OWN CORRESPONDENTand REUTERS, Johannesburg | Tuesday THE Building Industries Federation of South Africa (BIFSA) has revised down the sector’s growth forecast this year because of crime, the weak rand and recent political upheaval in Zimbabwe. Executive Director Ian Robinson said in his annual report that “the single most negative domestic influence on the fortunes of […]

A CAPE Town court has sentenced two Muslim vigilantes to a suspended sentence and three years of community service for the killing of a seven-year-old girl in 1998. The men, Mogamat Adams and Abduraghman Thebus, are members of the vigilante group People Against Gangsterism and Drugs (Pagad). The two were found guilty of murdering Christel […]

Ongeri John, Dar es Salaam | Tuesday THE opposition Civic United Front (CUF), which lost presidential elections on the semi-autonomous islands of Zanzibar by 0,4% in 1995, has criticised police for allegedly siding with the ruling party in a series of public clashes that has left hundreds imprisoned and scores in hospital. CUF presidential candidate […]

STEVEN MANN, Cape Town | Tuesday IT could take up to 20 years before the government realises its goal of providing all South Africans with access to clean water, Water Affairs Minister Ronnie Kasrils has admitted. Kasrils told a media briefing in Parliament while running water had been laid on for six million South Africans […]

CONCERNS still remain about the reliability of local transport, criminal activity at bus stops and ongoing intimidation of commuters in Khayelitsha outside Cape Town, where turf wars between taxi operators and bus companies claimed several lives earlier this year. This is in spite of relative calm having returned to the township, according to a report […]

THE man known as the “saloon killer”, Velaphi Ndlangamandla, who killed 19 people in a five-month reign of terror in Mpumalanga in 1998, has been sentenced to 137 years’ imprisonment. Ndlangamandla, 34, was convicted of 19 murder charges, nine of attempted murder, six robbery charges, one attempted robbery charge, five housebreaking charges (three of housebreaking […]

ZIMBABWE President Robert Mugabe has made a rare concession on his plan to confiscate farms for redistribution to landless blacks, telling one of the country’s biggest corporate landowners, Anglo American, that it could keep sugar estate and cattle ranches that had originally been listed for confiscation. A powerful South African-based mining conglomerate, Anglo American owns […]

ZIMBABWE police have expelled hundreds of squatters occupying five white-owned farms and destroyed some of their makeshift huts, notably near Harare. Apart from a few brief scuffles with squatters on one of the farms, the expulsion operation was uneventful. Chenjerai Hitler Hunzvi, leader of Zimbabwe’s war veterans who have led a campaign to occupy white […]

EDGARS Consolidated Stores (Edcon) expects interim earnings to be well below those of the same period last year, saying it would be difficult to match 1999’s overall earnings. Edcon said an improvement would only be expected if the retail environment showed an upswing over the Christmas season. Edcon earlier this year forecast a 10% increase […]

THOUSANDS of civilians have been trapped by a relentless Philippine military assault on Muslim rebel hostage takers on Jolo island in the southern Philippines. Food and water are scarce and the wounded cannot be taken to hospital because of a military cordon around the area of operations. An American being held by Muslim kidnappers has […]