POLLING stations opened late in several parts of Mpumalanga because more than 300000 ballot papers were delivered to the wrong places. IEC provincial media officer Leon Mbangwa said some ballot papers intended for Standerton, White River, Middelburg, and the Lowveld District Council were delivered instead to the IEC offices in Nelspruit. With the help of […]
TUESDAY, 12.30PM: STATE-owned synthetic fuel producer Mossgas has asked the government to allocate R180-million from the Central Energy Fund to finance the development of its Bredasdorp Basin gasfields. The request from one of South Africa’s most expensive white elephants comes at a time when the future of the South African petroleum industry is in turmoil […]
MPUMALANGA health and welfare authorities have set aside R4-million to boost the distribution of female condoms across the province in the battle against Aids, said chief medical officer, Dr Kelvin Billinghurst, on Tuesday. He said the female condom, which is inserted into the vagina and also covers the external genitalia, was initially regarded as a […]
VOTING got off to a false start in the hotspot of Greenfields on the East Rand when officials discovered they had been using the wrong ballot papers. IEC officials accidentally used tender ballot papers for the first 177 voters. Clusters of police officials are monitoring voting at both the Greenfields and nearby Phola Park polling […]
TUESDAY, 2.30PM: THE International Monetary Fund on Monday approved a $175-million, 13-month stand-by credit to Zimbabwe, which is destined to assist the government in funding its 1998 economic reform programme. Some $52-million of the loan will be made immediately available to the government, while the remainder will be paid at quarterly intervals, subject to the […]
ABOUT 3000 people are waiting in voting queues filling the park surrounding Yeoville’s Community Centre where Gauteng’s second largest polling station is based. Voters are waiting on average of four and a half hours to get to the polls. The IEC says the pace is picking up, with voters going into the two voting halls […]
POLLING stations in the Highveld region of Mpumalanga have requested extended voting hours as snags and staff shortages are preventing them from processing more than 100 voters per hour. IEC media spokesman Leon Mbangwa said on Wednesday afternoon that polling stations in the rural Moutse and Mbibane areas of the former KwaNdebele had requested that […]
CHRISTIAN Solidarity International, a non-governmental organisation involved in a controversy over Sudan’s slave trade, said on Wednesday it had freed almost 1400 slaves in May. CSI has liberated a total of 9112 Sudanese slaves since the start of its campaign in 1995. The Zurich-based NGO frees the slaves by buying them. The method has been […]
THE head of a 19-member Commonwealth observer group, Britain’s Lord David Steel, said polling reflected that South Africa was becoming a normal country. “There is a very big contrast in what was a liberation election and this one which is much more like a normal election held in any country, with healthy debate between the […]
GRAHAM GRIFFITHS, London | Wednesday 2.45pm. MCGRATH against Tendulkar….an early confrontation between tournament heavyweights South Africa and Pakistan….buoyant Zimbabwe battling to reach the semifinals for the first time. These are among the appetising ingredients that make up the compelling cricket cocktail which is in prospect for the second stage of the World Cup when the […]