Yearly Archives: 1999

RESIDENTS living beside the R488 million Driekoppies Dam in Mpumalanga fear for their lives and have urged both the government and the dam’s developers to move them from the area. Concerned residents said at a community meeting in Schoemansdal, just north of the Swaziland border at the weekend, that three people had already drowned in […]

FOREIGN Affairs Minister Alfred Nzo appointed Sheila Sisulu ambassador to the United States on Monday. Sisulu replaces the colourful Franklin Sonn, who on Monday announced that he is leaving politics to concentrate on a new business venture. Nzo also announced that he has appointed Thuthukile Mazibuko-Skweyiya as ambassador to France, Kingsley Mamabolo as ambassador to […]

UGANDA Airlines has sacked 72 of its 280 employees, including senior managers, in a cost-cutting measure ahead of privatisation in March, airline officials said on Saturday. The government has been spending an estimated $12-million annually to subsidise the state-owned airline. Four international airlines — British Airways, Sabena, Air Mauritius and Alliance Air — have submitted […]

THE Italian government has announced a grant of $455000 to an Ethiopian relief agency to help people who have been displaced by the border conflict with Eritrea. The aid, destined for the northern Tigre and north-eastern Afar regions, was handed over by ambassador Marcello Ricoveri to the head of the Disaster Prevention and Preparedness Commission, […]

MOZAMBIQUE’s publicly owned airports company, ADM, says it needs $42-million for the rehabilitation of runways and other infrastructure, according to a recent report on the state of the country’s airports. The chairman of the ADM board of directors, Jose Cossa, quotted in the Sunday paper Domingo, said the company does not have the funds, and […]

SEVEN people were shot and injured when two men armed with a shotgun and a 9mm pistol ran through a house in Kraaifontein near cape Town in the ealry hours on Sunday. Police spokesperson Superintendent Wicus Holtzhausen said the two men pulled up in a white bakkie and ran through a house, believed to be […]

ZAMBIAN President Frederick Chiluba, due to have arrived in South Africa on Sunday, has postponed his visit indefinitely to allow him to continue consultations with the leaders of countries involved in the Democratic Republic of Congo peace process, Deputy President Thabo Mbeki’s office said on Sunday. Chiluba arrived in Harare on Sunday morning to consult […]

ZIMBABWE”s three major economic sectors — manufacturing, mining and agriculture — recorded declines in growth in 1998, Ziana news agency reported on Sunday. According to figures released by the Ministry of Finance, they were hit by inflationary pressures due to the plunging Zimbabwean dollar. The Agricultural sector was expected to record more growth, although crop […]

THE North African state of Mali is to sell some of the government’s stake in the ailing state-owned telephone and electricity companies, Finance Minister Soumaila Cisse said on Sunday. He said the government’s stake in Energie du Mali, the local power company, will fall from 97,2% to 51%, he said. No figures were provided as […]

A GROUP of some 200 supporters of vigilante group People Against Gangsterism and Drugs and the fringe Muslims Against Global Oppression staged a peaceful placard protest at the Cae Town Waterfront on Sunday, in protest at last week’s police action against Muslim protests around the visit of British Prime Minister Tony Blair. On Friday, at […]