South African IT group Datatec announced on Tuesday that its South African operations will merge with African Legend Technologies (ALT) to form an R800-million-a-year IT company. Datatec will have a 55% shareholding and African Legend Technologies will hold the remaining 45% in the newly merged entity.
European and African ministers said on Monday that the waves of illegal migrants seeking a better life in Europe would never be stopped until Europe helps Africa fight poverty. The ministers, meeting in Rabat to reach a plan on migration, were from 50 nations — grouping for the first time countries where migrants start out from, transit countries and the destinations.
A resourceful blogger’s quest to trade up on one red paperclip until his bartering produced a house has paid off. On Wednesday Kyle MacDonald will be owner of a home on the prairie after the small town of Kipling, Saskatchewan, decided to turn over the keys to a three-bedroom property as a way to stem its population loss.
A South African whose short story offered a child’s view of life under apartheid has won this year’s Caine Prize, organisers of the award for African writing said on Monday. Mary Watson’s Jungfrau explores family dynamics from the perspective of the young daughter of a committed teacher in late apartheid South Africa.
The Potsdam hotel room of South African Airways’ (SAA) chief executive Khaya Ngqula was cleaned out by robbers during the World Cup final between Italy and France, it was confirmed on Monday. It is understood Gauteng Premier Mbhazima Shilowa was also targeted, as were Zuzi Buthelezi, the son of Inkatha Freedom Party president Mangosuthu Buthelezi, and businessman Dr Dudu Kunene, but this could not be confirmed.
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Under a haze of French flags and firecracker smoke, the crowd of several thousand people filling Place de la Concorde on Monday afternoon chanted ”Zizou! Zizou!” in a hero’s welcome for Zinédine Zidane, the French football captain sent off for headbutting an Italian player as France lost the World Cup final.
Britons, famous the world over for queuing, waste four days, or 96 hours, each year waiting in line, according to results of a study released on Monday. But far from being polite in the process, more than 40% admit to having lost their cool, with the airport check-in queue cited as the most hated by 65% of the respondents, the ICM poll for KLM Royal Dutch Airlines suggested.
Zimbabweans will have to contend with rising prices of goods and services in the foreseeable future amid warnings by analysts that the June slowdown in the rate of inflation is only on paper and not supported by major improvements in economic conditions. The country’s annualised rate of inflation slowed to 1 184,6% in June.
Fighting surged in Mogadishu on Monday between Islamist militias and fighters loyal to the city’s last warlords, pushing the death toll over two days to at least 60 and pounding a key hospital with artillery and gunfire. Residents feared the death toll would climb even further in the most ferocious fighting in the capital since the Islamists seized it a month ago from an alliance of United States-backed warlords.
Nine Palestinians were killed on Monday as Israel pounded Gaza with deadly air strikes and Prime Minister Ehud Olmert defended the massive military offensive in the face of international criticism. Despite the mounting toll, Hamas’s exiled political chief insisted the captured soldier would not be freed without a swap for Palestinian prisoners.