Jürgen Kögl, the businessman reported on Friday to be one of former deputy president Jacob Zuma’s benefactors, is considering taking the matter to court, his lawyers said. ”Our client denies any wrongdoing whatsoever,” read a statement from Johannesburg law firm Cheadle, Thompson and Haysom.
”I still hear the sounds of people being beaten in prison. I will never forget it. It’s terrible,” said opposition MP Roy Bennett. He was addressing the Johannesburg Press Club this week, en route home from a two-month visit to Britain, where he spent time recovering from eight months in Zimbabwean prisons.
The London Zoo unveiled a new exhibition on Thursday — eight humans prowling around wearing little more than fig leaves to cover their modesty. <i>The Human Zoo</i> is intended to show the basic nature of human beings as they frolic throughout the August bank holiday weekend.
A random police check in the early hours of Friday in a Lisbon neighbourhood known for its nightlife found 90% of drivers had a blood-alcohol level above the legal limit. Of the 653 drivers that police stopped between 2.30am and 7.30am, 585 had a blood-alcohol level above 0,5g per litre of blood, police said in a statement.
Mobile operator Vodacom has announced an unprecedented cut in call rates of up to 50% during the peak call time of 5pm to 8pm on weekdays. Dubbed Vodacom’s "Happy Hours", the new tariff, to be launched on Sunday, will see a standard on-network call rate of R1,49 per minute for pre-paid and contract customers.
It is really a bit of minnow, this fossil fish of which a team of British and South African scientists have now found a dozen or so examples, embedded in 450-million year old Ordovician shale in a roadside quarry in the Cederberg. Still, this fish, has put the Cederberg ”Soom” fossil site firmly on the map.
The Congress of South African Trade Unions’ (Cosatu) enthusiastic support for former deputy president Jacob Zuma went down like a lead blimp at this week’s Cape Town launch of the jobs coalition touted as a United Democratic Front-style grassroots movement.
A racing pigeon belonging to Britain’s Queen Elizabeth II has been missing for more than a month ahead of a big race, a spokesperson said on Friday. Pigeon-fanciers feared the young bird may be flocking about with common pigeons — or, worse, have been eaten by a sparrowhawk.
Burundi’s new President, Pierre Nkurunziza, was sworn in Bujumbura on Friday as the country’s first elected leader after 12 years of war at a ceremony attended by several other African heads of state. The swearing-in also marked the end of an extended four-year transitional period that ushered in democratic rule in Burundi.
Homeopathic treatment is no more effective than a placebo, the dummy substance used in medical trials, according to a study appearing in Saturday’s issue of The Lancet, the British medical weekly. That is the conclusion of a team of doctors in Britain and Switzerland, who reviewed a mountain of published evidence.