Rotten apple falls close
FNB afraid of the Sexy Boys? (“Rotten sheriffs”, nose134) I don’t think so! Perhaps he who looks for rotten apples in someone else’s backyard, discovers some in his own? FNB’s potentially dodgy partnership with Quick Sell estate agents, may well be a bigger story than the equity theft made possible by corrupt sheriffs in South Africa.
Jacques
Cape Town

Making BEE work
In the light of your article “BEEn there” (nose134) – just think how much money gets lost with these types of contracts. The only assured fact is how much the “right person” makes. I really feel we must support proper transactions with accredited BEE companies by awarding them contracts they can handle, and have some sort of audit/support system in place to ensure they acquire the skills required to move up the ladder. Big business ought to get together on this; with concerted efforts, they could change the way BEE is handled. For a start we could take a closer look at the really successful BEE deals that have gone down, and how they were made to work.
BJ

By email

DA or ANC: spot the difference
It is most irritating to see that Western Cape MEC for local government Anton Bredell has behaved in exactly the same way we have accused our ANC-led councils of doing. I wonder if the DA will react to this story? This type of thing cannot be helping the cause of our local DA who are pulling out all stops to get elected here.
Beverley
Plettenberg Bay

Nuking Japs the right thing
Harold Strachan knows nothing about that war against the Japanese (nose133). I was involved in that war, chasing them out of Burma. We were preparing for the assault on Malaya and Singapore when the Americans dropped the Bomb, thus saving hundreds of thousands of lives, both Allied and Japanese.

The Japanese soldier was a total savage to his defeated opponents, seldom surrendered and had to be killed to get past him; it was assumed most of the Jap civilians would have acted likewise.

The carnage would have been horrendous: the American estimate of their casualties for the initial lodgment on the Japanese islands was 250,000 killed, wounded and missing. Add to that the Jap casualties and the bombs were totally justified.

That’s apart from the fact that the Japs needed to be taught that their savagery at the rape of Nanking, their brutalisation of the inhabitants of conquered countries and the deaths of an estimated 20,000 allied PoWs on the Siam death railway and in PoW camps had severe consequences.
B Nobile
Vereeniging 

Mono-Choice
Current DSTV decoders from Multichoice are blocked so that one cannot record TV programmes onto a DVD recorder/player. Only the PVR recorder can do the job, but Multichoice does not tell you this when you upgrade your older decoder. The PVR costs R2,000 and a monthly fee of R65 – far more than a DVD recorder. So don’t throw out your old decoder.

And move over Bill Gates, we have a new monopoly on the block.
Chris Elston

Glenwood, Durban

Best Legge Forward
In the article “Jake White threatened me with Kebble killer” in nose131 there is a defamatory reference to me as “Star sports editor David Legge (later fired for falsifying overtime claims) ...”. That is untrue.

I resigned as an executive editor (responsible for sports coverage in The Star, Saturday Star and The Sunday Independent) in 2008 to join AFP as Africa sports correspondent. The decision was mine alone and no pressure was brought to bear on me.

The Star editor Moegsien Williams and deputy editor Jovial Rantao repeatedly pleaded with me to change my mind and stay. As a compromise I stayed on for many weeks after my planned departure date to ensure a smooth transition for my successors.

Mr Williams later hosted a farewell dinner for me. At no stage in 24 years (1984-2008) at Sauer Street was I asked to explain a financial decision. I was responsible for millions of rand and received continuous praise from superiors for the way I handled it.
David Legge
by email

A few senior colleagues on The Star confirmed that they had heard rumoured at the time what was reported as fact by Dale Granger in his noseweek piece, but both Mr Williams and Mr Rantao have assured us that the rumour was completely unfounded. We sincerely apologise for inadvertently having perpetuated a falsehood, thereby possibly harming Mr Legge’s good name. The offending reference has been removed from our website. – Ed.

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