South Africa’s banking giant Absa has been roped into Zimbabwe’s biggest media scandal in 25 years, which erupted recently with revelations that the country’s state security agency had taken over three mainly private newspapers. Absa was dragged into the rumpus after disclosures that Zimbabwe’s central bank governor was instrumental in helping the Central Intelligence Organisation take over the newspapers.
A Welkom community comprising the poorest of the poor lost a total of R640Â 000 after housing consultants backed by politicians encouraged them to participate in a housing scheme. Among those accused of promoting the scheme is former Free State Premier and now national MP Winkie Direko.
Grain SA’s beleaguered chairperson, Bully Botma, has escaped dismissal as a Maize Trust trustee — but has been barred from further meetings of the trust. This follows the disclosure that, under Botma’s care, more that R7-million of Maize Trust (used to promote farming) money was either misdirected by Grain SA or not spent.
The Congress of South African Trade Unions is out of step with the public in its support for former deputy president Jacob Zuma, report <i>Marianne Merten</i> and <i>Ferial Haffajee</i>. Public opinion polls suggest South Africa is far more ambivalent about Zuma than his union and business backers.
South Africa is often considered to be in the unfortunate position of having some of the world’s best laws and poli-cies to protect women and children but an inability to implement them. Take the roll-out of post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP) for rape survivors to prevent HIV infection, a lot of dissatisfaction with the programme has been widespread.
So, what’s up with starting columns with questions, the kind that, prefaced with a mutated bimbo conjunction, beg Dear Reader to cock his head to one side, hang an index finger from the corner of his mouth, and shrug exasperatedly? What did bad columnists do for introductions before Jerry Seinfeld made it okay to flaunt the banal?
Telkom looked outside its own structures for new leadership when it named United States-educated, charismatic former youth leader Papi Molotsane as its CEO. A senior Transnet staffer described Molotsane as a "people’s person" who can be firm. Molotsane is a director of Arivia.kom, South Africa’s America’s Cup Challenge and Fike Investment.
I stopped just short of buying a tame politician in a "canned" hunt recently. The deal came to an end when I refused to fork out R100 000 to a minor government politician in return for seven sets of authentic identity documents and birth certificates.
<a href="http://www.mg.co.za/specialreport.aspx?area=zuma_report"><img src="http://www.mg.co.za/ContentImages/243078/zuma.jpg" align=left border=0></a>"I wish I knew how it would feel to be free. I wish I could break all the chains holding me. I wish I could say all the things that I should say." The Lighthouse Family song, played during former deputy president Jacob Zuma’s video presentation at Congress of South African Trade Unions’s central committee meeting this week, was intended to express ANC deputy president Jacob Zuma’s predicament as he faces a corruption trial.
Pension Funds Adjudicator Vuyani Ngalwana’s proposal to have hidden pension charges declared illegal can be achieved with registrar’s recommendation and minister’s consent, the <i>Mail & Guardian</i> has established. "The registrar and the minister have the power under the provisions to declare such practices undesirable," Ngalwana’s deputy, Naleen Jeram, told the <i>M&G</i>.