No image available
/ 12 October 2005
![]()
Former deputy president Jacob Zuma’s trial date has been set for July 31 next year, the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) said on Wednesday. ”We are very pleased with this as it offers us what we wanted all the time — which is enough time to prepare for this case,” NPA spokesperson Makhosini Nkosi said.
No image available
/ 11 October 2005
![]()
Former deputy president Jacob Zuma will reveal the reasons for his implication in corruption after his court battle, he promised more than 1Â 000 supporters outside the Durban Magistrate’s Court on Tuesday. Thanking them for their support, Zuma said he was humbled by their presence at his second appearance on two charges of corruption.
No image available
/ 11 October 2005
![]()
Jacob Zuma’s lawyer advocate Kessie Naidu told the Durban Magistrate’s Court on Tuesday that his client’s case could not be transferred to the High Court without an indictment. ”There are no charges pending in the High Court,” said Naidu.
No image available
/ 11 October 2005
Serious flaws have emerged in a September 2005 English additional language (higher grade) test paper in KwaZulu-Natal, the Witness website reported on Tuesday. It said the first section of the question paper contained at least 60 errors. The test was reportedly designed for grade-11 pupils across KwaZulu-Natal.
No image available
/ 10 October 2005
![]()
A major security operation comes into effect at the Durban Magistrate’s Court at 4pm on Monday ahead of the appearance of former deputy president Jacob Zuma. Zuma will appear in court on Tuesday on two charges of corruption following the conviction and sentencing of his former financial adviser, Schabir Shaik.
No image available
/ 10 October 2005
Drought, depressed commodity prices and a strong rand value have taken their toll on commercial and emerging farmers in South Africa, the Land Bank said on Sunday. In the bank’s 2004/05 report published this week, chairperson Jethro Mbau said South Africa’s agricultural sector is going through ”difficult times”.
No image available
/ 10 October 2005
The Inkatha Freedom Party on Sunday urged its members to vote in great numbers in the coming municipal elections to increase the party’s councillors as well as municipalities to govern. ”The strength of the IFP is in its members,” Zanele Magwaza, the IFP’s national chairperson, told crowds at an IFP rally in Soweto.
Tourism linked to bird watching has provided an alternative to slash-and-burn agriculture in rural northern KwaZulu-Natal. Its viability has also been recognised as a worthwhile source of income in industrialised Richards Bay, according to Duncan Pritchard, Rio Tinto’s programme director of the Zululand Birding Route.
The Durban Magistrate’s Court will be closed between 9am and 11am on Tuesday next week until the corruption case against former deputy president Jacob Zuma is completed. Court manager Cyril Mncwabe insisted that Zuma is not getting ”preferential treatment” and that the magistrates have agreed to make up for the lost time.
Comedian Marc Lottering plans to become a walking, talking condom dispenser, to ”encourage all Capetonians to protect themselves and to survive”, he said in a statement announcing the launch of an innovative nationwide HIV/Aids pledge campaign this weekend. Pledges will be not for money, but rather for action.
As hirings and firings go, you couldn’t get a much greater contrast than the two that happened in South African rugby this week. The Griqualand West Rugby Union passed a vote of no confidence in its president, Baby Richards, accusing him of failing to vote in the manner instructed by his union.
Recently the Pension Funds Adjudicator (PFA), Vuyani Ngalwana issued rulings on a further 22 retirement annuities (RAs). Life companies have chosen to settle 15 of these rather than face the negative publicity. This brings to 54 the total number of RA rulings since March. The life companies are appealing seven of these in the High Court.
There is a steady increase in HIV prevalence in South Africa, a professor from the University of KwaZulu-Natal said at the opening of the Gauteng Aids Council conference in Johannesburg on Thursday. The life expectancy in the country would soon plummet from 63 years to 46, Professor Alan Whiteside said.
Cool and conditions moving over the northern parts of the country brought some relief on Wednesday for firefighters still battling veld fires in Mpumalanga. Earlier in the day, a fire that raged through the North West veld overnight was brought under control near the Vredefort Dome. However, the fire risk remains high in the northern parts of the country.
It is ”patently obvious” that the rights of patients in state hospitals are not being respected and that urgent action is needed, the Democratic Alliance said on Wednesday. DA MP and health spokesperson Dianne Kohler-Barnard released a damning report on the country’s ”five worst hospitals” during a press conference at Parliament.
Former deputy president Jacob Zuma’s attorney Mike Hulley will not lodge an application in the Durban High Court on Wednesday for the return of documents seized during recent raids by the Scorpions, according to his secretary. On Monday, Hulley said the application would probably be lodged on Wednesday.
