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The Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) expressed support on Monday for a countrywide strike by more than 200 000 municipal workers to take place on Tuesday. The two unions representing municipal workers were right to reject their employer’s wage offer, Cosatu said in a statement.
South Africa backs Iran’s stance on the right of a country to develop nuclear power for peaceful purposes, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Aziz Pahad said on Monday in Pretoria on the first day of the second session of the South Africa-Iran Deputy Ministerial Working Group’s meeting.
A United Nations envoy who investigated Zimbabwe’s razing of townships will report to UN Secretary General Kofi Annan in about two weeks, a spokesperson said on Monday. On Monday, police moved into Harare’s plush suburbs where they ordered the demolition of staff quarters, garages and other outbuildings built without approval.
A store fire in the northern Russian city of Ukhta killed nearly 20 people on Monday, emergency officials said. The emergency situations ministry put the toll at 19 dead and 17 injured. The Federal Security Service in Moscow earlier said 16 had been killed and 20 injured.
Minister of Social Development Minister Zola Skweyiya has vowed to arrest grant fraudsters, saying on Monday that some mothers are using subsidies meant for their children to have their hair done. Skweyiya said in the past the government lost about R1,5-billion a year to grant fraud.
Sanlam, South Africa’s second-largest life assurer, is planning to undertake a share repurchase totaling about R4-billion as part of its major capital restructuring plans, the company said on Monday. The group will offer shareholders R12 per share in a specific pro-rata offering for 10% of their shares.
South African church leaders were ”shocked” on Monday by conditions at a holding camp housing people displaced by Zimbabwe’s controversial government clean up operation, said Matthew Esau, the spokesperson for the archbishop of Cape Town Njongonkulo Ndungane.
Indications are that the South African residential property market is not generally experiencing bubble conditions just yet. However, it is quite conceivable that certain types of housing in certain areas of the country are experiencing bubble conditions, says a senior Absa economist.
People should use condoms and not have sex too young, said former president Nelson Mandela on Monday.