Media watchdogs have reacted with shock to the gagging order placed on the Mail & Guardian newspaper by the Johannesburg High Court on Thursday night. The Media Institute of Southern Africa, the Media Monitoring Project, the Democratic Alliance and the South African National Editors’ Forum have all responded critically.
Swaziland closing its borders with South Africa? Michael Jackson seeking asylum in Zimbabwe? Jean-Bertrand Aristide appointed Minister of the African Diaspora in the South African Cabinet? It’s that time of the year when gasps of disbelief are quickly replaced by a collective slapping of the forehead — April Fool’s Day.
"In an internationally condemned move, an enraged King Mswati III of Swaziland has decided to close his country’s borders with South Africa, starting on Friday." Sounds unbelievable? It is! Read the <i>Mail & Guardian Online</i>’s April Fool’s Day story that had its readers wondering about the Swazi monarch’s shock announcement.
A number of buildings had to be evacuated in Stilfontein, near Klerksdorp in the North West, on Wednesday after an earth tremor preliminarily measuring five on the Richter scale. About 3Â 200 miners at DRDGold’s operations near Stilfontein were being evacuated after the tremor. Thirteen miners were injured in the tremor.
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/ 10 February 2005
African National Congress Youth League president Fikile Mbalula was stung into action this week after the Mail & Guardian raised concerns that politics and big business make uneasy bedfellows. Mbalula said that, according to the M&G, ”comrades are … not entitled to participate in the country’s economy”.
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/ 27 January 2005
Music channel MTV’s first pan-African music channel, the long-anticipated MTV base, launches on February 22, it was announced on Thursday. MTV base will start broadcasting with a specially recorded message from African-American rap artist Xzibit. His words of welcome will be echoed by international and African artists as well as African music fans.
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/ 25 January 2005
Yesterday, South African filmmaker Darrell Roodt’s touching film about a young woman, played by Leleti Khumalo, coming to terms with Aids, has been nominated for an Academy Award for best foreign-language film, it was announced on Tuesday. The Howard Hughes epic The Aviator leads the contenders with 11 nominations.
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/ 21 January 2005
Forty MPs are to be prosecuted for their role in Parliament’s travel scam, the Scorpions announced on Friday. "After considering the evidence and consulting with the affected parties, we have decided to prosecute certain members of Parliament in this matter," spokesperson Sipho Ngwema said.
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/ 20 January 2005
Award-winning author and television scriptwriter K Sello Duiker was found hanged in Johannesburg on Wednesday night. Before his death, Duiker had been working as a commissioning editor for the South African Broadcasting Corporation. His first novel, <i>Thirteen Cents</i>, attracted considerable publicity and won a 2001 Commonwealth Writers’ Prize.
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/ 11 January 2005
Dolly Mokgatle, the CEO of Spoornet, has resigned, parent Transnet said on Tuesday. Transnet has accepted her resignation with immediate effect. No reasons were given for Mokgatle’s resignation. Tami Didiza, head of Transnet group communications, declined to comment further, saying only that Mokgatle will be "pursuing other interests".