OWN CORRESPONDENTS, Johannesburg | Wednesday WITH 9,8 million votes counted in South Africa’s key local government elections, the ruling African National Congress has wrested control of 46 local councils, with the Democratic Alliance taking 18 as it made major inroads into ANC’s support base. Early on Wednesday afternoon the ANC had captured 58% of the […]

OWN CORRESPONDENTS, Johannesburg | Wednesday WITH just over six million votes counted in South Africa’s key local government elections, the ruling African National Congress has wrested control of 24 local councils countrywide, double that of the opposition Democratic Alliance – but the DA is looking ominous in the hotly-contested Western Cape. By Wednesday morning, the […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Lagos | Wednesday SCAVENGERS, undeterred by the death of some 60 people in last week’s fuel pipeline fire in Nigeria, have begun scooping up fuel around another leak site. Security agents guarding the Atlas Cove Jetty, a few metres from the site of the inferno near Lagos port, stood by and watched as […]

THE bus driver in the horror smash that killed 26 British tourists and a South African tour guide on the Long Tom Pass near Lydenburg last year has applied for a State lawyer to represent him when he goes on trial. Titus Phillip Dube, 41, will appear in the Nelspruit Regional Court on January 11 […]

UNIDENTIFIED gunmen opened fire with automatic weapons on a Belgian passenger aircraft landing in Burundi’s capital on Monday, hitting it several times and wounding two people. The plane, a Sabena airlines Airbus A-3300 arriving from Brussels, was targeted at an altitude of 200m as it was about to touch down, passengers said. The aircraft was […]

AN American couple that was hijacked near the Kruger National Park will fly to South Africa to testify against nine suspects in the Nelspruit Regional Court next year. New Yorkers Scott and Lesley Newman were hijacked and robbed near the Kruger Gate in Northern Province on September 9 while on honeymoon. The nine accused, including […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Cape Town | Monday FINANCE minister Trevor Manuel says government is considering doing away with South Africa’s virtually worthless 1c and 2c coins. According to Manuel, the South African Mint and the South African Reserve Bank have already recommended to government that these coins should be withdrawn from circulation as the high rate […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Cape Town | Tuesday HARVESTING plants for medicines to treat anything from mad cow disease to malaria could help alleviate the poverty of African communities, a Commonwealth conference has been told. “There is a demand for African herbs and plants to be used in medicines and our aim is to exploit that for […]

PHILLIP NKOSI and JUSTIN ARENSTEIN, Standerton | Tuesday MORE than 40 Mpumalanga politicians tried to award themselves a R1m golden handshake as a “farewell” payout before the local government elections. Mpumalanga local government department director Bruno Vilane confirmed that four city councils attempted to give outgoing councillors large irregular severance packages. Council finance officials advised […]