South Africa

From the splendour of Pretoria's Union Buildings, President Thabo Mbeki's vision of a resurgent Africa is obscured by the sprawling crisis in Zimbabwe. Almost everything Mbeki want...

In 2000 South Africa's ministries were grouped in 'clusters', to rationalise policy-making and eliminate contradictions. The Department of Foreign Affairs is grouped with the Depar...

The Pretoria High Court ruled on 14 December that the government must supply nevirapine, an anti-retroviral drug, to mothers infected with the human immuno-deficiency virus (HIV). ...

Wouter Basson, known as Dr. Death, was the former apartheid regime's leading chemical weapons specialist. He headed Project Coast, developing and testing chemical weapons, and is n...

All South Africa's main newspapers lose money. Journalists fear that that their publishers, by sharp cutbacks in editorial staff, will make the papers even blander and limit invest...

A born-again Executive Outcomes operation is at the centre of allegations of a military contract between ex-South African Defence Force soldiers and the Sudanese army. A former dir...

The New National Party, heir to the old Afrikaner-apartheid tradition, hitched up in June 2000 to the Democratic Party, whose members claim to inherit South Africa's liberal tradit...

The African National Congress often deals with its opponents by co-opting them, offering jobs and a hearing in exchange for an end to opposition. Co-option began with the Governmen...

The first few days of August dealt a double blow to South Africa's privatisation programme, a central part of the government's economic strategy. The plan to sell the state telepho...

For three years, trades union leader Zwelinzima Vavi has marched his troops to the top of the hill, then marched them down again. This month Vavi, the General Secretary of the Cong...