A Pietermaritzburg family has been forced to vacate its home in Azalea township after it was invaded by snakes, the Witness reported on Wednesday. The newspaper’s website quoted Bongekile Ndlela (42), a mother of five, as saying she first discovered the reptiles on Sunday inside her bedroom. Since then she has killed five of them with the help of a neighbour.
The national strategic plan to combat Aids to 2011 met with business, government and civil society approval in Johannesburg on Wednesday. ”I regard [it] as a major landmark in our efforts as the people of South Africa to respond to HIV and Aids,” acting Health Minister Jeff Radebe told a conference on the presentation of the plan.
As the African National Congress (ANC) and General Council of the Bar in South Africa expressed concern at the situation in Zimbabwe on Wednesday, the Democratic Alliance said the government’s response to the situation is shameful. ”The ANC is concerned about the current situation in Zimbabwe,” party spokesperson Smuts Ngonyama said.
Muslims in South Africa could be incorrectly suspected of being involved terrorism due to comments by intelligence officials that the country has become a haven for terrorists, Muslim organisations warned on Wednesday.
Though manufacturers are still looking on the bright side, overall business confidence in South Africa is at its lowest in two years, according to the latest Rand Merchant Bank/Bureau for Economic Research index. The index, released on Wednesday, showed a decline from 83 points late last year to 81 in the first quarter of 2007.
The president of Ethiopia’s remote Afar region on Wednesday denied Eritrean accusations that local separatist rebels were responsible for abducting a British embassy group there for almost a fortnight. ”There are no rebel movements operating in the Afar region. Our soldiers monitor the area daily,” Ismail Ali Sero told Agence France-Presse by telephone.
Somalia’s prime minister appealed on Wednesday for ,6-million to fund a national reconciliation meeting in Mogadishu and said the next two weeks would prove if it could secure the violent capital in time. Eight people died on Tuesday when a barrage of mortar bombs launched by suspected Islamic insurgents struck the city’s presidential palace.
Iran’s president voiced defiance on Wednesday as world powers prepared to put the finishing touches to new sanctions against the Islamic Republic, saying his country would not surrender. His tough language was echoed by another senior official, who said mastering the nuclear fuel cycle was a ”red line” from which Iran would never retreat.
South Africa has become one of the most dangerous countries in the world to be a police officer, the Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP) said on Wednesday. Party spokesperson Velaphi Ndlovu said the emotional damage the job causes was shown in the increased number of police-officer suicides in the second half of last year, he said in a statement.
The Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP expressed concern on Wednesday about reports that international terrorists might be in South Africa. ”The IFP is alarmed at reports that suggest we might be harbouring international terror suspects, with links to Afghanistan, Iraq and al-Qaeda, without our knowledge,” the IFP’s John Bhengu said.