Durban

A train derailment in Durban has left 86 people injured, Metrorail said on Thursday. Netcare 911 spokesperson Chris Botha said a coach left the tracks near the Duffs Road Railway Station in KwaMashu. It appeared most of the injuries occurred when passengers tried to jump from the coach. There were no major injuries.

Two foreign delegates attending the International Sociological Association’s world congress in Durban were beaten and assaulted within three hours of arriving in the city on Saturday evening. Mexican sociologist Daniel Gutierrez Martinez (33) and Belgian sociologist Delphine Resteigne (28) were attacked by a group of at least 10 youths who attempted to mug them.

The Underberg community is divided by the R160-million tarring of the Sani Pass — touted by Transport Minister Jeff Radebe as the southern Drakensberg’s gateway to tourism. ”They [tourists] enjoy the horror of the trip. That’s why they come,” a local tour operator said on condition of anonymity.

African National Congress deputy president Jacob Zuma’s family reacted with shock on Tuesday to reports that his first wife’s name has been used in a 419 scam e-mail. Nephew Michael Zuma, in Nkandla, said: ”What? She doesn’t even have a computer. She has a phone, but she can’t even send SMSs.”

It turned out to be the big gamble that paid off as Dick Muir’s decision to field a completely new look Sharks side — he now has two teams of equal strength at his disposal — was vindicated with a 34-16 triumph over the Pumas in their Absa Currie Cup rugby match in Durban on Friday night.

The 37-year-old man who allegedly killed his wife before driving into Durban’s harbour in a bid to cover up the crime has claimed he is mentally unstable. Dhanendra Heeralall appeared in the Durban Magistrate’s Court on Monday to face charges of murder and defeating the ends of justice.

South Africa will pledge an additional R1-million this year to the global fund to fight Aids, tuberculosis and malaria, Minister of Health Manto Tshabalala-Msimang said in Durban on Tuesday. ”We further remain committed to supporting the global fund consistent with our potential and ability to do so,” she said.

A man suspected of murdering his wife and then trying to disguise the crime as a hijacking has confessed to the murder, police in Durban said on Friday. On Wednesday night, the man was fished out of Durban harbour near the landmark sugar terminals after he drove his bakkie through a security boom.

A worker was crushed by a six-ton rubbish truck in Durban on Friday morning. A Netcare 911 spokesperson said it appeared that the 40-year old man had slipped off the side of the moving Durban Solid Waste truck. The truck, weighing nearly six tons when empty and 10 tons when fully laden, drove over him.

Police arrested a man on Thursday who allegedly stabbed his wife 12 times and then tried to disguise the murder as a botched hijacking by driving his bakkie into Durban’s harbour. The 37-year-old husband was arrested at Durban’s St Augustine’s Hospital on Thursday morning.

South Africa’s municipalities are owed R19,2-billion and do not expect to recover more than 50% of this debt. Municipalities’ failure to effectively collect money for services rendered is severely impacting on service delivery, Auditor General Shauket Fakie said on Monday. Johannesburg alone has made a bad-debt provision of R7,2-billion.

Wing Wylie Human got a hat-trick of tries for the Lions but his side ended up with a single bonus-point reward for their efforts in their opening Absa Currie Cup rugby match in Durban on Friday night as the Natal Sharks claimed the spoils for a 33-22 victory and a bonus point for four tries.

Judgement is expected in the Durban High Court on Thursday in an urgent application by 15 Westville Prison inmates to expedite their access to anti-retroviral (ARV) treatment. Judge Thumba Pillay heard that according to the prison’s operational plan prisoners had to undergo four sessions of counselling before receiving ARV treatment.

Durban is being touted as the next city to host the 2016 Olympic Games. Launching the city’s Durban Beach Africa festival on Wednesday evening, the city’s deputy mayor, Logie Naidoo, said: ”We believe that the 2016 Olympic Games should come to Durban. Cape Town has had its chance. It’s time for Durban to bid for this biggest of events.”

Spy bosses, rugby bosses, political bosses, diplomats and former deputy president Jacob Zuma were all on stage at the Absa Stadium in Durban in front of nearly 50 000 people for the Youth Day celebrations on Friday. Zuma’s message was one which stressed the unity of the ruling African National Congress and attacked ”analysts” who predicted the downfall of the party.

The anti-Aids ABC message — abstain, be faithful and use condoms — has left many of the continent’s youth confused, an Aids conference in Durban heard on Wednesday. In a survey of 1 766 pupils conducted in the Valley of a Thousand Hills near Durban, only one schoolgirl said abstinence is ”not having sex until one is married”.

Aids-treatment programmes need to expand dramatically in Africa, an expert said on Tuesday, suggesting nurses do some of the work of doctors and more people be trained as counsellors in order to meet the enormous need. ”We need to expand four- or fivefold from where we are now,” said Dr Mark Dybul, the United States State Department’s deputy global Aids coordinator.

The South African government on Monday demanded a greater say over the way millions in United States HIV/Aids funding is spent in the country, arguing that giving the money directly to local programmes created a coordination problem. The Bush administration has pledged -billion to combat HIV/Aids over five years in 15 of the world’s worst-hit countries.