Casino owners in Atlantic City are counting the cost of a two-day shutdown caused by New Jersey governor Jon Corzine’s gamble to fix a ,5-billion hole in the state’s Budget. The city’s 12 gaming halls closed when 45 000 state employees, including casino inspectors, were sent home as politicians resisted Corzine’s plan to increase sales tax.
Thirty-eight people, including trade union officials, appeared briefly in the Cape Town Magistrate’s Court on Friday in connection with the May 16 rampage through Cape Town by striking security guards. The cases were postponed to August 25 for further investigation.
The government has politicised policing to the detriment of South Africans, Democratic Alliance leader Tony Leon said on Friday. ”Far from removing policing from the party political arena, this government has actually aggravated the politicisation of policing to the detriment of the safety of its citizens,” he wrote in his weekly newsletter on the DA website.
Government’s social sector cluster of ministries is making steady progress with delivery, Minister of Social Development Zola Skweyiya said on Friday. Over 3,4-million children under the age of 14 now received the child-support grant, he said during a media briefing on the implementation of government’s programme of action.
China and India on Thursday bridged decades of distrust and the world’s highest mountain range by opening a direct trade link along a winding road that runs between the planet’s two most populous countries. The two nations’ representatives, who broke bread and ate sweets together, declared the customs post open in the early morning.
Egyptian MPs are demanding cuts in a popular new film, claiming it defames their country with its gritty portrayal of corrupt politicians, police brutality, terrorism and homosexuality. The Yacoubian Building — the most expensive film ever produced in Egypt — has been breaking box office records since its release a fortnight ago.
Conservative candidate Felipe Calderón has won the final official count of Mexico’s presidential poll by a razor-thin margin but his main rival, the leftist Andrés Manuel López Obrador, has vowed to contest the result. With 99,56% of the vote counted, Calderón had 35,82%, López Obrador 35,37% with three other candidates sharing the remainder.
Russian President Vladimir Putin began a public relations offensive on Thursday before he chairs a summit of the G8 countries in St Petersburg next weekend with a two-hour webcast in which he told United States President George Bush that they were friends and 10 years of conflict in Chechnya had been ”worth it”.
The JSE was in the black at midday on Friday, lifted by resources, which were also firmer in London. The JSE’s gains came despite the firmer rand. By noon, the all-share index was up 0,11%. Resources added 0,79%, the gold-mining index was up 0,48%, while the platinum-mining index advanced 1,24%.
One of the many and varied tragedies about the turbulent Saturday night we all endured is that we will now never know what it would feel like to walk down Sven-Goran Eriksson Street. Had the outgoing England manager persuaded football to come home as he had promised he would, the relevant municipal authorities may well have granted him this honour.