Staff Reporter

HOWARD BARRELL, MARIANNE MERTEN, Johannesburg, Cape Town | Friday DEMOCRATIC Alliance leader Tony Leon is demanding the complete dissolution of the New National Party, and his senior colleagues are insisting that NNP leader Marthinus van Schalkwyk faces disciplinary action. Senior party sources also told the Mail & Guardian this week that if the Cape High […]

David Macfarlane As many teachers dying every year of HIV/Aids as qualify to teach; school districts exhausting their annual budgets within two months on transporting deceased teachers to their homes; widespread closure of schools because HIV/Aids has stripped them of their teachers … These nightmare scenarios afflict Zambia, Malawi and the Central African Republic respectively […]

Marianne Merten How do you make mathematics and science relevant to youngsters? At the MTN ScienCentre that’s easy: through interactive displays, maths sleep-overs and workshops where children can build their own electronic burglar alarm or explore polymer chemistry by making slime, rubber balls and foam. The MTN ScienCentre hopes to demystify science by encouraging innovation […]

Barry Streek Analysts are expecting lower economic growth projections and continued caution over public spending when Minister of Finance Trevor Manuel presents his medium-term budget policy statement next week. The statement, an assessment of government spending during the current financial year and a three-year spending projection, will be presented on Tuesday. Former senior Department of […]

* There are 14 training centres offering the programme, run by the national and provincial education departments. Centres are in the Eastern Cape (Bisho), Free State (Sasolburg), Gauteng (Soshanguve, Soweto, Alexandra, Atteridgeville), KwaZulu-Natal (Nqutu, Bergvile), Mpumalanga (Lekazi), North West (Mmabatho, Rustenburg), Northern Cape (Kimberley) and Northern Province (Giyani, Hoxani). ENDS

Cape Town’s cup specialists have a good record against the top sides Ntuthuko Maphumulo Ajax Cape Town play the “diamond system” favoured by their mother side, Ajax Amsterdam, and are trying to bring the Dutch brand of total football to their home at Newlands stadium. But the side often confound their supporters. They produce sparkling […]

Shock estimates of HIV infection on campuses have spurred the authorities into action David Macfarlane One in five university undergraduates is estimated to be HIV-positive; by 2005 the rate of infection could be as high as one in three. Now university vice-chancellors are mounting an urgent intervention on the pandemic and its threat to the […]

The MEC for Transport in KwaZulu- Natal and Chair of the African National Congress in that province, S’bu Ndebele, is not under investigation for alleged criminal activities. In the Mail & Guardian of October 12 we quoted Scorpions’ spokesperson Sipho Ngwema as naming Ndebele as one of a number of individual politicians under criminal investigation […]

Niki Moore The women of the Sokhulu community on the KwaZulu-Natal South Coast would harvest mussels by sneaking into the intertidal zone and indiscriminately scraping the rocks with a panga. Large mussels, small mussels, other rock-bound marine life all would be swept off and bagged in haste. All the time someone would keep an eye […]

Niki Moore Imagine a school where you learn how to set up a business, are taught how to please your customers, how to manage your money and how to market your product. Just to take it one step further, your teacher then introduces you to potential clients, lends you money, organises storage for your goods, […]

Jake la Motta is still raging at 80 Steve Bunce It is an image the cinema gave boxing, a sentiment all fighters understand and the dialogue was worth an Oscar. It is Jake la Motta looking in a mirror and telling himself he could have been somebody and it happened most nights for 20 years […]

Colleen du Toit revisits the issues that gave rise to the formation of the South African Grantmakers’ Association a second look From its inception the association has sought to facilitate ethical outcomes in grantmaking through collaboration, cooperation and networking. It was with these values that the organisation was founded in 1995, and that participative ethos […]

BuyAfrica is helping local craftsmen and women to ply their trade over the Internet Jubie Matlou Hundreds of rural craftsmen and women who ply their trade of making curios and artefacts in their backyards never thought they would enter the export market and supply the world with South African cultural symbols such as beads, dolls […]

A SECOND LOOK John Young If South Africa’s cricket selection convener Rushdi Magiet really is “cocking things up as Peter Robinson argues (“Convener of selectors should be dropped”, October 12), then of course he should be fired. Robinson finds Magiet inept, incoherent and short of public-relations skills and concludes that Magiet is “the gravest threat […]

SERJEANT AT THE BAR The brouhaha around the arrest of Tony Yengeni has restored some much-needed confidence in this country’s ability to prosecute corruption wherever it might be sourced. But if the press coverage is to be believed, Yengeni risked much for relatively little; even Hansie Cronje appeared to pocket far more than Yengeni and […]

Khadija Magardie A combination of poorly run, decrepit facilities, untrained technicians and the use of inferior-quality animals could lay waste to claims by vivisectionists in South Africa that their experimentation on animals is of any scientific benefit. A recently released study commissioned by the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (NSPCA) warns […]

