Andy Rice is a founding partner of Yellowwood Future Architects, a marketing strategy consultancy. In his other lives, he is the southern hemisphere's only supporter of Cambridge United Football Club, and was once upon a time the South African National Spoofing Champion. He has played football at Wembley and cricket at Lord's within the same weekend, but troubled the scorer on neither occasion. Things could only go up from here.
Brkic is the founder and editor of The Daily Maverick.
He has edited magazines on business and politics, technology, and wildlife. He has also published fiction and non-fiction books, most of them in Serbian. Though he has never pretended to be a reporter, his wide knowledge of politics (especially in America), combined with his experiences in a disintegrating Yugoslavia, gives him an unusual outlook on events in South Africa.
Despite the vowel-poor surname, he tells anyone who asks that he hails from Hyde Park, Johannesburg, having spent most of his adult life in South Africa.
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Brendah works for a management consultancy during the day, you know, one of those companies that no-one really knows what they do. Before she defected and went uber-corporate she worked for UpperCase Media and the Mail & Guardian and now does her writing on a freelance basis. She has dreams of being the change Zimbabwe needs. And did we mention she is female? Black female?
Spector retired from the American Foreign Service after a 31-year stint. His postings included Japan, Indonesia, Swaziland and South Africa during some of the darkest days of Apartheid. In the early 90s he was in charge of negotiations around the end of the American cultural boycott of South Africa.
His academic career has included numerous papers and book contributions on American foreign policy, and he taught at the International Relations Department of the University of the Witwatersrand.
Spector is the host and executive producer of a weekly arts and culture show on Radio Today.
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Scottish-South African investment analyst Chris Gilmour has had a varied career in the financial world. After leaving Scottish & Newcastle Breweries in 1982, he came to SA, where he worked as an investment analyst for the dear departed Max Pollak & Freemantle, at the time one of the largest and most prestigious stockbroking firms on the JSE. During the next sixteen years he worked for many other stockbroking firms, latterly with Merrill Lynch. He has also worked on the buy side, as an institutional investment manager in Cape Town. Prior to joining Absa Investments in August 2007, he worked as an honest journalist with Financial Mail for over four years. He holds a B.Sc. (Hons) in Chemistry and a Postgraduate Diploma in Financial Studies, both from Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh, Scotland. There is no truth to the rumour that he is a rabid Scottish Nationalist, just waiting for the call to return to Scotia in the wake of a majority vote for Scottish Independence in any forthcoming referendum.
David grew up in the Free State, with his father working on the gold mines. Spent a big chunk of his life trading in agricultural commodities. Eventually he became a project manager, working mainly on the Debswana diamond mines in Botswana.
Later he took-up freelance writing, appearing in Business Day and The Weekender. David has an unusual talent for making people open up to him, which he later turns into a gripping read. He gained nationwide fame after he completed the biography of Joost van der Westhuizen, Joost: The Man In The Mirror. David is currently working on Glen Agliotti's biography.
Fred first started teaching people how to build their brands in the digital economy way back in 1998. Fred is currently the CEO of digital marketing agency World Wide Creative, with clients such as Honda, Old Mutual, Fancourt, Virgin, Exclusive Books and Ferrari, and is also the co-founder of The Heavy Chef Project, dedicated to demystifying digital marketing. Fred is obsessed with brand strategy and digital media - with side habits of pizza, Hawaiian shirts, movies, Danish beer and fine wine. Fred also happens to do a mean version of ‘Angie’ by the Rolling Stones at 3am in any randomly selected Korean karaoke joint (feel free to search for it on YouTube).
Vegter is a former technology journalist who took up carpentry and ran away to Kynsna after one too many incidents of crime in Johannesburg. But because he likes argument for the sake of it (the coherent, intelligent type; not the froth-at-the-mouth version found among political and religious fanatics) he still writes a number of regular columns.
He has found himself in trouble with environmentalists, recreational cyclists, white people, black people, and just about every other group you can think of because of his views. Luckily he doesn't care what anybody else thinks about him.
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Rousseau is a voluntary exile from professional philosophy, where having to talk metaphysics eventually became unbearably irritating. He now spends his time trying to arrest the rapid decline in common sense exhibited by his species, both through teaching critical thinking and business ethics at the University of Cape Town, and through activities aimed at eliminating the influence of religious ideology in public policy.
When not being absurdly serious, he’s one of those left-wing sorts who enjoys red wine, and he is alleged to be able to cook a mean Bistecca Fiorentine.
