Five officials of the Eastern Cape health department were arrested in a pre-dawn raid by the Scorpions on Wednesday for allegedly defrauding the government of R12,5-million. The five will soon appear in the Mdantsane Regional Court on charges of fraud, theft, money laundering and tax evasion.
A blaze that gutted at least 40 shacks in Alexandra in Johannesburg on Wednesday was brought under control thanks to prompt action by residents who were trained by the fire department. The ”Umashesha”, or ”fast movers” as they are known, were first on the scene and formed bucket lines with other community members.
A Zimbabwe judge was expected on Wednesday to begin handing down sentences as the trial of 70 suspected mercenaries accused of plotting a coup in oil-rich Equatorial Guinea resumed. ”Today we are expecting judgement, sentencing and trial,” said defence lawyer Jonathan Samkange.
After opening lower on the back of a stronger rand, the JSE Securities Exchange (JSE) was off its worst levels in noon trade on Wednesday due to an easing in the currency. Volumes were reasonable, with more than R1-billion-worth of shares changing hands in morning trade.
Just a few miles from the Texas office where United States President George Bush served as state governor, a panel of religious experts weighed a question with relevance to many people of faith: How would Jesus vote? It’s a complex topic that can’t be boiled down to simple political terms, said religious leaders who attended a Texas Faith Network conference in Austin on Tuesday.
African leaders gathered on Wednesday to ratify controversial power-sharing arrangements between minority Tutsis and the Hutu majority in Burundi as well as discuss a massacre of at least 160 refugees at a United Nations camp. The power-sharing formula has been rejected by Tutsi-led parties but accepted by Hutu leaders.
<li><a class=’standardtextsmall’ href="http://www.mg.co.za/Content/l3.asp?ao=120485">UN suspends talks with Burundi rebels</a>
A total of 118 South African women have discovered since the beginning of the month that they had been married without their knowledge, the Home Affairs Department said on Wednesday. This emerged from a campaign urging women to check their marital status on the department’s records in a bid to curb the problem of fraudulent marriages, the department said in a statement.
While most Latin American countries have not yet experienced large-scale HIV/Aids, recent trends suggest the it could reach pandemic proportions.
The move to plastic-based banking products is dramatically increasing, fuelled by the need to bank the previously underbanked and to fulfil the requirements of the financial services charter. But this has led to an increase in crime related to the use of automatic teller machines (ATMs) — and now First National Bank has launched an ATM security week.
Standard Bank has managed to gain a bigger slice of the lending pie. Since June 2003, its share of mortgage loans has increased from 21,2% to 24,5%, while its stake in the domestic credit card market has grown from 26,6% to 30,9%. Its share in the area of instalment finance has ncreased from 21,5% to 22,5%.