Zimbabwe’s main labour body on Monday urged President Robert Mugabe not to sign into law a controversial Bill to bug telephones and monitor emails. Last week Zimbabwe’s upper and lower houses of Parliament passed the Interception of Communications Bill.
Angola, Cameroon, Morocco, Nigeria, Sudan and Tunisia were celebrating qualification for the 2008 African Nations Cup on Monday. The Black Antelopes of Angola, the Indomitable Lions of Cameroon and the Atlas Lions of Morocco ensured their places at the biennial African football showcase by taking unassailable group leads.
Nigerian unions will start an indefinite general strike in Africa’s top oil producer on Wednesday to protest against rising prices and privatisations, the two umbrella union bodies said on Monday. The Nigeria Labour Congress and Trade Union Congress called the strike after the deadline passed on an ultimatum to the government.
There is no sign that public servants are getting tired as their pay strike enters its third week, Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) general secretary Zwelinzima Vavi said on Monday.”The strike continues … there is no sign that workers are getting tired; instead they are more angry,” he told a Cosatu conference in Boksburg.
Potchefstroom’s city council is to make an announcement on the city’s name on Wednesday. In a media invitation, the city council said the mayor, Maphetle Maphetle, will make an announcement ”about the decision that has been taken in relation to the name change of Potchefstroom”.
Free primary-school education, curbing spiralling housing costs and accelerating land reform are some of the issues to be thrashed out at the upcoming African National Congress (ANC) policy conference. The ANC will also debate how foreign land ownership can be regulated without affecting investment.
The Department of Water Affairs and Forestry has denied claims that a jet-fuel leak at the Blaauwpan dam, a protected wetland near OR Tambo International Airport, had not been cleaned up. This follows media reports that contamination at the dam had not been cleared nine months after oil spilled into a storm-water drain at the airport.
In the first substantive meeting between the media and the government since 2001, President Thabo Mbeki and senior Cabinet ministers met a delegation of editors in Pretoria on Sunday and agreed to meet yearly from now on. Sunday’s meeting tackled key legislative issues affecting media freedom, among other issues.
Heroic 12-year-old Neil Brenkman managed to sneak his father’s 9mm pistol to him during an armed robbery at their Pretoria home on Saturday night, reported News24 on Monday. One of the gang of robbers was killed in the ensuing gunfight. The others fled.
The murder case of baby Jordan resumed in its usual start-stop fashion on Monday with the court having to adjourn until noon to obtain two missing pre-sentencing reports. The Cape High Court also heard that an unnamed, privately engaged probation officer had shown no interest in interviewing Dina Rodrigues at Pollsmoor Prison.