Several dentists working in Eastern Cape hospitals have been sent from pillar to post as they try to find out why they haven’t been paid Glenda Daniels and David Macfarlane Ten dentists doing community service at various hospitals in the Eastern Cape have not been paid and are considering a work stoppage if their plight […]
Stefaans Brmmer and Mungo Soggot One of the men implicated in a bribe scandal that rocked the state oil industry was this week made chairperson of Armscor. Seth Phalatse has admitted he took a $20 000 (about R165 000) cash bribe in May last year. He subsequently returned the money and, months later, helped blow […]
A kaleidoscope of people are getting ready to participate in protests before and during the World Conference against Racism Khadija Magardie The frenetic pace of activity in Geneva around the finalisation of the draft declaration for the World Conference against Racism is being matched by those working around the clock to touch up the controversial […]
Paul Kirk Parts of South Africa’s railway infrastructure are slowly being carted away piece by piece in shopping trolleys and home-made carts. Durban’s unscrupulous scrap metal merchants have, in the past, been known to buy all manner of metal much of it clearly stolen. The latest target for scrap metal thieves in the city is […]
A SECOND LOOK Jaspreet Kindra The Democratic Alliance is not a party of true liberals, claims African National Congress spokesperson Smuts Ngonyama. This is the ANC’s major problem with the official opposition for “if the Democratic Party and the DA believed in liberalism it would not demonise a democratically elected government”. Exposing that “problem” are […]
Paul Kirk Delegates and observers attending the World Conference against Racism in Durban at the end of the month are being charged more than twice the going rate for accommodation in the city. A visit to the United Nations-run conference website showed Durban-based company Turners Conferences has been appointed the agent to arrange accommodation for […]
We should no longer refer to First and Third Worlds, but to regions that are hardwired to information flows, writes Dwayne Winseck New technology and patterns of investments shaping their deployment helped redraw the lines of world communication in the last decade of the 20th century. A highlight was, of course, the growth of the […]
Jubie Matlou reviews new telecommunication technology Wireless Telephony Technologies l Second-generation technology: Global System for Mobile Telephony (GSM) current technology for mobile telephony. Based on digital technology with voice and limited text/fax provisions. l Third-generation technology: Basically upgrades a cellphone into a personal computer, compatible with satellite signals that enable a consumer to make or […]
Training programmes are being devised to spread high-tech skills Jubie Matlou Mateli Mpuntsha speaks with confidence when asked about the training challenges facing South Africa’s information system, electronics and the telecommunications technologies’ industry (ISETT). As chief executive of the industry’s Sector Education and Training Authority (Seta), Mpuntsha is responsible for co-ordinating the skills development programme […]
CRICKET Peter Robinson Along with soaring sales of pool chemicals and taxi blockades (although this last tends to be an event for all seasons), one of the rites of the South African spring is to watch the national cricket selectors trip over their own feet as they stride purposefully towards the new summer. Two years […]
About 98% of the Cape Town Opera choir is black, writes Barry Streek Opera in South Africa, especially in the “racist” Western Cape, has suddenly gone black. In the process, the image of opera as elite, Eurocentric art and entertainment has all but disappeared. Today 98% of the Cape Town Opera choir is black, as […]
Social and regional alliances are some of the strategies that will be discussed at a labour conference next week focusing on how to deal with the problem of globalisation and the changing nature of work. The conference is entitled Challenges Facing Labour in Southern Africa: Marginalisation or Revitalisation?. Topics for discussion include: labour in a […]
Jaspreet Kindra Former African National Congress Youth League (ANCYL) leader James Nkambule has quit the party. Nkambule, who is facing charges of defrauding the state, was assisting Minister of Safety and Security Steve Tshwete to unearth a plot to unseat President Thabo Mbeki. He says that while he feels “used” and “betrayed”, he will continue […]
analysis Neeran Naidoo The impact of telecommunications and information and communication technologies (ICT) on economies, countries and societies is speculative in nature. Much of the current analysis is pinned on case studies. There is little evidence from which to predict the outcome of the trend towards knowledge economies apart from the fact that we need […]
President Robert Mugabe’s speech on Saturday made it quite clear that he is becoming increasingly willing to resort to anarchy and violence in order to gain political popularity and retain power. His warning to farmers that they must not retaliate or expect police protection when confronted with violence by axe-wielding mobs of thugs bent on […]
Q&A: Nicky newman Matthew Krouse Johannesburg comes under fire in The Architecture of Fear, a frightening documentary expounding every city-dwellers worst fears. Unwittingly, it’s a dark comedy of paranoia. Well-known individuals, such as photographer David Goldblatt and confidence coach Mike Lipkin, as well as a host of suburban reprobates reflect on the way Jo’burg fortifies […]
