There seems to be a deliberate pattern emerging in the approach being taken by the Frankel Investment Scheme suspects to the unfolding story of what appears to be South Africa’s largest Ponzi scheme. It appears to be to a deny everything strategy that puts the onus on investors (or victims) to prove their claims and […]
Michael Trapido
Mike Trapido is a criminal attorney and publicist having also worked as an editor and journalist.
He was born in Johannesburg and attended HA Jack and Highlands North High Schools.
He married Robyn in 1984 (Mrs Traps, aka "the government") and has three sons (who all look suspiciously like her ex-boss).
He was a counsellor on the JCCI for a year around 1992.
His passions include Derby County, Blue Bulls, Orlando Pirates, Proteas and Springboks.
He takes Valium in order to cope with Bafana Bafana's results.
Practice Michael Trapido Attorney (civil and criminal) 011 022 7332
Posted inNews/Politics
Is Cope imploding?
Caiphus Kgosana in an article which may be found on IOL suggests that the Congress of the People party may be in danger of travelling the same path to relative political obscurity as that of the UDM and the ID. The prognosis is based upon a document, a copy of which is in the newspaper’s […]
Posted inBusiness
Billions lost in SA’s largest ‘Ponzi’ scheme?
Many South African and overseas investors will soon be realising what many of them have probably been dreading for a while now, namely that the Frankel Investment Scheme, into which billions were poured, is nothing more or less than a vehicle designed to defraud them. Whether this turns out to be a classic “Ponzi”, along […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Put navy chief Mudimu in sub on bricks at the bottom of the ocean
If South African Navy chief Johannes Refiloe Mudimu has suggested that he will not pay allegiance to our commander in chief, President Jacob Zuma, then the submarine that has been put on bricks must be taken out of mothballs, the gentleman placed therein and immediately sunk without a trace. I must in all fairness point […]
Posted inNews/Politics
SABC: Time to start becoming accountable
With the SABC and its financial problems very much in the news at the moment I was interested to read a letter headlined “Others share blame for SABC woes” in the Mail & Guardian of May 29 2009. The letter was published under a pseudonym, “SABC staffer — name withheld” — and suggested that despite […]
Posted inGeneral
Hlophe is not Zuma, end it now
The ongoing war of attrition by Western Cape Judge President John Hlophe is getting uglier by the week. So much so in fact that in the Sunday Times this week former Democratic Alliance leader Tony Leon suggests that Hlophe is some sort of fifth columnist who is destroying our justice system from within. There is […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Cairo: Obama makes JFK look like a conformist
United States President Barack Obama will either be remembered as one of his country’s greatest ever leaders or possibly its most naive. Whichever way history adjudges it one thing is certain, this is not a presidency that will soon be forgotten. His somewhat misguided speech at the University of Cairo designed to lance the boil […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Zuma and Zille the pride of a nation
On the same day as our President Jacob Zuma was delivering his State of the Nation address I was monitoring the near implosion of Prime Minister Gordon Brown’s British cabinet. A second cabinet minister Hazel Blears joining Jacqui Smith in resigning her post; two in as many days. The brouhaha over the members of parliament […]
Posted inNews/Politics
SA gun owners up in arms
The Firearms Control Act (60 of 2000) has long been the cause of heated debate between those who would possess firearms as opposed to those who regulate and administer control thereof. I recall an evening about ten years ago when one particular genius — who I’m sure slept with his guns while his missus took […]
Posted inGeneral
Professor De Vos vs David Bullard…where’s Qwelane?
Professor Pierre de Vos is an expert on constitutional law at the University of the Western Cape while Dave Bullard is a professor of street smarts from the university of life. As a huge fan of both I was intrigued to see the professor respond to David’s column on “The new media racists” with one […]
Posted inSport
Blue Bulls batter Chiefs
Jacob Zuma — in the finest tradition of South African presidents confirming the support of a nation for the country’s top athletes — wished the players well and assured them that they had their countrymen behind them. Zuma magic, like that of former president’s Mandela and Mbeki before him, worked wonders at what had been […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Nothing philosophical about council paying Plato’s legal fees
Cape Town mayor Dan Plato has been given the go-ahead to use council funds in order to bring an action for defamation against a local tabloid who claimed that he was having an extra-marital affair. “A late report to the council on Wednesday said it was in the public interest that those responsible were held […]