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/ 14 December 2006
Three armed men went on a robbery and hijacking spree in Pretoria on Wednesday, police said. Inspector Anton Breedt said the men began their spree at a travel agency in the Willows shopping centre. ”They held up staff at gunpoint and robbed them of two laptops. The suspects fled in a white Volkswagen Polo Playa.”
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/ 14 December 2006
A young woman accused of witchcraft was burned alive in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) on Wednesday, while in another town two men were burned for suspected rape, a radio station reported. The woman was stoned and then burned in Bugara, a neighbourhood in the eastern town of Rutshuru, the report said.
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/ 14 December 2006
The Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries’ (Opec) president and oil powerhouse Saudi Arabia stepped back from direct calls to slash output on Wednesday, the eve of the group’s year-end meeting, in potential good news for consumers worldwide.
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/ 14 December 2006
Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe Governor Gideon Gono is expected to introduce a long-promised new currency next month for the economically troubled Southern African nation, banking industry sources said. The Zimbabwe dollar is shedding more value at the moment than any other currency in the world.
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/ 14 December 2006
It’s a pity that a hard-working woman’s year will be remembered for little more than her flying habits. Deputy President Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka’s year started on a high-flying note — and it has ended in exactly the same way. In January, she hit the runway rolling as a holiday to Dubai aboard a defence force jet got up the nation’s nose.
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/ 14 December 2006
While all eyes are on the banking industry’s credit expansion, the mass market faces a far greater threat from credit extension by furniture retailers. According to LifePower, a company that provides financial literacy education to workers, furniture retailers that provide credit, including big brand names such as Joshua Doore and Ellerines, are largely responsible for the debt traps consumers find themselves in.
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/ 14 December 2006
From the postman to the mayor, nearly everyone grows Christmas trees in the sleepy Hungarian hamlet of Surd in a long-held tradition that has guaranteed economic survival, even in hard times. Local lore says that Surd, population 650, produces enough Christmas trees to supply half of the capital of Budapest’s two million residents.
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/ 14 December 2006
Boiling water, hammers and iron pipes were among the instruments used to kill some of the 1 128 children murdered in South Africa last year. This is according to Safety and Security Minister Charles Nqakula, who, in a written reply to a parliamentary question posed by the Democratic Alliance, said almost a fifth of the child murders were committed by other children.
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/ 14 December 2006
Fifty thousand illegal firearms were destroyed on Thursday, said Gauteng police. ”The firearms destroyed bring the total to more than 100 000 destroyed within a month,” said Director Govindsamy Mariemuthoo. ”The consignment consisted of AK47 rifles, shotguns, rifles, pistols and revolvers.”
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/ 14 December 2006
When the Governor of New Hampshire, John Lynch, introduced his guest of honour at a rally to celebrate the state’s Democratic routing of the Republicans in the recent mid-term elections, he shared a secret with the large, boisterous crowd. ”We originally scheduled the Rolling Stones,” he said, ”but we cancelled them when we realised Senator Obama would sell more tickets.”