AN officer of the police VIP protection unit and bodyguard to Deputy President Thabo Mbeki appeared in the Mamelodi Magistrate’s Court on Wednesday charged with murder. Sergeant Evans Modise (33) was released on R1000 bail and the case was postponed to January 21. Modise was arrested after Samuel Baloyi was beaten to death on New […]
THE United Nations Population Fund announced the appointment of Nigerian literary legend Chinua Achebe as its goodwill ambassador on Thursday. The appointment will see Achebe, currently professor of literature at New York’s Bard college, acting as a voice for the population fund on such issues as family planning, gender equity and reproductive health. Achebe, author […]
LIBYA warned Seoul on Thursday that South Korean companies operating in the North African country will be expelled if the government does not back off from supporting United States attacks on Iraq. Libya’s official news agency Jana reported that, “South Korea…must know that its companies operating in the Arab states would be expelled in case […]
THE Zambian state has closed its case in the trial of 77 soldiers charged with treason over a coup attempt against President Frederick Chiluba in October 1997, defence lawyers said on Wednesday. “The state closed its case on Tuesday, and we are now trying to have some of the detainees released because some of them […]
SIERRA Leonean Finance Minister James Jonah said on Thursday said that Nigerian-led Ecomog troops are in control of all strategic points in the capital, Freetown, a day after rebels stormed the city. “All the major strategic points are fully under Ecomog control, including the Wilberforce barracks [Ecomog HQ],” Jonah said. “The rebels never made a […]
ZAMBIAN President Frederick Chiluba announced on Tuesday that the long awaited Democratic Republic of Congo peace talks will be held in Lusaka in mid-January. The talks, say Chiluba, will be attended by the rebel Congolese Rally for Democracy — a significant breakthrough if it occurs as DRC President Laurent Kabila has refused to talk to […]
GAUTENG housing MEC, Dan Mofokeng, is demanding a total of R1-million from the National Party in the province and its leader, Johan Kilian, for defamation over an auditor general’s report Mofokeng released on December 28. Kilian accused Mofokeng of suppressing some of the report’s findings. The report appeared to clear the provincial housing and land […]
ISAAC MOFOKENG (29), the man accused of shooting Johannesburg Zoo’s Max the gorilla, fell asleep during his trial in the Johannesburg Magistrate’s Court on Wednesday. He has pleaded not guilty to 11 charges, including rape, abduction, housebreaking and malicious damage to property (Max the gorilla). Mofokeng has managed to delay his trial through bizarre behaviour […]
THE holiday season road death toll rose to 787 by noon on Wednesday, according to Arrive Alive. This figure compares favourably with the 812 people who died in traffic accidents over the same period last year. Most deaths were reported in KwaZulu-Natal with 151, followed by the Western Cape with 122, Gauteng 112, the Eastern […]
TANZANIA’s first president Julius Nyerere has the government for its decision to privatise public firms. Addressing the fourth provincial chapter of the East African Province of the Holy Ghost, the elder statesman said that to privatise the economy of a country like Tanzania, where there is no private sector, is to “foreignise” it.