JOHANNESBURG – South African mobile phone operator MTN Group named the head of Vodafone Europe as its new CEO on Monday, bringing in an outsider with a risk management background less than two weeks after it agreed to a $1.7 billion (£1.16 billion) fine to settle a dispute in Nigeria. Rob Shuter, a South African […]

Almost two days late, the African National Congress has named Thoko Didiza as its candidate for mayor of Tshwane, a metro that the party could quite possibly lose in the upcoming municipal election. On Monday morning there were also reports of a shooting outside the Tshwane Events Centre apparently related to dissatisfaction over the nomination of Didiza. Violence […]

As Matthew McConaughey gets spotted in Cavendish Square the past weekend – he’s in the country to shoot a movie – and Cape Town announced it has issued a record number of movie-shooting permits so far in 2016, we list some of the movies being shot or recently shot in SA. 1. The Odyssey (l’Odyssée) A biopic […]

The African National Congress delayed its announcement until late Saturday – almost till midnight – of its mayoral candidates, although the nominee for Tshwane, one of the metros the party could likely lose in the election, remains undecided. It was reported in the Sunday Times that Thoko Didiza, a cabinet minister under Thabo Mbeki who sometimes […]

In the latest allegation against the Gupta family – and the biggest  by far in rand terms – two reports this weekend allege that they, together with Duduzane Zuma, tried to capture South Africa’s main rail company and get it to accept a R51 billion tender. The letter, which was obtained by the investigative team at amaBhungane, […]

A poll being done by news network eNCA and market research company Ipsos has found that the Democratic Alliance could win Nelson Mandela Bay and Tshwane/Pretoria, and could rule in a coalition government in Johannesburg. The poll was carried out on June 6 and 7, and results were compared to the 2014 national election results. Ipsos […]

You are never too young to raise awareness – and money – for the plight of Africa’s big cats, as the kids at a Durban primary school have proved. They raised R2,000 and had a great time doing it. Kerry McNevin, principal of Tree Tops School (which has kids from age 3 to grade 3), […]

On a crisp Saturday morning early in June, 100 kayakers set out to paddle across the Cape Peninsula, from False Bay to Table Bay. Their primary mission: To raise public awareness of the city’s waterways and canals, and to show the public’s connection to them. The route for the Peninsula Paddle team – kayakers and stand-up paddle boarders doing […]

The company responsible for the South African firefighters who went to help fight blazes in Canada but returned after a pay dispute over their wages said the South Africans earn more than their Canadian counterparts “in real terms”. The 301 South Africans arrived in Canada to help fight wildfires there. After reports surfaced that they were […]

NAIROBI – With more money in their pockets, Africans are eating more fast food and adopting more sedentary lifestyles, leading to a surge in obesity and associated diseases like diabetes and cancer, experts said on Tuesday. Rates of obesity and overweight are rising in nearly every country in the world, the Global Nutrition Report said, […]

In a wide-ranging interview with Business Day’s Sam Mkokeli, “Inside the Mind of Julius Malema”, the Economic Freedom Fighters leader says he wants to be number one in the country and that he would make coalitions after the election with the Democratic Alliance but never the ANC. Some quotes from the interview: “I will never be […]

The hacktivist/s known as Anonymous Africa, after targeting the websites of the SABC, the EFF and Robert Mugabe’s ZANU-PF over the last few days, on Wednesday said they are going after what they called “the 2nd most corrupt family in SA (after the Zumas)”. Anonymous Africa promised to take the Guptas’ companies offline at midday, and by […]

The Test Kitchen in Woodstock has been voted one of the World’s 50 Best Restaurants in New York City on Tuesday, for the second year in a row, with the Cape Town’s La Colombe making the top 100 list for the second time. Chef Luke Dale-Roberts’ Woodstock restaurant came in at position No. 22, after coming […]

Jules Cambon, a former French diplomat, wrote: “Diplomacy will always have ambassadors and ministers; the question is whether it will have diplomats?” Referring to the diplomatic faux pas of International Relations and Cooperation (Dirco) Minister Nkoana-Mashebane when recently interviewed by Al Jazeera, Business Day suggested in an editorial “SA must learn art of diplomacy”. This […]

The Constitutional Court on Tuesday ruled that the Independent Electoral Commission failed to uphold section 16 of the Electoral Act – which deals with providing voters’ addresses – and erred in its fundamental mandate to safeguard the freeness and fairness of elections, but has said the 3 August elections can go ahead. The Democratic Alliance, one of numerous parties in […]

South African comedian has appeared on the popular daytime talk show hosted by Kelly Ripa. Noah talks about speaking six languages – not all perfectly, he emphasised – how he grew up in a family that loved dogs and about driving a taxi as one of his jobs. https://youtu.be/YkGpPtowCnA

As the winter’s first snows fall on South Africa’s mountains, lots of us remember something we often forget – ours is a land of amazing mountains. Here are 10 of them, many covered in snow (with a surprise 11th at the end). We also remember that the Mountain Club of South Africa has this year been hiking these […]

Talented Cape Town chef and photographer Bruce Marais is one of four competing chefs on the latest episode of the hugely popular US channel Food Network’s show “Chopped”. In the show the chefs are given a less than obvious combination of ingredients to quickly transform into an appetiser, an entree and a dessert, with one of the four being eliminated after […]

The almost 300 South African firefighters deployed in Canada to help with wildfires there have been demobilised and are arriving home tomorrow, according to the minister of environmental affairs, who asked South Africa not to condemn the firefighters for what happened in Canada. “Condemning them for disappointing us can only demoralise them despite their successful track-record,” minister […]

Former ANC secretary general Cheryl Carolus says that President Jacob Zuma is dividing the country and African National Congress for his own enrichment, and that his legal bills have already reached R1 billion. “If you add up all the things that the president has serially (done), since pre-Polokwane, the legal costs, hundreds of millions each case,” Carolus told […]

For anyone who has been on a South African Airways flight – sitting way back in economy like many of us maybe – here’s a glimpse of what it’s like to be in the cockpit during take-off. This flight was a recent one from Johannesburg to Perth, Australia, on the A340-300. “Our long history of filming […]

Most of the websites of the SA Broadcasting Corporation, if not all of them, went down for hours on Sunday, after being hit by hacktivists acting against SABC’s COO Hlaudi Motsoeneng’s steps to allegedly censor the news. Anonymous Africa, which took similar action against the EFF a day earlier, said in a tweet early on Sunday […]

A diamond found in South African in 2014, the Cullinan Dream, has become the most expensive Fancy Intense blue diamond sold at auction, according to Christie’s. The diamond sold in New York this week for $25,365,000. In the audience was Mark Cullinan, an international jewelry dealer and the great-grandson of Sir Thomas Cullinan, who discovered the Cullinan […]

The MyCiti bus service in Cape Town has launched a free WFfi service on a number of its buses, and will continue the rollout gradually. The programme will begin on Monday. MyCiti said in a statement on Thursday the pilot on-board wifi offering will provide each passenger on a number of buses in the city centre with 50MB of data […]