Microsoft is changing the way it makes money. And consumers and businesses are disturbed by the giant’s moves so far, reports Neil McIntosh All eyes are on Microsoft this month as it launches its new flagship product, Windows XP, and begins the process of transforming itself from simple software vendor into a network-age seller of […]

Ngwako Modjadji As senior students across the country sit for their matric exams, the commercial crime investigative unit in the Eastern Cape has uncovered an alleged scam involving forged matric certificates to obtain government jobs. A senior official has appeared in court on charges of fraud and forgery. The scam comes in the wake of […]

The violence at Zandspruit is a reflection of more than the country’s racial xenophobic tendencies with South Africans objecting to black, but not white, immigrants Evidence wa ka Ngobeni The violence that erupted at the Zandspruit informal settlement near Honeydew this week not only unearthed the xenophobic tendencies that continue to haunt South Africa but […]

Willie Madisha has been under surveillance and has received death threats Glenda Daniels Private security guards will be hired for the president of the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu), Willy Madisha. He collapsed from nervous exhaustion this week after a string of death threats. Madisha has been singled out by the ruling party’s […]

After years on Mount Baldy, a Buddhist retreat, Leonard Cohen has finally found peace. He talks to Nick Paton Walsh about drink, drugs and women Leonard Cohen is the high priest of pathos. His voice exudes misery. A suicidal Kurt Cobain, when describing the most melancholic place imaginable, in his dirge Penny Royal Tea, sang […]

David Macfarlane Tension escalated on Unisa’s strife-torn campus this week as staff widened their campaign against the university’s controversy-ridden council. Eleven academics eight of them black are circulating an open letter expressing no confidence in Unisa’s council and calling for the council to be dissolved. The letter, addressed to the council and Minister of Education […]

The stable of trainer Terry Lowe has shown fair form since his return to regular racing some months ago and a nice prize could go his way on Saturday in the R200000 grade 2 Elevation Stakes over 2000m at Gosforth Park. Lowe sends out five-year-old Polo Classic, who was runner-up in both the South African […]

Despite a revolutionary new proposal, there are still several stumbling blocks in the labour legislation Glenda Daniels Amendments to the Labour Relations Act recently hailed as a major breakthrough between labour, business and the government remain bedevilled by controversial sticking points and may not see the light of day this year. Hitches remain over the […]

The Buffeljagsbaai Sustainable Livelihood Project has brought pride and renewed hope to an isolated coastal community Robert Davies ‘For as long as the oldest people in our community can remember, we have been dependent on the sea for our existence,” says Marco Boshoff. Boshoff is one of about 110 people living in the village of […]

Tusi Fokane There are just days to go before the 30-day Arts Alive Television (ATV) broadcasting licence expires, with-out any part of the promised Johannesburg spring cultural festival being broadcast. Instead, the programmes packaged for the festival may find a slot on Lesotho Television. ATV cites a number of reasons for this failure, ranging from […]

Marianne Merten Tens of thousands of documents accumulated by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) since 1995 are making their way from Cape Town to the national archives in Pretoria. If all document files were lined up, the paper trail would stretch 3km. Among the files are accounts of apartheid-era atrocities, records of investigations conducted […]

It must be a long time since the Mail & Guardian published an article as pedantic as the one by Sipho Seepe (“Language, truth and logic”, October 5). He makes all kinds of outrageous epistemological claims in a pompous response to Evidence wa ka Ngobeni’s simple suggestion that Seepe’s conclusion that there is no difference […]

Sarah Bullen In May 1996 the rand was sitting at R4,40 to the dollar. On Monday it touched R9,59. Why is a country whose economic and political fundamentals are sound finding itself in a position where its currency is facing demise? Financial guru Suze Orman has an answer. “Why should anyone invest in your country […]

Mail & Guardian reporter Sugar is not dubbed KwaZulu-Natal’s white gold for nothing it employs thousands of that province’s people, but also ploughs back in kind to deserving groups and communities. The sugar industry employs about 85000 people and an additional 400000 largely small-scale farmers and cane growers depend on the industry for an income. […]

Mail & Guardian reporters “South Africa’s success stories of tomorrow are not yet in business today,” says Hugh Herman, chairperson of the Investec Group. “If meaningful empowerment comes with the creation of sustainable employment, then we all have a role to play in helping small business take root.” Investec feels strongly about stimulating a vibrant […]

Mail & Guardian reporter The importance of conserving water and treating it with respect is vital to Rand Water’s corporate social responsibility programme, involving educational, hands-on projects that are fun and informative while turning children into “water-wise warriors” who share the message with communities. Other important initiatives in the organisation’s corporate social responsibility programme include […]