THULANI MTHETHWA, Mbabane | Thursday SWAZILAND’S royal advisory council warned that it would forcibly close the Media Institute of Southern Africa (Misa) branch if it persisted in publicly criticising the kingdom’s political system. Misa’s Swaziland national director Comfort Mabuza said members of the Swaziland National Committee appeared to be annoyed with a prominent article in […]

The opposition Movement for a Democratic Change (MDC) accused the Zimbabwean government of “harassment” and “intimidation” following a raid on its offices on Thursday morning. Zimbabwe police raided a number of MDC offices, ostensibly searching for illegal weapons. Paramilitary police armed with automatic weapons blocked the entrances to the MDC headquarters just outside Harare, the […]

LABOUR’S Job Creation Trust Fund is ready to start spending R62 million collected from one-day salary donations collected by three major labour federations. The fund, created at the 1998 Presidential Job Summit, collected money from members of the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu), the National Council of Trade Unions and the Federation of […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Cape Town | Thursday LIGHT snow fell on Table Mountain on Wednesday night, a representative of the Table Mountain Aerial Cableway Company said on Thursday. The company’s operations supervisor, Sedick Sabra, said a light dusting of snow was still on the mountain top early on Thursday, but was rapidly melting. The last time […]

Radio 702 will invite Health Minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang to appear on talk show host John Robbie’s show again. The African National Congress on Tuesday accepted 702 owner Primedia’s apology for the way Robbie’s interview with the Minister ended last week. Robbie told her he had never heard “such rubbish” and told her to “go away” […]

An opposition alliance in Mauritius appears headed for a landslide victory in the general elections according to early results released on Tuesday. With about one third of the votes counted, the alliance looks poised to sweep all 60 of the National Assembly seats being contested. The race is chiefly between an alliance of Prime Minister […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Cape Town | Wednesday The Democratic Party’s Patrick Hill has taken over as metropolitan mayor of Cape Town after William Bantom was forced to resign from the New National Party after being caught with a pornographic video in his office. NNP provincial leader Gerald Morkel admitted on Tuesday that he had made “an […]

THOUSANDS of Mauritians took to the streets to celebrate the landslide victory of the opposition alliance, which could result in a first non-Hindu prime minister for the Indian Ocean island. Electoral Commissioner Irsam Rahman said the alliance between the Mouvement Militant Mauricien (MMM) and the Mouvement Socialiste Mauricien (MSM) had won 54 of the 62 […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Johannesburg | Tuesday SASOL, the listed fuel, gas and chemicals producer, has concluded a R14bn deal with petroleum companies in Nigeria, barely days after completing a R163m project to install a pipeline gas distribution network in KwaZulu-Natal. In the Nigerian deal, the joint venture with Chevron Overseas Petroleum and the Nigerian National Petrol […]

DE BEERS, the world’s largest producer of diamonds, has completed its successful 305m Canadian dollar bid for the takeover of diamond producer Winspear Diamonds.The offer saw 96.2% of Winspear shareholders accept De Beers’ bid of C$5 per share. De Beers last month concluded the agreement for the acquisition of Winspear, which counts among its assets […]