Their names are Lavinia, Lidia, Marin, Tarhon Big and Petrica, and they’ve spent most of their lives “behind iron bars in dirty little cages” in a Romanian zoo – until now. The animals were flown by the rescue organisation Four Paws to South Africa and landed on Friday, and will soon be transferred to their new home at […]

There is something unmistakably common in Africa: the continent’s ageing and long-serving presidents. Its five longest presidencies stretch between 29 and 36 years, adding to a cumulative 169 years. Their longevity in office is matched by their old age, ranging from 71 to 92 years, and a combined 392 years. Gabon’s Omar Bongo had been […]

It bears all the markings of another potential social media storm like the one created by Cecil the Lion. Initial reports claimed an elephant – which some said was iconic because of his huge tusks – was reportedly shot when he strayed out of the Kruger National Park into Zimbabwe a week ago. But how much of […]

BEIJING – China has said it is banning the import of ivory obtained through hunting for the next year, according to a statement on Thursday by its forestry agency. The statement comes only days after the Chinese authorities announced the forestry police had seized almost $4 million in trafficked ivory and arrested 16 people, and other news that […]

Prime global residential rents are struggling to grow, but Cape Town and Zurich have substantially bucked the trend, according to the latest Knight Frank global rental index. In Cape Town prime rents – the top five percent of the market – ended the year to June 2015 10.2 percent higher, compared to the world average […]

What if we won the Rugby World Cup? I would guess that question has been asked many times in the last few decades. The interesting thing is that we have actually shown the world on a few occasions that we can be a nation of winners! Yes, we have actually won and defied many sceptics in the process. […]

Sandibe Okavango Safari Lodge in Botswana is one of nine hotels vying for the top hotel award at this year’s World Architecture Festival, to be held in Singapore in November. The 12-suite lodge’s unique shape has been likened to an upturned boat or a big wooden ribcage, although we prefer the allusion to the endangered pangolin. […]

JOHANNESBURG – Crowds of protestors took to the campus of Wits University on Wednesday over plans to raise fees by more than 10 percent. The increases are meant to go into effect from 2016, and have been caused, among other things, by reduced subsidies by government, according to reports. A flood of messages about the protest, which began this morning, […]

Mozambique was declared clear of landmines only last month, and one of the reasons which made it possible was because of the little-publicised rats that have been trained to sniff out the deadly explosives. Widely known as Hero Rats, they are part of a programme run by the nonprofit organisation APOPO, whose slogan is “we train rats […]

The title of Evan Haussmann’s video says it all: ‘How to film a charging rhino (and not crap yourself).’ Says photographer journalist Haussmann, who took the video in 2012 (although it continues to get circulated for the ‘rush’ it gives): “So I’m minding my own business while working in the greater Kruger area and this […]

BEIJING – In a sign that China may be taking a harder line on the trade in wildlife products, police there have seized one of the biggest hauls of smuggled ivory and other rare animal parts and have arrested 16 people, it was reported on Monday. Police in Beijing took possession of 804 kilograms of ivory, 11 kilograms of rhino […]

LONDON – The South African brewer SABMiller has agreed to a $104-billion takeover bid by its larger rival Anheuser-Busch InBev, it was reported on Tuesday. It will apparently be the largest-ever takeover of a British-listed company. According to one news report, the takeover is also one of the top five mergers in corporate history, and will […]

Maboneng, Joburg’s hot new shopping and eating area, was one of the first to glam up old shipping containers with glass windows and wooden floors to turn them into retail shops, but now Melville has gone one better by creating the 27Boxes mall out of over two dozen of them. Opened in July, the mall is one of the […]

TORONTO (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – Contrary to reports that Chinese firms were buying or leasing millions of hectares of prime African farmland, Chinese investors have acquired only about 240,000 hectares, according to a book published on Monday. Deborah Brautigam, director of the China Africa Research Initiative at Johns Hopkins University, analyzed media reports that Chinese […]

JOHANNESBURG – South African companies are more likely than their counterparts abroad to stay away from potentially corrupt deals and will pull out of a deal they discover is corrupt even if they have already invested in it, but also feel strongly that not paying a bribe could hurt business, according to a new survey. The annual ‘International attitudes […]

Just in time for the worldwide release of the highly anticipated Danny Boyle movie ‘Steve Jobs’, about the Apple founder, a South African version of the trailer – with a couple of ‘bliksems’ and ‘voetseks’ thrown in – has been uploaded to YouTube. https://youtu.be/H_tnqZ_686w The movie stars Michael Fassbender as the legendary but controversial Jobs, as […]

Some 4,000 people in Johannesburg climbed in the saddle early on Sunday for the fourth annual Freedom Ride Jozi, the organisers said, “celebrating the memory of Nelson Mandela and the freedom to ride around the city”. The 27-kilometre ride – on which only five minor injuries were reported – was free and part of Freedom Ride’s […]

CAPE TOWN – The city of Cape Town has reopened a walkway near Boulders Beach to dogs after temporarily closing it following the death of 22 more penguins north of Seaforth Beach near Simon’s Town, although it says it will increase monitoring of the area. Since the beginning of the year 42 endangered African penguins […]

KATHMANDU – The deputy leader of the Democratic Alliance in North West whose two-person aircraft did not return from a flight in Nepal earlier this week remains missing, according to a statement by the party. The ultralight aircraft with Petro Nel and a Russian pilot on board went missing on Thursday during a morning flight out of Pokhara, about 150 km west of Kathmandu, […]

MIDRAND – The African National Congress has seen its membership fall by about one-quarter since 2012 – from 1,220,057 to 769,870 – President Jacob Zuma said today, addressing the party’s National General Council. Zuma said that party members were growing tired by the impression of a “lack of discipline”, infighting and divisions in the ANC. There was reportedly […]

In 1987, when Martin Pistorius was a 12-year-old in Johannesburg, something happened. His whole body shut down. For the next 12 years, he stayed that way, trapped inside himself. Until the shut-down, his mother Joan told an American radio interviewer earlier this year, Martin was a bright child who from the age of three had said […]

DAR ES SALAAM – A Chinese woman known as the ‘Queen of Ivory’ has been arrested in Tanzania, the most important ivory trafficker ever caught in the country, according to a statement released on Thursday. Yang Feng Glan, 66, has been followed by Tanzania’s National and Transnational Serious Crimes Investigation Unit for over a year, and was […]

BLOEMFONTEIN – The South African Broadcasting Corporation chief Hlaudi Motsoeneng should be suspended while a disciplinary hearing is conducted into his alleged breaches – a huge salary increase and fake matric papers – according to a Supreme Court of Appeal Court ruling on Thursday. Motsoeneng‚ the SABC and the Communications Minister had challenged a lower court’s decision that, following a report by […]

The Democratic Alliance and the African National Congress have both been clamouring over the past week for the other party to take immediate action after news broke of serious problems within their ranks, namely the ANC’s possible involvement in a deal with Hitachi and a DA parliamentarian’s indiscrete tweet that has been called racist. On Thursday (today) […]

The ‘South Africa’s Got Talent’ audience was on its feet Sunday night when DJ Arch Junior, all of three years old, took to a digital music deck and handled the jog wheels and transport controls like a pro. Oratilwe Hlongwane from Alexandra township has reached the semifinals of the show’s national competition. He’s the youngest person to have ever been on the […]