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/ 18 November 2003
Former transport minister Mac Maharaj on Tuesday dismissed the Hefer commission’s changed terms of reference. He denied that he ever accused National Director of Public Prosecutions Bulelani Ngcuka of abusing his powers due to past obligations to the apartheid regime.
‘Mo Shaik fingered Ngcuka’
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/ 17 November 2003
A stony-faced Mac Maharaj presented himself as the paragon of virtue when he took the stand at the Hefer Commission of Inquiry this morning and repeated his allegation that National Director of Public Prosecutions Bulelani Ngcuka ”in all probability” had been an apartheid spy.
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/ 14 November 2003
Department of Labour inspectors have surveyed the wreckage of a bridge that collapsed at the Coega development zone outside Port Elizabeth and interviewed eight construction workers about the disaster. Two construction workers were killed and 18 injured on Thursday when the bottom formwork of the bridge collapsed.
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/ 12 November 2003
The ruling African National Congress (ANC) has won two municipal by-elections – in the Western Cape at Breede River/Robertson municipality and at Dealesville in the Free State unopposed — while the official opposition Democratic Alliance (DA) has won a seat at Phillipstown in the Northern Cape unopposed.
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/ 10 November 2003
Conservation bodies have strongly criticised plans to mine heavy metals and build a toll road along part of the Eastern Cape’s Wild Coast, calling for a rethink before government gives the go-ahead. The World Wildlife Fund said projects ”pose an inherent threat to the region’s natural environment and its people”.
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/ 6 November 2003
South African Department of Labour on Wednesday said over one thousand contravention notices and almost 170 prohibition orders were issued by inspectors during last week’s blitz inspections of the construction industry, which ran from October 27 to 31.
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/ 5 November 2003
Former apartheid spy Vanessa Brereton has apologised to the anti-apartheid activists she betrayed during her time as agent RS452, saying she does not deserve or expect forgiveness. The former Eastern Cape human rights lawyer said she was ”spellbound” by her lover — senior security policeman Carl Edwards — who recruited her into the secret police in the 1980s.
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/ 4 November 2003
South Africa has made significant gains since the advent of democracy in April 1994. However, the country still faces serious problems. The most significant one — apart from the impact of HIV/Aids — is the lack of economic and social rights for a large sector of the population.
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/ 3 November 2003
Buffalo City Municipality is set to change racially offensive names of zones in its massive Mdantsane township. The sections of Mdantsane are currently numbered from NU1 to NU17. ”The term NU 1 to NU 17 stands for native unit and is offensive,” said mayor Sindisile Maclean at the unveiling of the Mdantsane Urban Renewal Programme.
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/ 30 October 2003
Twenty-one people were killed on the N1 when a bus and a truck were involved in a collision near Beaufort West in the early hours of Thursday. The accident happened around 1am about seven kilometres outside Leeu-Gamka, between Beaufort West and Laingsburg. That strip of road is infamous as a ”death run”.
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/ 29 October 2003
Several officials employed by the Eastern Cape provincial administration were arrested at their offices on Wednesday in connection with fraud and corruption charges. Numerous documents were also taken as evidence in fraud and corruption investigations involving R4,4-million.
R1-million govt fraud bust in KZN
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/ 25 October 2003
One more person has died and a hand belonging to a three-year-old child has been found near the scene of Friday’s truck accident on the Main Street in Mount Frere near Umtata, Eastern Cape transport officials said on Saturday. A truck travelling from Umtata collided with 12 vehicles, killing 11 and injuring 28.
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/ 23 October 2003
Two former anti-apartheid activists are to testify before the Hefer commission on Thursday during its fourth day of public hearings in Bloemfontein. Commission secretary John Bacon said Letha Jolobe and Advocate Glenn Goosen would be called to the stand.
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/ 21 October 2003
The name Unisa is to remain, a university is to be named after former president Nelson Mandela, and the term technikon is to disappear, Minister of Education Kader Asmal said on Tuesday. He was announcing the new names of higher education institutions that are to merge in terms of a plan approved by the Cabinet last year.
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/ 21 October 2003
A consortium led by Accenture has been awarded the tender to set up the information and communication technology systems, valued at R3,7-million, of the Coega Industrial Development Zone (IDZ) in Port Elizabeth, the Coega Development Corporation (CDC) said on Tuesday.
