On the segregated campus of South Africa’s University of the Free State this weekend, tensions were thunderously high as black students planned a mass protest for Monday against the white students who made a video humiliating their black cleaners.<br><img src="http://www.mg.co.za/ContentImages/319216/video-icon.gif"> <a href="http://www.mg.co.za/articlePage.aspx?articleid=333647&area=/breaking_news/breaking_news__national/" target="_blank" class="standardtextsmall"><b>With live video</b></a>
French Test flyhalf Frederick Michalak scored his first try in Super 14 rugby when the Sharks beat the Bulls 29-15 in an all-South African match on Saturday. Michalak scored the first of three Sharks tries in the final 10 minutes to help maintain his team’s unbeaten start to the season and settle a match in which the lead changed hands four times.
A glaring error by referee Kelvin Deaker cost the Lions seven points in the Super 14 match which they eventually lost 18-16 to the Western Force at Ellis Park on Friday night. The call forced the Lions to play catch-up after a Cameron Shepherd penalty had put the visitors ahead with a long-range penalty.
Skipper Graeme Smith and Neil McKenzie set a world record for an opening wicket stand to help South Africa amass 509 for one at lunch on the second day of the second and final Test against Bangladesh on Saturday. McKenzie was not out for 223 with Hashim Amla unbeaten on 35 at lunch.
The Kremlin is planning to falsify the results of Sunday’s presidential election by compelling millions of public-sector workers to vote and by fraudulently boosting the official turnout, a media report said. Governors, regional officials and even headteachers have been instructed to deliver a landslide majority for Dmitry Medvedev, Russia’s First Deputy Prime Minister.
A crowded bus plunged off a cliff into a deep ravine in Guatemala on Friday, killing 37 people and injuring 25, emergency workers said. The bus was packed with people traveling to the village of Chiquimulilla in southern Guatemala when it skidded off the edge as it sped around a bend.
Ken Livingstone will be thumbing through his thesaurus in search of new adjectives. The United States embassy in London — whose head has been described by the London mayor as a ”chiselling little crook” — now owes more than £2-million in unpaid congestion charge payments and other traffic penalties.
No image available
/ 29 February 2008
Industrial users of electricity feel that they are bearing the brunt of electricity rationing, while more needs to be done to involve other sectors of society, an energy working group said in Cape Town on Friday. ”Busa [Business Unity South Africa] said that businesses are bearing the brunt of this and need the rest of the economy to come in,” Public Enterprises Minister Alec Erwin said.
No image available
/ 29 February 2008
A Drum magazine journalist was beaten up in what is believed to have been a racial attack in a café in Bloemfontein on Thursday night, the magazine said. ”Drum condemns the incident and believes there is no place for such racist behaviour,” said deputy editor Elmari Rautenbach on Friday.
No image available
/ 29 February 2008
South Africa’s monthly trade deficit widened to R10,2-billion in January, compared with December’s R1,2-billion gap, the South African Revenue Service said on Friday. Compared with the previous month, exports fell by 8% while imports increased by 13%, largely due to a rise in imports of minerals products and machinery.