Attempts to find the person responsible for microwaving a live cat at the University of KwaZulu-Natal will continue until the culprits have been found, the university said on Friday. ”While there’s still no evidence on which we can base a case, we’re not stopping until we get to the bottom of this,” dean of student affairs Trevor Wills said.
United Democratic Movement leader Bantu Holomisa has suspended eight of his top elected officials with immediate effect following fears that they were intending to cross the floor next month. Holomisa would not supply details, claiming it is an internal matter, but denied they were asked to leave, as was previously stated.
KwaZulu-Natal health minister Peggy Nkonyeni on Thursday denied media reports that the department’s head, Professor Ronald Green-Thompson, had been fired. Her statement came after provincial newspapers and the South African Broadcasting Corporation quoted Green-Thompson as saying that he had been sacked.
The Premier Soccer League (PSL) season, which gets into full swing this weekend, will be a gruelling one — particularly in the run-up to Christmas. Each of the 16 top division clubs must complete 20 league games and two domestic knockout cup competitions by December 22.
The Inkatha Freedom Party’s support base is ”eroding” in urban areas but still strong in rural KwaZulu-Natal where people believe it represents the interests of the Zulu people, according to a political analyst. ”There are two factions … one loyal to the leadership of Mangosuthu Buthelezi and another pressing for democratisation,” he said.
The police are searching for a man who was seen with a little girl shortly before she was strangled in Sundimbili in northern KwaZulu-Natal on Tuesday. Police spokesperson Captain Jay Naicker said according to reports the girl was last seen with a man who was visiting his family in the area.
Liberation is in the mind The main difficulty in South Africa is in trying to address any issue in isolation. Everything is interrelated, so Zanele Nkosi (”Own the affirmation”, August 12) has to look at the variety of reasons why intended beneficiaries denigrate affirmative action. Colonialism is an insidious process that causes its victims to […]
The Inkatha Freedom Party on Sunday suspended its national chairperson, Ziba Jiyane, at a national council meeting at Umhlanga Rocks, Durban. The IFP said Jiyane last week brought its name into disrepute by saying that the party was operating as ”an internal dictatorship”.
The controversy over the leadership of the Inkatha Freedom Party is a storm in a teacup, the party’s president, Mangosuthu Buthelezi, said on Saturday. In a speech prepared for delivery at an IFP rally in Nongoma, KwaZulu-Natal, he said some people are waiting ”with bated breath” for the ”explosion of our party, and even its burial”.
The Inkatha Freedom Party Youth Brigade has officially denounced, ”with contempt”, utterances made by the party’s national chairperson, Dr Ziba Jiyane, at a weekend IFP rally. The action is expected to be among a variety of personal attacks engineered by the party’s spin doctors.
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Friendship and camaraderie was the reason for payments made by Schabir Shaik to former deputy president Jacob Zuma, the Durban High Court heard on Tuesday in Shaik’s corruption and fraud appeal bid. Shaik’s defence also called his 15-year jail sentence ”shockingly inappropriate”.
A suspected cannibal who allegedly murdered his niece and then roasted and ate her right thigh is expected to appear in the Harding Magistrate’s Court in southern KwaZulu-Natal on Tuesday. Police spokesperson Superintendent Zandra Hechter said the man was arrested on Sunday after he allegedly killed his sister’s three-year-old daughter and attempted to kill her other children.
At least 3Â 900 state officials in KwaZulu-Natal face arrest for social grant fraud, the Scorpions said on Friday. Spokesperson Makhosini Nkosi said the arrests will be conducted over various phases. People expected to be apprehended include nurses, teachers, police officers and clerks.
A KwaZulu-Natal man committed suicide inside his home on Friday as police waited for him to open the door to arrest him for allegedly attempting to kill his wife. According to police spokesperson Captain Tienkie van Vuuren, Lucky Mthethwa (50) was wanted for the attempted murder of his wife.
Anti-Aids drugs will be more accessible to prisoners in KwaZulu-Natal after threats of a hunger strike and a letter of demand was sent to prison authorities earlier this week. Currently, if doctors recommend that inmates be given anti-retrovirals (ARVs), they are transported to one of the sites where ARVs are administered.
Scorpions detectives have arrested a number of staff members in connection with fraud and theft at three KwaZulu-Natal hospitals, the Natal Witness website reported on Thursday. It said more arrests were expected. About 250 staff members — mostly general assistants — at Edendale hospital were believed to be under investigation for social welfare grant fraud.
