A ”standstill” can be expected in South Africa if the government does not act on public-service workers’ demands, Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) president Willie Madisha told thousands of marchers in Cape Town. Speaking outside Parliament, Madisha called on the government to ”negotiate seriously and properly”.
More than 10 000 public-service workers started marching in Pretoria on Friday demanding better pay and working conditions. Much of the protesters’ anger was aimed at Public Service and Administration Minister Geraldine Fraser-Moleketi. Protesters sang songs blaming her for the breakdown in pay talks between the unions and the government.
Sandra Botha has beaten her rival, former National Party minister Tertius Delport, for the post of leader of the opposition in the National Assembly. Finance spokesperson Ian Davidson was elected unopposed for chief whip after KwaZulu-Natal leader Mike Ellis withdrew from the contest.
The Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP) on Wednesday claimed it had proof that KwaZulu-Natal Premier S’bu Ndebele ordered provincial government departments to cease advertising in the Sunday Tribune. On March 1, IFP KwaZulu-Natal caucus leader Lionel Mtshali released a statement that the provincial government had pulled R200Â 000-worth of advertising.
Schabir Shaik was mistried, his legal team told the Constitutional Court on Wednesday. ”The conviction and sentence were the culmination of a trial that, being unfair, was in breach of constitutional guarantees against punishment without due course of law,” the court was told.
The South African Weather Service recorded 54 weather records in the icy wet and snowy weather this week. On Monday, there were 34 new temperature records and on Tuesday another 20. At least 17 people were reported dead from exposure or in fires trying to keep warm in the icy wet weather gripping the country.
Schabir Shaik’s last bid for freedom will be heard in the Constitutional Court on Wednesday and Thursday. The former financial adviser of African National Congress deputy president Jacob Zuma is asking the court for leave to appeal his conviction on two counts of corruption and one of fraud, his 15-year jail term and the seizure of his assets.
Two hungry and thirsty crocodiles are recovering in KwaZulu-Natal (KZN) after a week-long ordeal with their snouts taped shut, the Witness reported on Tuesday. The metre-and-a-half-long crocs were rescued from the Umgeni River near Wartburg by the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals and animal rights organisation Justice for Animals.
The academic who supervised Shamim ”Chippy” Shaik’s allegedly bogus doctoral thesis has resigned from the University of KwaZulu-Natal, media reports said on Tuesday. Professor Viktor Verijenko tendered his resignation via e-mail on Monday morning.
Passengers on board the train that left Johannesburg for Cape Town on Monday will want to wrap up warmly, especially those in third class. When it passes through the Karoo railway junction town of De Aar in the small hours at about 11pm, the mercury will be on its way to plummeting down to minus eight degrees Celsius.
More than 800 people were forced to evacuate their homes by the stormy weather that hit Cape Town on the weekend, the city’s disaster risk management centre said on Monday. And the South African Weather Service said more bad weather is on the way. Forecaster Stella Nake said Cape Town should expect another cold front on Thursday.
Chippy Shaik has for four years laid claim to a bogus doctorate that he and a cabal of internationally acclaimed South African professors fraudulently concocted, the Sunday Times reported. An extensive investigation by the newspaper found that Shaik’s 2003 PhD in mechanical engineering from the then-University of Natal was plagiarised.
Widespread frost is expected over the central interior and Highveld of Gauteng from Tuesday until Thursday morning, the South African Weather Service said on Sunday. Very cold conditions were expected to persist over the central interior until Wednesday.
Business mogul Tokyo Sexwale’s decision to enter the African National Congress (ANC) presidential succession race has dealt a heavy blow to President Thabo Mbeki’s chances of securing a third term as party president, the Sunday Times reported. It said several senior ANC leaders close to Mbeki have decided to throw their weight behind Sexwale’s bid.
Tunisian doctors are coming to South Africa to alleviate a local staff shortage, the Ministry of Health said on Friday. KwaZulu-Natal, the Eastern Cape and Northern Cape and Mpumalanga are expected to benefit, said spokesperson Sibani Mngadi. H said it was a short-term measure that would give the department time to train more staff and improve its ability to retain them.
