kinshasa regime remained far apart and the facilitator warned a deal might not be found. “If they continue to argue like they have for weeks then […]
Even the government is entitled to exhaust legal remedies in asserting its rights, writes Eric Mabuza There are serious but unsubstantiated allegations against the African National Congress-led government in Jonathan Berger’s article “So much power, so little rule”, which appeared in your publication of April 5. The theme of his article is that the government […]