South Africa is not paralysed in its policy towards Zimbabwe and will continue its engagement to prevent a complete collapse, Minister of Foreign Affairs Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma said on Wednesday. ”If there is any country that we’ve been engaging with, and spent hours and days … it is Zimbabwe,” she said.
Patient fees at public hospital rates will decrease by up to 70% once a new fee structure has been approved by provincial hospitals, the Department of Health said on Wednesday. Departmental spokesperson Sibani Mngadi said the revised rates have been sent to all provincial health departments.
It is said to be the world’s largest tomato battle. Tens of thousands of people hurled truckloads of tomatoes at each other on Wednesday, sending knee-deep rivers of tomato sauce down the streets of the small Spanish town of Buñol during its annual food fight, the Tomatina.
Zambia’s High Court on Wednesday ruled that three opposition lawmakers who accepted ministerial posts in President Levy Mwanawasa’s government should lose their parliamentary seats because their party has sacked them. The judge said the three ceased to be parliamentarians when they were expelled from their party.
The Zimbabwean Parliament’s approval of constitutional restrictions on civil liberties has fuelled calls for President Thabo Mbeki to reconsider his policy of gentle diplomacy with his northern neighbour. Some even suggest Mbeki withdraw an offer of a loan aimed at keeping Zimbabwe from being kicked out of the International Monetary Fund.
The United Nations has launched an appeal for -million to help 4,2-million people threatened by hunger in Malawi amid a general warning about looming shortages elsewhere in Southern Africa. Funding shortfalls mean that only a fraction of those needing food aid in Southern African countries will receive it.
The United Democratic Movement has expelled six of its senior members, including deputy leader Malizole Diko, with immediate effect. On Tuesday, Cape High Court Judge Basheer Waglay reversed the suspensions of the six, saying the party had not followed its own constitution in suspending them.
The Independent Democrat’s Lennit Max won another round of his marathon legal battle with the party on Wednesday afternoon. However, the way is not yet clear for him to cross the floor to the Democratic Alliance at midnight. Earlier, he won a court order barring the ID from filling his seat in the Western Cape legislature.
The Democratic Alliance has threatened legal action if the uniform patient fees system is not urgently reviewed, because many patients cannot afford it. Unaffordable fees imposed on patients at state hospitals by the Department of Health are causing a horrifying decline in the number of patients able to obtain treatment, it said.
A bouncer charged in connection with the death of a man following a nightclub brawl was found not guilty in the Pretoria Regional Court on Wednesday. The trial, which started on Tuesday, ended in an acquittal for Bernard Potgieter shortly before the lunch break on Wednesday, said control prosecutor William Manzini.