The local publishing industry continues to feed South Africans’ insatiable appetite for ”exclusive” new details of what Paris, Angelina and Britney are up to. Afrikaners now have a new celebrity mag in Mense, while an up-market gossip sheet, In Style, will soon hit the news-stands.
Luis Felipe Scolari, the coach who won the World Cup with Brazil in 2002 and took Portugal to the semifinals of the recently completed tournament in Germany, has emerged as the dark horse for the plum job of national coach of South Africa. However, he will have to beat the frontrunner, Gerard Houllier, whose wife is concerned that a change of climate might exacerbate the former French coach’s health problems.
Israeli air strikes killed 17 people in Lebanon on Monday and Hezbollah announced more rocket attacks on Israel after world powers put the onus on the Syrian- and Iranian-backed Shi’ite guerrilla group to end the fighting. Overnight raids destroyed two army posts on the northern Lebanese coast, killing nine Lebanese soldiers, and damaged the homes of Hezbollah officials in eastern Lebanon
The death toll from severe rainstorms and flooding across China in the aftermath of severe Tropical Storm Bilis has risen to 154, state media said on Monday. Torrential rain hit several provinces including Fujian, Hunan, Guangdong, Jiangxi and Zhejiang in the aftermath of the storm, forcing millions of residents to be evacuated and wreaking havoc on transport and communications.
Michael Schumacher cruised to a polished victory for Ferrari in Sunday’s French Grand Prix and then set his sights on a remarkable eighth drivers’ world title. The 37-year-old German, seven-times drivers’ world champion, drove a faultless race to finish ahead of defending champion Fernando Alonso of Spain.
Anti-apartheid icon Nelson Mandela turns 88 on Tuesday.
A heavyweight government salvage team has been sent into the Department of Home Affairs to rectify the financial disarray graphically detailed in a recent report by Auditor General Shauket Fakie. The task team began its work on July 1 and has a time-frame of six months.
The Fourth of July was celebrated with all the usual pomp and swagger in the United States, but less attention across the news media was given to another Fourth of July celebration right here on the African continent. This has become a day of national commemoration of the arrival of liberation forces in the wake of the unspeakable genocide in Rwanda in 1994.
In the charming if somewhat rundown marina of Larnaca, the cedar-emblazoned flag of Lebanon flies proudly from a yacht as nearby Israelis clad in <i>kippa</i> and prayer shawl prepare for the Sabbath. The holiday island of Cyprus and its coastal resorts, which have long played host to sworn foes in the Middle East, is once again gearing up to serve as safe haven for a troubled region.
In 2000/01 South Africa endured a cholera epidemic that spread throughout the eastern coastal region and to other provinces. It resulted in 265 deaths in five provinces and 117 147 people, mostly in KwaZulu-Natal, were infected. The epidemic was, according to the World Health Organisation, the biggest such outbreak in Africa for the reporting period.