A new war of words erupted between the African National Congress and the Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP) on Tuesday sparked by the recent establishment of the National Democratic Convention (Nadeco). The ANC rejected as ”preposterous” an assertion by IFP leader Mangosuthu Buthelezi that the ruling party was behind the birth of the new party.
Water restrictions have been imposed on the south coast of KwaZulu-Natal, where there has been little rain and river water levels are low. The north coast — particularly the Tongaat area — was being closely monitored, eThekwini municipality water and sanitation head Neil Macleod said on Tuesday, appealing to residents to use water sparingly.
Firefighters on the KwaZulu-Natal north coast were on Tuesday monitoring the situation in a pine plantation in the Nyalazi area outside Mtubatuba after they managed to extinguish a ”vicious” fire that started on Sunday. ”We are still assessing the situation and the damage,” said a supervisor for protection services in the area.
It’s official. For an initial period of a year, former Springbok and Sharks coach Rudolph Straeuli will rejoin the management team at the headquarters of the KwaZulu-Natal Rugby Union in the new post of commercial manager. Originally the post had been advertised as being for a director of rugby.
Firefighting teams are battling to extinguish 15 forest and veld fires that continue to burn out of control in Mpumalanga, Limpopo and KwaZulu-Natal, Working on Fire (WF) said on Monday. WF spokesperson Val Charlton said about 26 WF firefighting teams are battling the blazes across the northern parts of the country.
About 50 Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) members on Sunday shackled themselves to railings at Parliament in Cape Town to highlight their jobs and poverty campaign. Cosatu’s Eastern Cape provincial secretary said marches would start at 10am on Monday in East London, Port Elizabeth, Mthatha and Queenstown.
No image available
/ 30 September 2005
Central Gauteng on Thursday were all but celebrating the South African Interprovincial men’s golf tournament title after their fourth straight win with one match to play at the Benoni Country Club. After comfortably defeating current champions Western Province 7-5, the team from Johannesburg now face a showdown with Kwazulu-Natal on Friday.
No image available
/ 29 September 2005
Work to uncover and eradicate corruption in the 2004/05 financial year has saved the government projected future losses of nearly R3,5-billion, the Special Investigating Unit said on Thursday. This was calculated on the premise that malpractices exposed during the year were likely to have continued on average for ten more years.
No image available
/ 27 September 2005
Fires that have killed two people and ravaged large areas of land have largely been contained, but now the provinces are starting to count the costs. Crews from the Western Cape, Eastern Cape, Gauteng, Free State, Mpumalanga, KwaZulu-Natal and Limpopo have been fighting fires since September 23.
No image available
/ 26 September 2005
Wildfires began claiming lives — both human and animal — on Monday as they ran unabated across the hot, dry countryside, fanned by heavy winds. A six-year-old girl, Bonakele Ngema, burnt to death in a house where she was trapped while seeking refuge from a roaring blaze that bore down on her in Mntanenkosi reserve, KwaZulu-Natal.
No image available
/ 26 September 2005
Firefighters were put on standby in the Eastern Cape and Western Cape on Monday after fears that blazes in four other provinces could spread, a public-private firefighting organisation said. Working on Fire spokesperson Val Charlton said fires are raging in Limpopo, KwaZulu-Natal, the Free State and Mpumalanga.
No image available
/ 26 September 2005
A leading South African HIV/Aids expert on Saturday advocated male circumcision as the best available ”vaccine” against the virus in his country, where an estimated six million people are infected and more than 600 people die every day. South Africa has the one of the highest number of people living with HIV/Aids in the world.
No image available
/ 25 September 2005
![]()
KwaZulu-Natal Premier S’bu Ndebele has pledged to lead a delegation of top ANC leaders to support axed deputy president Jacob Zuma when he appears in court on October 11, the Sunday Times reports. Ndebele, a close ally of President Thabo Mbeki, has recently been under pressure from his mainly Zuma-supporting colleagues in the province, said the newspaper.
No image available
/ 21 September 2005
Lamontville Golden Arrows beat Tembisa Classic 2-0 in a KwaZulu-Natal Castle Premiership derby played at King Zwelithini Stadium on Wednesday afternoon, thanks to goals by Alton Meiring and Mabhuti Khanyeza. This was Arrows’ first win of the season and Classic’s first loss under new management.
No image available
/ 21 September 2005
A third of Nelson Mandela Bay’s population of about 1,3-million is HIV-positive, making the region’s prevalence the highest in the province, the Eastern Province Herald newspaper reported on Wednesday. The figure was revealed in the annual national ante-natal HIV prevalence study.
No image available
/ 16 September 2005
Mangosuthu Buthelezi, president of the Inkatha Freedom Party, reminds me of the main character in a perspicacious Zulu myth. This myth is a message about death, which originated from the failure of human beings, or their messengers, to relay a message of mortality punctually.