channel vision Robert Kirby Speaking on last Sunday’s Carte Blanche, visiting BBC interviewer Tim Sebastian recalled a comment once made to him by Northern Ireland mandarin Gerry Adams. “How long have you been in Northern Ireland?” asked Adams, after being interviewed by Sebastian. “Since this morning,” said Sebastian. “It shows,” said Adams. Last week’s series […]
The Zimbabwean army is to be deployed on white-owned farms to “speed up” redistribution of land and to “protect” black settlers from violent farmers, says the government. Land Minister Joseph Made told the state-owned Herald newspaper that the military is being called in because the pace of farm seizures is too slow. Harare is portraying […]
Jo’burg people are portrayed as complex and creative in the work of Patrick de Mervelec Matthew Krouse Patrick de Mervelec’s exhibition Jo’burger, currently at the Pretoria Art Museum, is the result of a labour-intensive work of love. This master of French photography, now living in South Africa, has initiated a body of work “born out […]
DaimlerChrysler denies there is a government-company strategy to deal with the motor strike Glenda Daniels DaimlerChrysler’s chairperson has crushed union suspicions that the government advised the company to threaten to withdraw from South Africa to stop the protracted automobile strike. Union insiders said they suspected that DaimlerChrysler, “being friends” of the government, was urged to […]
The government says it is working on a strategy to improve the delivery of much-needed systems Barry Streek Minister of Education Kader Asmal has disclosed in Parliament that two-thirds of South African schools (17907 schools) are without adequate sanitation and 11,7% (3188 schools) do not have any sanitation at all. There were 27148 schools in […]
Jubie Matlou One training institution that has cut a niche for itself in information and communications technology is the Learning Information Networking Knowledge Centre (Link) of the Wits University Graduate School of Public and Development Management. Cellphone provider Vodacom made funds available for the study of new information and communications technologies and their possible effects […]
PAUL KIRK, Durban | Friday FROM June 1 last year to July 4 this year, 106 police were dismissed from the South African Police Service in KwaZulu-Natal. Seven of them were convicted of murder. These figures were released last week by the minister of safety and security in response to a question in Parliament about […]
Thabo Mohlala House number 63, Shelley Road, Lombardy East, is owned by Transnet. It has a big yard, five rooms and two bathrooms. Since April Piet Mabotja*, a young security officer from Lebowakgomo in the Northern Province, has been standing guard around the clock for a pittance R20 a month. Four months later, Mabotja is […]
The South African Women’s Arts Festival could have done with a little more humour and less exclusivity Thebe Mabanga It was not so much art with feminine chic but rather art with feminine grit as vain plain Janes, poets and prancers came out to play at the fifth offering of the South African Women’s Arts […]
Mungo Soggot In what would be a first in modern times, South Africa is within reach of a budget surplus. Tax collections have far exceeded expectations during the first few months of the fiscal year. At the same time, government expenditure is not keeping up the pace amid ongoing concerns that several departments lack the […]
A NEW oil pipeline fire is threatening to force Anglo-Dutch oil group Royal Dutch/Shell to cut exports by 200 000 barrels per day, a newspaper report said on Friday. The newspaper This Day quoted Shell representative Precious Omoku as saying production was threatened by the fire which Shell blamed on vandalism of its oil pipelines […]
We need to look afresh at how technology can bring high-quality services to all, writes Chris Bell While fibre optic cables are today being laid around the coastline and in major African cities, there still remain vast tracks of the continent where populations are unlikely to benefit from these investments. The danger is obvious: rural […]
Paul Kirk From June 1 last year to July 4 this year, 106 police were dismissed from the South African Police Service in KwaZulu-Natal. Seven of them were convicted of murder. These figures were released last week by the minister of safety and security in response to a question in Parliament about how many police […]
Local soccer cannot seem to avoid controversy Ntuthuko Maphumulo Just as the Premier Soccer League (PSL) was about to breathe a sigh of relief that the end of its off-the-field problems was in sight, trouble blew up on the field. Efforts by African Wanderers and Bloemfontein Celtic to extend their stay in the elite league […]
KHADIJA MAGARDIE, Johannesburg | Friday THE frenetic pace of activity in Geneva around the finalisation of the draft declaration for the World Conference against Racism is being matched by those working around the clock to touch up the controversial “unofficial agenda”. As organisers limber up for the official conference, various NGOs, individuals and groups have […]
Marianne Merten Feel like visiting the pyramids without leaving your armchair? Or maybe getting to grips with Heathrow Airport in London before stepping off the plane? Simply enter what looks like a miniature television game show set, sit and let the computers do the rest at the virtual reality laboratory at the Institute of Satellite […]