Staff Reporter
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/ 16 October 2006

The govt goes green

Government’s new green energy strategy is steaming ahead, combining a strong focus on renewables and energy efficiency. Three organisations have been established this year under the Central Energy Fund, a state-owned body, with a mandate to research and commercialise alternative energy technologies.

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/ 16 October 2006

A sparkling example of economic growth

Not many post-independence countries had a worse start than Botswana. At independence in 1966, the country had 22 university graduates, about 100 matriculants and only 12km of paved road. However, it has had record economic growth rates, higher than any other country in the world over the past three decades.

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/ 16 October 2006

Now it’s the hummersexual

There’s a war going on in the United States. A war on metros. After years of living under the cruel designer heel of those triumphant metrosexuals, poor old retrosexuals — alias ”regular guys” — are fighting back. Old-time, unself-conscious, un-moisturised masculinity is in. Guys are guys again, with manly, painstakingly shaped and trimmed beards.

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/ 16 October 2006

Judges should not call for the death penalty

The claim that the Constitution contains a criminal’s bill of rights has been often made by the ”law and order” lobby. These spokespeople emphasise order above law, as if the denial of due process to accused persons will curb the crime wave. There is a nostalgia in the land for a return to the jackboot of apartheid policing: assault an accused, extract the confession and procure a conviction.

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/ 16 October 2006

Scorpions advocate refused bail

The Randburg Regional Court refused bail to senior Scorpions advocate Portia Kgantsi on Monday. She was arrested recently for bribery, corruption, extortion and defeating the ends of justice. Also against Kgantsi was a prior conviction for theft, about which she had never told the National Prosecuting Authority.

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/ 15 October 2006

PW Botha discharged from hospital

Former president PW Botha was discharged from the George medi-clinic on Saturday, after going in for a ”routine check-up”, the hospital said. ”The family has asked not to reveal the nature of the tests but all results were good,” said hospital manager George Schutte.

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/ 15 October 2006

Indian cops battling to find an Afrikaans translator

Indian police have made little headway in a probe into a 2000 cricket match-fixing scam due a problem in translating taped conversations in Afrikaans, a report said on Sunday. In 2000, police in New Delhi had filed a case against Proteas cricketers, including then captain Hansie Cronje, and middlemen for allegedly accepting money to influence the outcome of matches.

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/ 15 October 2006

Fundraising dinner nets Zuma R500 000

A fundraising dinner in Nelspruit, Mpumalanga, has raised more than R500 000 for African National Congress deputy president Jacob Zuma, the South African Broadcasting Corporation reported on Sunday. Among those attending were the provincial leadership of the ANC, provincial ministers, mayors and business people.

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/ 15 October 2006

SABC interdict against M&G Online dismissed

Just after midnight, in the early hours of Sunday morning, Johannesburg High Court Judge Zukiswa Tshiqi dismissed with costs the SABC’s application to have the Mail & Guardian Online remove a report on the blacklisting of certain analysts and commentators by the broadcaster. ”I don’t believe that it is okay to suppress information or to hide information written in the report,” she told the court.