Another round of talks between the South African Local Government Association (Salga) and municipal unions is scheduled to take place on Monday in an attempt to reach a wage agreement and stave off a national strike. Unions are scheduled to embark on a second week of protest action on Monday.
An 81-year-old Portuguese woman remarried her former husband, who is 10 years older, on Thursday, more than three decades after she left him because of his womanizing, a daily newspaper reported. "He behaved badly and out of jealousy I left him after three years," Silvina Azenha told <i>Correio da Manha</i>.
Estimates of the number of black South Africans who want to become farmers may have been exaggerated, Democratic Alliance leader Tony Leon said on Friday. Joining the racially charged debate over land ownership in South Africa, he said recent research indicated only 9% of black people who are not currently farming wish to do so.
A nine-year-old boy was trampled to death in a rush for food during a lunch break at his school on the East Rand, the Gauteng education department said on Friday. Mabulelo Magqwana was trampled by fellow pupils in a rush for the food vendors at the Phumula Gardens Primary School in Vosloorus on Thursday.
United Democratic Movement leader Bantu Holomisa has suspended eight of his top elected officials with immediate effect following fears that they were intending to cross the floor next month. Holomisa would not supply details, claiming it is an internal matter, but denied they were asked to leave, as was previously stated.
Failed asylum seekers in the United Kingdom will not be sent back to Zimbabwe until the high court considers new evidence on whether it is ”safe” to resume deportations, a judge ruled on Thursday. The British home office also agreed to consider releasing 30 Zimbabweans in detention awaiting being sent back to Harare.
For decades, Ethiopia has been plagued by cyclical drought and chronic hunger with children worst hit. Preventable diseases and malnutrition on average kill up to half a million Ethiopian children a year, according to the United Nations Children’s Fund.
A Russian mini-submarine with seven sailors aboard got caught on a fishing net and is stuck on the sea floor off Russia’s Pacific Coast, navy officials said on Friday. Navy authorities have scrambled to try to figure out how to raise the vessel from a depth of about 190m amid conflicting statements on how long the air supply will last.
Namibia’s government is set to serve final notices of expropriation on 18 white commercial farmers after it failed to reach an agreement on the price of the land in the arid Southern African country. ”If there is no other solution, then that is the way to go,” Lands Minister Jerry Ekandjo said late on Thursday.
The United Association of South Africa (Uasa) hopes to know by the end of business on Friday whether it will join two other unions in South Africa’s first gold-mining strike in more than a decade. The union is currently consolidating the strike ballots it has been receiving since Wednesday.