Cape Town’s ailing public-transport system is set for a dramatic overhaul as the state ”takes ownership” of taxi routes, media reports said on Tuesday. The number of trains are to increase from 80 to 108, bus subsidies will be raised from R350-million to R500-million and the minibus taxi industry will be integrated into the public transport system.
Last week was World Press Freedom Day on May 3 — a good occasion to create and share some cool online research tools about South African media. There are 10 listed below, ranging in complexity as you read. But spending 30 minutes on getting to grips with them now could save you days’ worth of online search time in the future. True.
The European Commission said on Thursday that the European Union’s Galileo satellite navigation system would need to be entirely financed with public money to get the troubled programme back on track. The private consortium building the project was supposed to give plans on Thursday to overcome the current impasse.
The United Nations and African Union expressed cautious optimism on Thursday over the prospects of a political breakthrough in the troubled Darfur region of western Sudan. UN envoy Jan Eliasson and AU envoy Salim Ahmed Salim said they were encouraged by the increase in regional initiatives.
Residents in different parts Johannesburg were without electricity after a power failure on Thursday afternoon, City Power said. Spokesperson Louis Pieterse said the failure occurred at about 2.45pm. It affected Crosby, Mayfair, Homestead Park, Vrededorp, Brixton, Richmond, Parktown and parts of Auckland Park and Houghton.
Zambia has secured -million from Western financiers to clean up hazardous waste in copper-mining areas, where 60 000 people are at risk from lead poisoning, industry officials said on Thursday. The World Bank has given Zambia’s Copper Belt Environmental Project a -million loan and a -million grant. It also received -million from the Nordic Development Fund.
The president must explain which laws he relied on to remove Billy Masetlha from the position of director general of the National Intelligence Agency, the Constitutional Court heard on Thursday. Masetlha is asking the Constitutional Court to overturn a Pretoria High Court ruling upholding his dismissal.
President Thabo Mbeki was made a Knight of the Most Venerable Order of the Hospital of Saint John of Jerusalem in a colourful investiture ceremony held in St George’s Cathedral in Cape Town on Thursday. Mbeki was admitted to the British royal order of chivalry by the organisation’s grand prior, the Duke of Gloucester, a grandson of George the Fifth.
South Africa’s crime statistics will be released sometime in June, Safety and Security Minister Charles Nqakula said on Thursday. At a press conference on the work of government’s justice, crime-prevention and security cluster, Nqakula said the statistics and the police annual report will be released together.
Private security guards will not be ”taken over” by police but the relationship between the state and the private-industry security apparatus is set to become much closer, Safety and Security Minister Charles Nqakula said on Thursday. Addressing a press conference, Nqakula said various areas of cooperation have already been identified.