Ben Maclennan
Guest Author
No image available
/ 7 May 2007

Rodrigues guilty of baby’s murder

Dina Rodrigues did not flinch on Monday as a Cape High Court judge on Monday pronounced her and her four co-accused guilty of the murder of baby Jordan-Leigh Norton. She stared straight ahead as Judge Basheer Waglay said that even though she only planned the June 2005 killing, she was as guilty as the men she hired to carry it out.

No image available
/ 5 May 2007

Leon sees ‘new dawn’ in SA politics

Tony Leon on Saturday delivered his last speech as leader of the Democratic Alliance (DA), predicting that the party would one day bring about a new government in South Africa. In an emotionally charged session of the party’s federal congress in Midrand, he thanked supporters for the ”incredible journey” they had allowed him to take in heading the DA.

No image available
/ 3 May 2007

Baby Jordan murder trial: Rodrigues still awaits fate

Things looked dark for baby murder accused Dina Rodrigues at the end of the first day of a marathon judgement in the Cape High Court on Thursday. Judge Basheer Waglay told a packed courtroom that he accepted expert evidence that her thumbprints and handwriting were found on a waybill left at the scene of the June 2005 killing of baby Jordan-Leigh Norton.

No image available
/ 11 April 2007

Candidate judge grilled over racism claim

A candidate for a post on the bench of the Cape High Court faced tough questioning at the Judicial Service Commission on Tuesday over her claim that judicial appointments were often steeped in racial and gender prejudice. Advocate Nona Goso was also quizzed over incidents in which she appeared to have signed off review cases without reading them.

No image available
/ 5 April 2007

Sea of sand threatens prehistoric natural treasure

Rising barely 160m above the arid Namaqualand coastline, the Boegoeberge hardly deserve to be called mountains. Yet their size belies both their ecological importance and the controversy that is swirling around them. Once islands off the coast of a prehistoric Africa, today they are lapped by another sea. This time it is a sea of sand, generated by the operations of state-owned diamond-mining company Alexkor.

No image available
/ 30 March 2007

Pay boost on the cards for Mbeki

President Thabo Mbeki should get a 57% pay hike, the Independent Commission for the Remuneration of Public Office Bearers has recommended. This would add R716 962 to the president’s package, bringing it to R1,89-million a year. Mbeki has in past years deliberately not taken the full amount of pay he is entitled to.

No image available
/ 22 March 2007

Fidentia boss released from custody

Fidentia boss J Arthur Brown was released from custody on Thursday after his R1-million bail was unexpectedly paid on his behalf. His advocate Klaus von Lieres handed the cheque to Scorpions prosecutors moments after a Cape Town magistrate ruled that property belonging to a third party was acceptable as surety for bail.