A career-best performance by Kyle Mills saw South Africa in trouble on 266 for eight at close of play on the first day of the first Castle Lager Test against New Zealand at Supersport Park on Saturday. Graeme Smith won the toss and decided to bat first on a pitch that appeared to offer something to the bowlers.
Three players in the first Castle Lager Test between South Africa and New Zealand at Supersport Park this weekend will be joining the elite group of cricketers who have played in a hundred Test matches. Jacques Kallis and Shaun Pollock will be making their hundredth appearance for South Africa, while the New Zealand captain Stephen Fleming will be achieving his century of Tests for the Black Caps.
Banking group Absa was granted an urgent interdict by the Pretoria High Court on Wednesday against ”snake man” Jan Abel Manamela to stop him from releasing snakes or other dangerous reptiles or animals in the bank. Manamela was sentenced to three years imprisonment when he released five puffadders in the reception area of Absa’s head office in Johannesburg.
Protesters were shot at with rubber bullets and arrested at South Africa’s Matsamo border with Swaziland on Wednesday in demonstrations against the kingdom’s leadership, Mpumalanga police said. Initially the marchers were peaceful but then they started to blockade the roads, said Superintendent Mtsholi Bhembe. Police told them their march certificate only entitled them to picket and they cleared the road.
Three of South Africa’s five border posts with Swaziland were completely blocked to traffic in organised protests against the kingdom’s leadership, the Swaziland Solidarity Network (SSN) said on Wednesday. Members of the SSN, the Congress of SA Trade Unions the South African Communist Party and the Young Communist League were gathering at South Africa’s border posts with the kingdom to protest the curtailing of political freedoms.
South Africa’s KwaZulu-Natal border with Swaziland was completely blocked on Wednesday in a protest against the kingdom’s leadership, said the Swaziland Solidarity Network. ”The Golela border post, which is the border between South Africa and Swaziland in KwaZulu-Natal, has been blocked to traffic by our protesters since 5am,” said spokesperson Lucky Lukhele.
New Tanzanian President Jakaya Kikwete arrived in Pretoria on Friday for his first official visit to South Africa. Kikwete’s one-day working visit and meeting with South African President Thabo Mbeki was to build on the growing partnerships between the two nations, which included a joint commission between their respective departments of foreign affairs and a presidential economic commission.
The Pretoria Regional Court has dismissed an application to throw out the case against an IT executive at the centre of an alleged hoax e-mail conspiracy within the African National Congress. Muziwendoda Sikhona Kunene’s defence representatives had asked that the case be set aside because of high court action over his arrest on a search-and-seizure warrant rather than an arrest warrant.
The IT executive at the centre of an alleged hoax e-mail conspiracy within the African National Congress had no action pending in the high court over his arrest, the Pretoria Regional Court heard on Thursday. Muziwendoda Sikhona Kunene’s representatives had asked that the case be set aside because of high court action over his arrest on a search-and-seizure warrant rather than an arrest warrant.
Minister of Finance Trevor Manuel has been appointed to serve on the World Bank’s new Commission on Growth and Development, his ministry said on Wednesday. ”This Commission will highlight fundamental aspects of economic growth for the attainment of development objectives and identify forward-looking growth policies.”
Magisterial districts are being reviewed to ensure they can be aligned with municipal boundaries where possible, Minister of Justice Brigitte Mabandla said on Wednesday. Her department had already finalised a process of investigating current magisterial district boundaries through consultative meetings.
Police statistics showed a correlation between a decrease in car theft and an increase in aggravated robbery, a study presented in Pretoria on Wednesday suggests. ”What does a car thief do when they are not stealing cars? My feeling is that they may be involved in other forms of criminal activity when they are not stealing cars,” said Institute for Security Studies researcher Antony Altbeker.
South Africa is in no hurry to send ousted president Jean Bertrand Aristide back to Haiti without first securing agreement from the new president, the foreign minister said on Monday. ”South Africa as the host country is still willing to have Jean Bertrand Aristide here,” Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma said.
The Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) has called on the government to reverse its decision to exclude Aids pressure groups — including the Treatment Action Campaign (TAC) — from participating in the United Nations General Assembly’s special session on Aids later this year.
The South African Revenue Service (Sars) has collected R1-billion more than the revised budget of R417-billion for the past financial year, Minister of Finance Trevor Manuel said on Monday. Sars collected R418,116-billion, which is R45,3-billion more than the original estimate of R372,8-billion.
