Entrepreneur Dave King’s claims that South Africa had impoverished him by freezing his assets and that he could not afford legal representation was ”all nonsense”, the Pretoria High Court heard on Thursday. Prosecutor John Myburgh tackled King and his legal team for painting a picture of a poor, impoverished man whose rights were being trampled on.
Billionaire Dave King had already spent over R68,8-million on lawyers and there was more where that came from, the Pretoria High Court heard on Wednesday. King faces 322 charges of tax fraud, racketeering and foreign exchange contraventions laid out in an indictment of 200 000 pages.
The question over who should give the go-ahead for the Gautrain Rapid Rail Link was argued on Wednesday in the Pretoria High Court. Pretoria residents argue that neither the provincial environment minister nor the head of the Gauteng agriculture, conservation and environment department had the right to approve the Gautrain.
Three members of the Tshwane City Council were among seven people charged with fraud, Pretoria police said on Wednesday. They were arrested in stages late last month for selling vacant land, belonging to the council, to community members from Mamelodi, Inspector Paul Ramaloko said.
The South African justice system needs new legislation to improve how it deals with young offenders, government advocates and United Nations representatives said on Tuesday. Children had the right to be treated as children no matter how vile their actions, Constitutional Court Justice Yvonne Mokgoro told a conference on child justice in Pretoria.
Municipal managers could soon be forced to sign performance agreements to improve service delivery, Minister of Provincial and Local Government Sydney Mufamadi said on Tuesday. ”Now there will be a direct relation between what managers do and what the community expects of them,” Mufamadi said.
South Africa welcomes a European Union proposal to boost diplomatic ties but a closer relationship with the EU must benefit Africa, a senior official said on Monday. The EU’s European Commission has urged the 25-country bloc to upgrade links with Pretoria to a ”strategic partnership”, putting relations on the same footing as those between the EU and the United States, Japan, Russia, India and China.
Israel’s attack on Qana in Lebanon on Sunday, which killed 52 people, more than half of them children, was ”humanity gone mad”, South African Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Aziz Pahad said on Monday. Meanwhile, Israel has rejected mounting international pressure to end its 20-day-old war against Hezbollah guerrillas.
Foreigners with scarce skills will in future find it easier to immigrate to South Africa, President Thabo Mbeki said on Sunday after a three-day Cabinet lekgotla (meeting). The president also addressed crime, the 2010 Soccer World Cup, transformation in the judiciary and the backlog in environmental impact assessments.
A Pretoria High Court judge on Friday in no uncertain terms said the courts were fed up with the high rate of crime and with the disregard criminals had for the life of innocent people. He warned that criminals would feel the brunt of the law. This speech, by Judge Aubrey Ledwaba, was prompted by the killing of a Brakpan couple — Phillipus Meyburg (53) and his wife Ria (39).
Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) President Willie Madisha on Friday vowed that there will be regular protest action at the Israeli embassy in Pretoria. ”We want to tell the [Israeli] ambassador that we’ll march every day if needed until he goes home,” Madisha said.
The Special Investigating Unit (SIU) is investigating 400 000 people who might be fraudulently receiving social grants and pensions from the government, SIU head Willie Hofmeyr said on Thursday. He said the first phase of the probe, which started last year, focused on government employees. The unit will now start to look at private individuals.
South African aid organisation Gift of the Givers will probably travel to war-torn Lebanon over the weekend to deliver humanitarian aid, its chairperson said on Wednesday. Imtiaz Sooliman said the organisation has received all clearances from Syria to fly there and take the goods to Lebanon.
The present common law definition of rape was ”archaic” and resulted in inadequate protection for victims of sodomy and discriminatory sentences, a Pretoria High Court judge has said. Judge Natvarial Ranchod on Tuesday declared the common law definition of rape unconstitutional as it currently stood and extended the definition of rape to include anal penetration.
South Africa has the makings of a great nation, the leader of the African Peer Review Mechanism country assessment team said on Tuesday. Wrapping up a two-week visit to the country, Professor Adebayo Adedeji said South Africans are proud of their country and prepared to talk about its weaknesses and strengths.
The so-called ”Waterkloof Four” will know their fate in November after their sentencing was postponed again in the Pretoria Regional Court on Tuesday. The four — Christoff Becker, Frikkie du Preez, Gert van Schalkwyk and Reinach Tied — were found guilty last year of the apparently racist murder of an unidentified man and the assault of another in 2001.
