Cellphone operator Cell C scored a 19% rise in revenue for the year ended December 31 2006, the company announced on Thursday. It said gross profit increased by R352-million — or 18% — to R2,3-billion, and subscriber numbers kept on rising.
Ethiopian rebels who killed 74 people and seized seven Chinese workers in an attack on an oilfield said on Thursday they had no plans to hold the foreigners. But a London-based spokesperson for the Ogaden National Liberation Front, which claimed responsibility for the raid, gave no details about when the Chinese would be freed.
Organisers of the Comrades Marathon have fielded a string of complaints as a result of the decision to hold the country’s premier marathon on a Sunday, the Mercury reported on Thursday. According to the newspaper, more than 100 churches on the route will be affected by road closures as a result of the marathon.
The South African Local Government Association (Salga) has come out in support of a unified public service across all three spheres of government. On Thursday, the final day of its conference in Midrand, Salga adopted a resolution in favour of a single public service for national, provincial and municipal government.
United States Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice dismissed as nonsense on Thursday concerns in Moscow that a planned US missile shield in Eastern Europe could pose a strategic threat to Russia. In a further sign of growing tensions between Russia and the West, President Vladimir Putin in Moscow declared a moratorium on a key 1990 European arms treaty.
A senior African National Congress MP, Ben Turok, says the existing trade agreement between South Africa and the European Union has not benefited his country. The agreement "is not a good agreement. It has not brought benefit to South Africa. Europe has been the beneficiary," Turok said in an interview.
South Africa’s factory-gate inflation jumped to 10,3% year-on-year in March, official data showed on Thursday, above forecasts and raising the risk that interest rates may have to rise again. Producer inflation climbed from 9,5% in February to its highest level in almost four years, largely due to higher fuel costs, Statistics South Africa said.
China said on Thursday it remained fully committed to investing in Africa, despite a recent spate of violence against Chinese interests there, including the deaths of nine Chinese among the slaughter of 77 people in Ethiopia. ”China supports trans-national trade and investment between China and other countries, including those in Africa,” a Foreign Ministry spokesperson said.
South African platinum miner Wesizwe Platinum has agreed to buy a 26% stake in the Western Bushveld joint venture for R650-million, it said on Wednesday. Wesizwe, the investment vehicle for South Africa’s Bakubung Ba-Ratheo Tribe, said it would buy African Wide Mineral Prospecting and Exploration by issuing new shares.
Politicians running local governments across the country have been read the riot act by Finance Minster Trevor Manuel, who says that the argument about capacity constraints 13 years into democracy in South Africa is wearing thin. South Africa’s councillors have been urged to spend the available resources of local government wisely.