Gay chef Mark Gory was declared the sole heir to his partner’s estate by the Pretoria High Court on Friday after a legal wrangle with the other man’s family. Gory and his partner, Henry Brooks, met in 2003, bought a house in 2004 and lived together as a married couple until Brooks died suddenly, without a will, in April 2005.
The Scorpions have been given permission to confiscate a farm in Mpumalanga where the drug tik-tik, or ice, was manufactured, the National Prosecution Authority said on Friday. Spokesperson Makhosini Nkosi said the Pretoria High Court gave the order on Thursday.
Several new companies have been appointed to provide security at South African airports, the Airports Company South Africa (Acsa) announced on Thursday. ”Group 4 Securicor will provide services at Johannesburg International Airport with effect from 1 April 2006. They take over from Springbok Khulani and Enlightened Security, whose contracts expire on 31 March 2006.
The International Bar Association (IBA) on Thursday expressed deep concern over amendments to South Africa’s prosecutions policy, which it said granted the government new powers to give immunity to criminals and thereby undermined victims’ human rights.
Consumer confidence in South Africa in the first quarter of the year was at its highest level ever in the 24-year existence of the composite consumer-confidence index (CCI), First National Bank (FNB) announced on Thursday. FNB and Stellenbosch University’s Bureau for Economic Research (BER) measure the trends reflected in the CCI.
Telecommunications giant Telkom on Tuesday said it was waiting for two striking unions to approach it directly about the reissue of a retracted offer to overcome a deadlock in wage negotiations. ”We are waiting for the unions to talk to us directly. We are then going to tell them what has been decided and what can be done further to alleviate the situation.”
Two of the unions representing striking Telkom workers urged the parastatal on Tuesday to reissue an offer it retracted on Monday in order to overcome a deadlock in wage negotiations. ”We need to make it clear that there is no change in the unions’ stance as regards the offer that was put to us on Friday and then retracted.”
Legal papers would be served on President Thabo Mbeki on Tuesday informing him that Billy Masetlha, the former director general of intelligence, is contesting his sacking, Masetlha’s attorney said. ”The papers were issued on Monday and would like be served on the president in the morning,” said Imran Haffajee.
Solidarity and the Communication Workers Union’s (CWU) leadership have declared their national stayaway and march on Monday to deliver a memorandum of grievances to Telkom a success. An estimated 2 000 protesters marched to Telkom’s head office in Pretoria. About 13 000 Telkom employees stayed away from work.
Striking Telkom workers were to march from the Union Buildings to the company’s Pretoria headquarters on Monday to deliver a memorandum of grievances. ”We will be gathering at the Union Buildings at around 11am and marching to deliver the memorandum at lunch time,” said Communication Workers’ Union spokesperson Mfanafuthi Sithebe.
Unions have rejected a revised Telkom offer on profit-sharing and service awards, the company said on Friday. The fresh negotiations had not been well received by the Communication Workers’ Union and Solidarity, said Telkom personnel chief Charlotte Mokoena.
Sexual relations between the president and women Cabinet ministers, opposition leader Tony Leon being for the ”white man struggle”, and racist talks between Scorpions investigators are all part of the National Intelligence Agency’s hoax e-mail saga. On Thursday, the inspector general of intelligence declared the e-mails to be false.
Protesting security guards in Pretoria began to disperse on Thursday afternoon after their strike turned violent earlier, with a security vehicle set alight and rubbish strewn in the inner city. At one stage police fired rubber bullets at the protesting guards in an effort to calm the situation.
South Africa recorded its largest recorded capital inflow in 2005, the South African Reserve Bank said in its quarterly bulletin released on Thursday. ”Sound macroeconomic policies in South Africa and continued positive investor sentiment towards emerging markets in general gave rise to sizeable capital inflows in the country in 2005,” the bank said.
Photographs of the gruesome scene where a Soweto woman died in an explosion allegedly forming part of the Boeremag’s violent coup plot were shown to the Pretoria High Court on Wednesday. Colour photos of the scene where Claudia Mokone died on October 29 2002 formed part of a bundle of photos handed in by the state.
The Tshwane municipality’s department of environmental health is to take a closer look at food and drink arrangements at future music concerts held in Pretoria, a city spokesperson said on Monday. On Saturday, the Coca-Cola Colab Massive Mix concert in Centurion was plagued with long queues and not enough drinks on sale.
Most of the undeclared business interests of Cabinet ministers and their deputies were in companies that no longer existed, the Presidency said on Sunday. ”A preliminary investigation indicated that most of the directorships found to have been undeclared involved defunct or dormant companies that are not operating, or companies from which they had resigned,” spokesperson Murphy Morobe said in a statement.