Eight consortia, including SA cellphone giant MTN, are in the race for a second cellphone operator licence in Saudi Arabia. Revenues in the lucrative Saudi market, which has about eight million mobile users with a growth rate of about 30%, are predicted to soar to ,9-billion by 2007.
Aggrey Klaaste, former editor of the Sowetan, was laid to rest at the Avalon Cemetery in Soweto on Saturday, SABC radio news reported. Klaaste died of a lung condition last Saturday at the age of 64. The editor widely credit with the concept of ”nation building”.
The day after Michael Moore’s Fahrenheit 9/11 was released in American cinemas, it was announced on Saturday that a festival devoted to films debunking Moore’s own work will be staged later this year in Texas. The American Film Renaissance will feature up to 10 films, among them Michael Moore Hates America.
Conflict in Africa came under the spotlight when the deputy presidents of South Africa and Cuba met for bilateral discussions in Pretoria. Deputy president Jacob Zuma says he briefed his Cuban counterpart Carlos Lage about initiatives to eradicate conflict on the continent, with particular reference to the Democratic Republic of Congo, Rwanda, Sudan and the Ivory Coast.
South Africa’s oldest lesbian and gay service organisation, the Triangle Project, on Friday reacted with outrage at a website that called for the ”reclaiming of Cape Town from the homosexual plague”.
Vice president Dick Cheney brought a long-running feud with leading Democrats over his former company, Halliburton, to a foul-mouthed climax on the floor of the Senate. Cheney told Vermont’s senator, Patrick Leahy to ”fuck yourself”, after he apparently approached George Bush’s number two for a chat.
A group of 29 Italian police officers, including the country’s anti-terror chief, go on trial in Genoa on Saturday in connection with a brutal attack on protesters at the 2001 G8 summit and an alleged plot to justify the violence using fabricated evidence.
Firearm owners will seek a court interdict on Wednesday to stop government from enacting legislation to control the ownership of guns. The South African Gunowners Association says the Firearms Control Act is a threat to the country’s security and its citizens.
A humid strip of coastal rainforest in Australia’s far north, the world-heritage listed region has the highest number of endemic primitive plants in the world and may be the oldest rainforest. Now, an old row about housing development has been revived by the local authority’s decision to ban building on 450 privately owned plots.
Absa shareholders gave the go-ahead on Friday for a landmark deal that will see 10% of the banking group’s ownership directly held by black shareholders. Absa Group chief executive Nallie Bosman said the deal put Absa in line to meet the financial sector charter target of 10% direct ownership, but that it now has an overall ”indirect” black shareholding of about 25%.