Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe said on Thursday his government had bought 600 000 tonnes of maize to ease food shortages ahead of a June 27 presidential election run-off. Zimbabwe, once home to a prosperous agricultural sector, is suffering chronic food shortages.
India’s Reliance Communications is prepared to pay a significant premium for control of South African mobile phone group MTN, the FT Alphaville website said on Thursday. MTN and Reliance said on Monday they were in exclusive talks after India’s biggest mobile phone operator Bharti Airtel broke off talks.
Sasol on Wednesday announced the 50 black groups which will share in its R28-billion black economic empowerment (BEE) Inzalo transaction. They included energy and mining women’s groups, Sasol business suppliers, customers, franchisees and trade union investment companies, groups conducting skills and community upliftment projects, and professional associations.
A Cabinet minister is one of 30 Swaziland businessmen who are to be investigated by the country’s main anti-corruption unit over how they amassed their fortunes. Prime Minister Absalom Themba Dlamini told Parliament earlier this week that a Cabinet minister had amassed more than 30-million emalangeni in his bank account.
An investment of R42-million was placed into a project for a medical aid for ex-miners on Thursday. The agreement aims to improve public health facilities that will be largely utilised by ex-miners in South Africa and neighbouring countries, for the benefit of medical examinations.
Simba Makoni, the former finance minister who defected from President Robert Mugabe’s party to challenge him in presidential elections in March, refused on Thursday to say which candidate he would back in next month’s presidential run-off.
The United States will no longer be able to stockpile cluster bombs at its military bases in Britain under government proposals for an international ban on the controversial weapons. As diplomats from more than 100 states unanimously passed a treaty banning the use of cluster bombs, it emerged that British ministers are prepared to go further.
Drought in the central Karoo has reached critical proportions, Agri Wes-Cape said on Thursday. ”Large numbers of game and livestock are dying each day from the drought, and lambs perish at birth because the ewes simply do not produce milk,” the farmers’ organisation said in a statement.
The government has now back-pedalled on its initial claim that a "third force" was behind the recent wave of attacks on foreigners.
South Africa’s producer price inflation (PPI) accelerated unexpectedly to 12,4% year-on-year in April, increasing the possibility of a bigger than previously expected interest-rate hike in June. Statistics South Africa said on Thursday headline PPI — which represents domestic output — accelerated from an upwardly revised 11,9% in March.