Male circumcision should not be seen as a ”silver bullet” in fighting HIV infection, University of Cape Town researchers said in a paper published in the latest issue of the South African Medical Journal. The evidence for the preventive benefit of male circumcision is ”rather modest”, humanities student Alex Myers and co-author, public health professor Jonny Myers, said.
<i>Mail & Guardian</i> reviewers examine meaning and myth in Mmatshilo Motsei’s The Kanga and the Kangaroo Court
Durban is generally touted as the country’s surf capital. But such is the hype surrounding the upcoming Super 14 clash between the Sharks and the Bulls that even the surfers are talking rugby. The city’s two English-language daily newspapers have devoted pages and pages to the upcoming clash.
The increase in the period of internship for doctors from one to two years in 2008 may cause a shortage of doctors, the Health Department said on Thursday. Spokesperson Sibani Mngadi said the department was making efforts to address the challenge. ”There is ongoing collaboration between relevant stakeholders,” he said.
The municipality of Matatiele seems likely to stay in the Eastern Cape, according to Provincial and Local Government Minister Sydney Mufamadi. Briefing the media on Thursday following Cabinet’s fortnightly meeting the day before, he said new draft legislation would re-affirm the current cross-boundary arrangements as they are now.
A long-awaited report into an incident where President Thabo Mbeki was heckled, allegedly by Jacob Zuma supporters, at last year’s reburial of former African National Congress (ANC) stalwart Moses Mabhida has been sent to the party’s secretary general, Kgalema Motlanthe.
In what may be a first for South Africa, the Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP) on Tuesday announced that it had launched a beauty pageant in KwaZulu-Natal. And the search for Miss IFP KwaZulu-Natal has already received overwhelming interest, according to the IFP’s Sipho Mbatha, the organiser behind the event.
Universities in South Africa are on the brink of a physical renaissance: they are to receive a R5,95billion boost by 2010, to be used for refurbishing existing buildings, acquiring new ones, and improvements to teaching and learning equipment and library facilities.
Thugs in a KwaZulu-Natal community are robbing people living with HIV/Aids of their antiretroviral (ARV) drugs — and then smoking them to get high. Patients collecting their ARVs at St Mary’s Hospital outside Pinetown have complained to community outreach coordinators that criminals are stealing their Stocrin.
African champions Hendrik de Villiers and Kate Roberts view the Triathlon World Cup’s opening kilometre of the cycling stage as a potential deciding factor on Sunday. ”The swim should be all right if it is not too windy in the bay area, but it’s the first 600m of the cycle stage … that could be a bit of a test for the athletes,” De Villiers said.
The Department of Labour is to intensify the inspection of sectors where high workplace injuries and fatalities are being reported. ”National roving and blitz inspections will make sure that an inspector walks into a workplace at anytime. Our visibility will be at a high level,” labour director general Vanguard Mkosana said.
Oozing optimism and bonhomie at the start of the season, Kaizer Chiefs, Orlando Pirates and Jomo Cosmos were all confident of winning the Premier Soccer League crown. Now, with the tail end of the season fast approaching, the three ambitious clubs are battling for their lives.
South Africa’s only civil society network for rape and abuse victims, Themba Lesizwe, has collapsed after the European Union withdrew â,¬20-million it had pledged to the organisation over the next three years. Themba Lesizwe, established in 2001 by four NGOs, had grown into a network of 269 affiliates in the victim empowerment sector in South Africa.
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The Full Gospel Church on Tuesday distanced itself from the ordination of African National Congress Deputy President Jacob Zuma as an honourary pastor. Zuma was made honorary pastor at a meeting of independent charismatic churches at Ntuzuma, north of Durban, on Saturday.
If the Democratic Alliance is to shrug aside it baggage from the past, it could hardly do better than vote Cape Town mayor Helen Zille into the top job.
M&G Media, which publishes the <i>Mail & Guardian</i> newspaper in Johannesburg, has been contracted by Mafube Publishing to take over its key management functions, it was announced on Monday. M&G Media will market and distribute all magazine titles published by Mafube — including <i>Enterprise</i> magazine — and assist with advertising sales.
South Africa’s drive to abolish colonial and apartheid-era place names has met resistance in parts of the black community, where activists accuse the ruling African National Congress of honouring only its own heroes. Thousands of demonstrators thronged the streets of Durban on May Day to protest proposals to rename close to 200 buildings, roads and other landmarks.