Staff Reporter
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/ 9 February 2008

Actor Heath Ledger mourned at private funeral

Family and friends of actor Heath Ledger bade farewell at a private service in his Australian home town of Perth on Saturday, with the media kept away and Ledger’s father appealing for mourners to be allowed to grieve in peace. Ledger (28) died of an accidental overdose of prescription drugs in his New York apartment on January 22.

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/ 8 February 2008

African horse sickness reported in E Cape

Parts of the Eastern Cape are experiencing an outbreak of African horse sickness, which led to the death of 11 horses in the past six weeks, said the province’s department of agriculture on Friday. ”Fifteen cases have been reported to state veterinarians over the past six weeks alone, mainly in the Ndlambe (Port Alfred) and Makana (Grahamstown) areas.

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/ 8 February 2008

Bomb shock for Soshanguve police

Police at the Soshanguve police station, north-east of Pretoria, were unpleasantly surprised on Friday afternoon when a scrap-metal dealer brought a live mortar round into the station. ”He just walked in with the bomb, saying he was suspicious when he found it on a heap of scrap metal that he recently purchased,” said Captain Solly Marindi.

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/ 8 February 2008

Media24 sales figures adjusted downwards

The circulation figures of some magazines published by Media 24 were adjusted downwards, the Audit Bureau of Circulation (ABC) said on Friday. This follows an audit the ABC did on all Media24 magazines after it was found that the circulation of some of the company’s women’s magazines were fraudulently inflated between April 2006 and June 2007.

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/ 8 February 2008

‘Business as usual’ for Thabo Mbeki

There was nothing ”unusual” about President Thabo Mbeki’s Friday State of the Nation address, Democratic Alliance leader Helen Zille said. ”Contrary to the stated theme of his speech, this was business as usual for the president,” she said. Independent Democrats leader Patricia de Lille said Mbeki’s address was ”another list of promises”.

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/ 8 February 2008

YCL: Use of old SA flag in Ghana ‘an insult’

The Confederation of African Football and the Ghanaian local organising committee should apologise for using the old South African flag on Africa Cup of Nations posters, the Young Communist League (YCL) said on Friday. The YCL said it was ”flabbergasted” and ”despises” the posters put up in Ghana, symbolising South Africa but sporting the old flag.

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/ 8 February 2008

Consumer forum criticises public officials

Public officials and top managers needed to be scrutinised more carefully in light of the current electricity crisis, the National Consumer Forum (NCF) said on Friday. ”Our current electricity crisis is the result of public officials not doing their jobs properly,” said NCF chairperson Thami Bolani in a statement.