A Durban schoolgirl has approached the Equality Court to fight possible disciplinary action for wearing a nose stud, media reports said on Tuesday. The grade-11 pupil at Durban Girls’ High School claimed she was being unfairly discriminated against because of her cultural identity.
KwaZulu-Natal’s libraries will feel the effects of a R90-million budget cut in the 2005/06 financial year, but officials in the province’s department of arts, culture and tourism say they are seeking ways to minimise the impact. Department head Bonga Ntanzi said the reprioritisation should at most slow down library purchases.
The quest among the country’s 14 rugby provinces to qualify for the Super 8 of the country’s premier domestic tournament, the Absa Currie Cup, is set to intensify this weekend as teams gain a clearer idea of what they need to do to qualify. In section X, the KwaZulu-Natal Sharks host the Lions at Durban’s Absa Stadium.
The clothing sector is sometimes called the rag trade. Rags and riches may be more apt. If you work, for instance, as a machinist in the rag trade in a KwaZulu-Natal area such as Newcastle, you can expect to earn a union-sanctioned wage of just R228 a week. The same industry, though, paid R10-million to Edcon chief executive Steve Ross last year, nearly 1 000 times that of the machinist’s annual wages.
It is tempting to call it a no-brainer: the idea that attempts to prevent transmission of HIV from mothers to children should be matched by initiatives to keep these mothers alive after they give birth. For all this, efforts in South Africa to prioritise the health of HIV-positive mothers have fallen short over past years.
The remains of five men who fought the apartheid regime in the 1980s and whose fate remained unknown until this year were returned to their families on Sunday during a moving ceremony that paid tribute to them as ”giants” in South Africa. About 400 people attended the ceremony held at Freedom Park in Pretoria.
No South Africans have been confirmed killed in the bomb blasts in London on Thursday, the Department of Foreign Affairs said on Saturday. Unconfirmed reports earlier on Saturday said that four South Africans had been killed in the blasts. The rush-hour attacks on London’s transport system killed at least 50 people.
The Durban bus driver accused of killing a toddler during a road-rage shooting incident at the weekend is due to appear in court on Wednesday. Three-year-old Luyanda Khanyile was shot in the back during an argument between the driver of the Mynah bus and her father, Cedric Khanyile.
A taxi driver from the Dolphin Coast Taxi Association was shot dead at Shakaskraal on the KwaZulu-Natal north coast, South African Broadcasting Corporation news said on Monday. Meanwhile, police are mediating between two rival taxi associations at Umhlali near Stanger.
The Medical Research Council plans to launch a national study on hospital infections later this year, council president Anthony Mbewu said on Monday. On Thursday, the Department of Health is expected to release a report into the causes of the deaths of 19 babies at KwaZulu-Natal’s Mahatma Gandhi memorial hospital.
There’s no better way to assess a vehicle’s qualities — its roadholding, fuel consumption, dynamic performance and comfort — than a long journey. And when Citroën delivered a new C4 Hdi to the Mail & Guardian, a quick 1 200km round trip to St Lucia did exactly this.
Public servants should be open and honest and not engage in corruption and ”wheeler-dealing”, Anglican Archbishop Njongonkulu Ndungane said on Sunday. ”Tangible hope comes when elected representatives — at national, provincial and local level — and the officials who support them, are there as public servants, not to play with power and pursue self-enrichment,” he said.
Fewer than 1 000 children infected with HIV/Aids in KwaZulu-Natal are currently receiving anti-retroviral (ARV) treatment, it was reported on Friday.The figures were revealed at the Medical Research Council KwaZulu-Natal Aids Forum in Pietermaritzburg this week.
Coastal dunes surround an inland lake that is home to hippos, huge carp and barbels. A host of other rare fauna and flora dwell here in an ecologically unique paradise for nature lovers, budding botanists, fishing fanatics and bird-watchers alike. You’d be forgiven for thinking this describes some coastal haven in northern KwaZulu-Natal.
Four of South Africa’s top tourism companies were at the forefront of a Pro-Poor Tourism pilot project that aimed to increase the benefits of the industry to include poverty reduction and skills development. The project, which was established in May 2002, hoped to improve links between poor people and the businesses that drive the industry.
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Thousands of supporters of former deputy president Jacob Zuma and protesters from the KwaZulu-Natal Transport Alliance merged outside the Durban City Hall on Wednesday. Shop owners locked their doors as a precaution and there was a large police contingent keeping watch.