Mandy de Waal is a writer and journalist who reports on technology, corruption, business, psychopaths, scams, science, the media sector and whatever else she finds interesting. Back in journalism after spending time in the corridors of corporate greed, de Waal has written for Mail & Guardian, Noseweek, Brandchannel (New York) and a number of other good titles. She now writes for The Daily Maverick because it’s the smart thing to do. A judge for the Discovery Health Journalism Awards, de Waal also sits on the panel of judges for the PICA Awards convened by the Magazine Publishers Association of South Africa. de Waal has a predilection for good coffee, smart atheists, intelligent writing and well constructed arguments.
Marelise van der Merwe lives in Cape Town, where homophobia is soooo gay. She is regrettably unable to commit to a sexual orientation, as she does not own nearly enough Barbra Streisand DVDs. By day she is the resident writer in a design studio, and by night she is also the resident writer in a design studio. When she’s not doing that, she wires her heart to Facebook, falls asleep at parties, or makes a mean butternut soup.
De Wet is the deputy editor of The Daily Maverick.
Not having the imagination to even try anything other than journalism (or any medium other than words), he has spent all his adult life writing about what everybody else is doing. He has written about technology and telecommunications, business, politics, the property market, unusual medical conditions and, for a brief interlude, movies.
He has participated in the closing-down of one daily newspaper and two magazines, but implausibly claims that none of it was his fault.
Simon Williamson was once in advertising before realising that trying to convince people to think differently was far more purposeful than getting them to buy stuff. He once wrote for TV websites before flittering around the world with the sole purpose of seeing more of it. Nowadays, he writes for GoTravel24 as a travel journalist, telling people where to take their holidays.
Sipho Hlongwane is a self-taught writer who, apart from the occasional freelancing stint, slogs away at a law degree. He also makes regular contributions to the Mail & Guardian’s Thought Leader site.
He has driven forklift trucks, hosted radio shows, waited tables, reviewed books and has won prizes in visual arts competitions. You know, the normal, growing-up stuff.
He is a proud Zulu, (the Tswana blood is never to be mentioned. Ever) who hails from the KwaZulu Natal Midlands. He enjoys rugby in all its laddish raucousness, intelligent satire and chooses to spend his free time with people who don’t take themselves too seriously.
Grootes has been reporting for Talk Radio 702 and its sister station Cape Talk for nearly all his life. Apart from that stint working for the Royal College of Midwives in London, which he doesn't talk about, and a couple of foreign radio stations he graced with his presence when he was still a callow youth.
In recent years Grootes has focused on politics and politically-related court cases. His on-the-spot reportage has given him a unique insight into the personalities of a number of high-flyers, and made him more than a little cynical.
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With a high-school prize for best supporting actor in a one-act play and as captain of the chess team, Charalambous qualified to join the esteemed ranks of the Daily Maverick opionionistas.
After being expelled from the halls of finance houses for possessing an inkling of wit, this budding entrepreneur spends his days bird watching and writing subtle, yet moving social commentary pieces for South Africa’s bastion of journalism excellence (that’s The Daily Maverick, in case you were wondering).
Having escaped the Port Elizabeth mis-education system, Charalambous now resides in Joburg and can often be spotted quality-control testing the water in many of the city’s watering holes.
With a newborn son to add to his list of legal accolades, we expect the level, and frequency, of his journalism to increase as he relearns his ABCs. And he has nothing else to do at night.
Cohen is a business and political journalist and commentator of more years than he likes to admit. His freelance work has included contributions to the Wall Street Journal and the Financial Times, but he spent most of his life working for Business Day.
After a mid-life crisis that didn't include the traditional fast car, Cohen now divides his time between Johannesburg and a house situated almost exactly in the middle of nowhere in the Karoo.
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Dlamini is a writer, critic, traveller and portrait photographer. He also has a day job, sort of.
His portraits of writers have been published in many top literary publications, but he mostly makes his living as Chairman of the Chillibush Group of Companies, which deals in the dark arts of advertising, public relations and event management.
In 2007 Dlamini was the recipient of the South African Literary Awards' Literary Journalism prize. He regularly reviews books, especially from Southern Africa, and presents the The Victor Dlamini Literary Podcast.
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Xhanti Payi is a suit during the day and has worked for almost ever South African bank, and moonlights as a columnist, having written for the Weekend Argus. His main ambition is to win the Nobel prize, for whatever. Ok, maybe Economics.
He has the misfortune of being Xhosa, and carrying a name with a click in Cape Town. Xhanti enjoys jazz music, and displays anti revolutionary tendencies in drinking copious amounts of good red wine.
After a distinguished career in advertising, Yvonne was appointed as the CEO of the International Marketing Council of SA, responsible for creating and managing Brand South Africa, which she did for 7 years. She now a Marketer-at-Large specialising in creating communication solutions and strategy. She is a renowned public speaker, talking the country up at any opportunity.
