Western Cape police officials have admitted they are losing the battle to maintain law and order on Cape Town’s increasingly anarchic highways because the city is so underpoliced. The city has significantly fewer police personnel than Johannesburg: There is one policeman for every 2 300 Capetonians.
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Ghana’s World Cup dreams were shattered by reigning champions Brazil, but the Black Stars played well against some top football teams and served notice of what might happen on African soil in 2010. A three-week Cinderella run ended on Tuesday in a 3-0 second-round loss to Brazil.
If sport is a metaphor for life, then the passion and pain of the struggling West Indies cricket team is an apt reflection of the region that will welcome the 2007 ICC World Cup. Long gone are glory days when the islands in the sun churned out terrorising fast bowlers like the late Malcolm Marshall and master blasters like Viv Richards.
Israel’s assault on the Gaza Strip launched on Wednesday in a bid to free a kidnapped soldier could escalate into a wider conflict, observers warned. The crisis has saddled Prime Minister Ehud Olmert with the severest test of his premiership, but as dozens of tanks and troops poured into the southern Gaza Strip, officials were unable to say how or when the operation would end.
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It does not come much bigger than Germany vs Argentina — a match-up steeped in World Cup history that will bring the host country to a standstill on Friday. The quarterfinal clash in Berlin’s Olympic Stadium will evoke memories of 1986 and 1990, when West Germany and Argentina faced each other in successive World Cup finals.
Achieving the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) is not just economics, but a matter of life or death, said Jeffrey Sachs, special adviser to the United Nations secretary general. The MDGs, approved by almost every government in the world at the UN’s Millennium Summit in 2000, include such targets as halving extreme poverty, reversing the spread of HIV/Aids and reducing child mortality.
Western Cape police have completed their investigation into the death of a rugby player in a match last week and are waiting for a decision from the public prosecutor, a spokesperson said on Wednesday. Riaan Loots (24), a flyhalf for Rawsonville Rugby Club, died during a match with the Delicious Rugby Club last Friday.
Reports that North Korea has fuelled a long-range missile and was preparing to carry out its first test in eight years were called into question on Tuesday after more than a week went by without a launch. An initial report on June 18 quoted United States officials as saying that the Taepodong-2 missile had completed fuelling and ”all systems are go”.
The South African Congress of Trade Unions is concerned that the latest Quarterly Employment Statistics (QES) again show only very slow growth in formal employment, despite the growth in the economy in the past six months, it said in a statement on Wednesday. According to the QES, formal employment rose by about only 300Â 000 in the year to March 2006.
The JSE was a mixed back just after noon on Wednesday, with players switching out of resources — the recent stars of the market — and into banks and retailers which were sold down sharply. Overall, the air was one of caution ahead of the US Federal Open Market Committee decision on interest rates due on Thursday night.