Manchester United’s South African tour was an investment in the club’s future despite losing Saturday’s Vodacom Cup final in a penalty shoot-out against Kaizer Chiefs, Alex Ferguson said. Misses by goalkeeper Ben Foster and midfielder Chris Eagles consigned United to a 4-3 penalty defeat against the Johannesburg-based Chiefs on Saturday.
Prison authorities asked the Law Society of the Northern Province on Friday to help some awaiting-trail prisoners and those eligible for parole to be released in an attempt to ease overcrowding in prisons. Speaking at a conference of the society, Johan Wilkens, acting regional head of corrections in Gauteng, said prisons in the province were 171% full.
An appeal to uphold sexual harassment findings against former ambassador Norman Mashabane will probably only be heard in September, the Public Servants’ Association of South Africa (PSA) said on Friday. Mashabane was to have appeared in the Pretoria High Court on Friday, said the PSA’s Johan Blommestein.
About 30% of people killed in farm attacks are workers, and between 14Â 000 and 30Â 000 have left farms in the past 20 years because of attacks, trade union Solidarity said on Thursday. However, deputy general secretary Dirk Hermann stressed that the police moratorium on crime statistics had not made research easy.
The five-person panel appointed by the Treasury to study the possibility of imposing a windfall tax on petrochemicals group Sasol and state-owned PetroSA on Thursday issued a 102-page discussion document. Finance Minister Trevor Manuel first mooted the possibility of a windfall tax during his Budget speech in February.
A member of the public shot dead one robber and residents nabbed another two in separate incidents in Pretoria on Tuesday, police said. In the first incident in Pretoria North, a man shot at two alleged robbers as they were trying to hijack a vehicle at the Kolonnade Shopping Centre, said spokesperson Constable Brenda Kgafela.
A document has been drawn up to help facilitate the signing of a final ceasefire agreement in Burundi, South African Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Aziz Pahad said on Tuesday. The document was drawn up by South African Minister of Safety and Security Charles Nqakula and Burundi’s regional leaders after talks at the weekend.
Several dozen submissions on Johannesburg International airport’s name change to OR Tambo International airport have been received, the ministry of arts and culture said on Monday. A ministry spokesperson said the submissions have been a "mixed bag", with some for and some against the name change.
The number of requests to a helpline on Lebanon for South Africans have been ”manageable”, the Department of Foreign Affairs said on Monday. The department set up a hotline for South Africans with Lebanese links, and by Sunday 20 South Africans trapped in that country had been helped by the department.
Just a week after the statue of Chief Tshwane was unveiled in front of the city hall in Pretoria, vandals have painted it in the colours of the old South African flag. Tshwane metro police spokesperson Superintendent Alta Fourie said the statue, which was found painted on Friday morning, must have been vandalised on Thursday night.
Deputy Minister of Defence Mluleki George will attend the 90th commemoration of the Battle of Delville Wood in France on Sunday, the Ministry of Defence said on Thursday. During the ceremony — which commemorates the South Africans who perished in World War I — a new South African coat of arms will be unveiled at the South African memorial on the site.
Six major South African businesses will officially back the 2010 Soccer World Cup in South Africa, the local organising committee announced in Pretoria on Wednesday. First National Bank has already announced that it will sponsor the soccer extravaganza to the tune of -million (about R212,7-million).
North Korea’s Vice-Minister Kim Hyong Jun arrived at the Union Buildings on Tuesday for bilateral discussions with Deputy Foreign Affairs Minister Aziz Pahad. High on the agenda of the meeting, that is expected to last just over two hours, would be North Korea’s test firing of seven missiles last week including a long-range Taepodong-2, believed to be able to hit Alaska or Hawaii.
Western Province played an impressive and near clinical game of rugby to record a morale boosting 15-10 victory over a lifeless Blue Bulls team at Loftus Versveld on Saturday. Last week the Bulls looked like possible Currie Cup champions when they convincingly beat the Lions at Ellis Park, but this Saturday they were a completely different outfit.
The Democratic Alliance says it hopes Safety and Security Minister Charles Nqakula will redeem himself with an anti-crime drive he announced on Friday. Nqakula said in Pretoria that police would launch special operations in the coming six months to combat serious and violent crimes.
While South Africa will urge North Korea to stop its missile testing, it is not convinced that United Nations Security Council action is the best way to solve the crisis, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Aziz Pahad said on Friday. He said the issue will be on the agenda for a meeting on Tuesday with his North Korean counterpart.