Tumi Makgetla

Maanda Manyatshe resigned from cellphone company MTN recently in a move intended to distance MTN from damaging allegations against the former MD. The allegations, which were first published in the <i>Mail & Guardian</i>, relate to Manyatshe’s days as Post Office CEO, when he is said to have improperly pushed through a contract to revamp post office branches worth R100-million.

A number of South African firms refuse to employ skilled foreigners because of nightmarish immigration bureaucracy, say recruiting agents and immigration experts. This despite an immigration law that the department of home affairs amended last week to help firms combat the domestic skills shortage by employing skilled foreigners.

Nobody knows the trouble landlords have seen, nobody but Hollard Insurance, this is. And in its wisdom, Hollard is lightening the landlords’ burden with a new policy to protect them against defaulting tenants. An estimated 1,2-million landlords in South Africa will be cheered to know that R35 a month plus 1% of the rent can now buy them peace of mind.

Audit reports for the past year indicate continued high levels of financial mismanagement and poor compliance with reporting procedures, Auditor General Shauket Fakie told members of Parliament recently. Compared with seven in the previous financial year, 11 departments received qualifications, meaning their reports were inadequate.

The twelve-week long Shoprite Checkers strike that reportedly closed six stores across the country came to an end on Thursday after all-night negotiations. But this strike was just one of several months-long strikes this year in the service industry, a sector of the economy that is experiencing the strongest employment growth and the weakest labour relations.

Despite its strident objections to the lottery, Cosatu has emerged as one of the major shareholders in Gidani, the consortium recently awarded the licence to operate the national lottery. In 2003 Cosatu made a submission to Parliament objecting to the introduction of the National Gambling Bill, which established the lottery, saying it would have negative consequences on the quality of life of the most vulnerable.

Trade union federation Cosatu is sometimes described as a labour aristocracy, an island of privileged workers earning relatively high salaries surrounded by a sea of unemployed. Cosatu’s own figures appear to back this up: a survey for the union federation shows that its members earn a median R3 500 a month.

Crime costs South African firms the same as it costs their counterparts in other middle-income countries, but South African businesses suffer greater direct losses as a result of crimes such as robbery and pay more for formal security, says Christopher Stone of Harvard University.

Membership of the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) has stagnated since it ballooned to 1,8-million nearly a decade ago — and the federation is still wrestling with the consequences of that growth spurt. A survey has found Cosatu has failed to penetrate non-traditional sectors of the economy.

Apartheid law and order minister Adriaan Vlok this week shed new light on his involvement in the dirty war against activists in the 1980s — including signing pre-drafted letters thanking policemen for carrying out assassinations. In a wide-ranging, two-hour interview at the <i>Mail & Guardian</i>’s offices, Vlok also admitted using words like "eliminate" in motivating policemen to crack down on political troublemakers.

Black ownership is now concentrated in more than 20 significant empowerment groupings, including Mvelaphanda Holdings, Johnnic Holdings, Sekunjalo, Thebe Investments, Matodzi Resources, Worldwide African Investment Holdings, Safika and Shanduka.

A growing number of South African Jews think Israel should trade land for peace, a survey by the University of Cape Town’s Kaplan Centre for Jewish Studies and Research has shown. Sixty percent of local Jews surveyed in 2005, up from about 50% in 1998, said Israel should give up some land in exchange for a credible guarantee of peace.

"There’s a lot of excitement and anticipation here; there’s a buzz," electoral observer Ilona Tip tells me on her cellphone from the Democratic Republic of Congo’s (DRC) capital, Kinshasa. "It reminds me of South Africa in 1994. The stakes are also fairly high and in the conflict since 1998, 3,5-million people have died."

Chad has signed a precedent-setting agreement with the World Bank that guarantees 70% of its oil revenues will be spent on poverty alleviation projects. Civil society hopes this will allow Chad to escape from the "paradox of plenty", common in oil-producing nations, in which the majority of the impoverished population does not benefit from oil wealth.

The South African government has condemned Israel’s disproportionate response, but has said it will not suspend diplomatic ties with that country. This week the <i>Mail & Guardian</i> sought perspectives on the Middle East from Iqbal Jassat, chairperson of the Media Review Network, and David Saks, acting national chairperson of the South African Jewish Board of Deputies.