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/ 21 October 2003
The Hefer commission confirmed on Tuesday that it had been in contact with a former Eastern Cape human rights lawyer who had confessed to being apartheid government agent RS452. Commission secretary John Bacon said Vanessa Brereton, who now lives in London, contacted the commission last Sunday through a go-between.
Sources won’t be compromised
Arms deal focus
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/ 17 October 2003
Many fishermen angling from the shore along the Transkei coast are paying lip service to regulations governing the number and size of the fish they may catch, and most are ignorant about closed seasons for certain species.Richard Davies
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/ 15 October 2003
Thousands of Eastern Cape taxi drivers say they will support anything that will halt the government’s taxi recapitalisation programme because they still don’t understand it. Nearly four years after the government announced its plan to upgrade the ageing taxi fleet, provincial taxi bodies still complain that they have been excluded from all critical stages of its development.
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/ 10 October 2003
The Democratic Alliance (DA) said on Thursday it welcomed the expansion of the terms of reference of the Hefer Commission to include Justice Minister Penuell Maduna in the probe. ”But we believe there is still more work for the commission,” said Sheila Camerer, DA justice spokesperson.
Another court crisis for Ngcuka
Arms deal focus
Most Eastern Cape provincial departments have not responded to a request in May from the Public Service Accountability Monitor to provide it with information on disciplinary action taken against those allegedly involved in 409 reported cases of misconduct, corruption and maladministration.
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/ 26 September 2003
The idea of the Siyagruva series first came to me at a conference in mid-1999 when I listened to the head of the Centre for the Book in Cape Town, Elisabeth Anderson, talk about the need to get young people — teenagers — to read. Robin Malan, editor of the new Siyagruva series of novels for teens, tells how the successful project came about and developed.
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/ 24 September 2003
An out-of-court settlement between a farm owner and an occupant in Grahamstown recently is certain to attract attention from stakeholders rural reform policies. It is the first time that the Legal Resources Centre has handled a case in which there was ”such a favourable outcome” for the evicted occupant.
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/ 23 September 2003
About 5,3-million people in South Africa, or 31,2% of those economically active, were officially unemployed in March this year, Statistics South Africa said on Tuesday. The corresponding figures for September and March last year, which Stats South Africa provided earlier, were 30,5% and 29,4% respectively.
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/ 22 September 2003
Southern Africa is set to increase its annual output of aluminium from 1,1-million tons to 1,384-million tons, or 7% of global output, once the expansion of the Hillside and Mozal smelters is complete in 2004, BHP Billiton Aluminium South Africa president Mahomed Seedat said on Monday. At present, Southern Africa has three aluminium smelters — […]
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/ 19 September 2003
South African Deputy President Jacob Zuma has called the probe into allegations of corruption related to the multi-billion rand arms deal and his own alleged involvement, a test of South Africa’s democracy, saying the affair has actually proven how mature the country’s democracy has become.
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/ 19 September 2003
A special report by the provincial auditor general has highlighted financial mismanagement in most of the Eastern Cape’s municipalities. The shocking facts in the report include that 21 local authorities have not provided financial statements for two or more years.
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/ 19 September 2003
A story doing the rounds seeks to explain the inexplicable: how could Mbeki appoint Manto as acting prez while he and Zuma were out of the country? Apparently it was feared that if any more capable person was appointed, the people wouldn’t want Mbeki and Zuma back, Oom Krisjan muses.
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/ 17 September 2003
I was chatting to Oom Krisjan Lemmer in the Dorstbult Bar the other day. ”Subsistence farming? Jy trek my been, man!” he exclaimed. ”It will take our farming backwards. ”Modern boerdery is about the market, including exports. It needs capital and skills. Only plaas-yuppies can win in this business.”
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/ 14 September 2003
The National Directorate of Public Prosecutions has proof that its director, Bulelani Ngcuka, is not an apartheid spy, it was reported by a Cape Town television station.
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/ 11 September 2003
South African Minister of Labour Membathisi Mdladlana told the Commission for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration in a Cape Town seminar that the commission plays a vital role in protecting the rights of the most vulnerable of workers.
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/ 8 September 2003
Assuming the world’s least-developed countries will be able to come up with the resources to pay for and conserve fragile ecosystems is not sensible. This is the opinion of Minister of Environmental Affairs and Tourism Valli Moosa, who spoke at a briefing ahead of the opening of the fifth World Parks Congress.