Early indications are that flood damage in Nelson Mandela Bay could total as much as R120-million, the municipality said on Friday. It said in a statement that newly appointed municipal manager Graham Richards had told a special council meeting that there was extensive damage to roads, storm-water drainage and other municipal infrastructure.
A Thabong man shot dead a 14-year-old plaintiff in a case against him outside the Welkom Magistrate’s Court on Friday, Free State police said. The man then shot and wounded himself, Captain Rosa Benade said. The man allegedly went to the state prosecutor and said he wanted to plead guilty on a charge of assaulting the teenager.
About 20 women whose loved ones died violent deaths demonstrated outside Parliament for tighter gun controls Friday in one of the world’s most crime-ridden countries. Shaheema Langeveldt said she still grieved over the murder of her 13-year-old son, shot to death eight years ago as he tried to give evidence to police about another murder.
The Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) on Friday called on its members to boycott all Shoprite Checkers stores. ”Cosatu is calling on its members not to buy from Shoprite until the strike is resolved,” Cosatu’s regional chairperson Sdumo Dlamini told a 2Â 000-strong crowd of protesters in Durban.
Democratic Alliance leader Tony Leon on Friday accused the African National Congress of deliberate sabotage of the parliamentary process through the passage of the new anti-mercenary Bill, resulting in President Thabo Mbeki’s Africa policy being undermined.
The National House of Traditional Leaders says it is planning public hearings on circumcision in a bid to counter the continuing deaths resulting from the ritual. Chief Dikgale Solomon, head of a four-man task team, said on Friday it was intended to hold the hearings before the December circumcision season.
Nearly 1Â 000 striking Shoprite workers marched down Durban’s West Street on Friday morning amid a heavy police presence. The workers were due to hand over a memorandum to the KwaZulu-Natal regional managing director of Shoprite at its flagship store in West Street. The Shoprite store in West Street was closed for business.
Angola’s Parliament has approved an amnesty plan for separatists in Cabinda as part of a deal to end a simmering 31-year conflict in the oil-rich province, media reported. The Angolan government and a faction of the Front for the Liberation of the Enclave of Cabinda signed a peace deal earlier this month.
The enigma that is South African soccer was again evident on Thursday as the South African Airways Supa8 competition experienced a stuttering take-off on the eve of the weekend’s two opening fixtures. By Thursday, a mere seven tickets had been sold for the match between Mamelodi Sundowns and Santos in Atteridgeville.
New forthright Orlando Pirates coach Milutin Sredojevic is under no illusions about Saturday night’s CAF Champions League game against Ghana’s Hearts of Oak at Ellis Park. Kick-off is at 6pm. ”It is a battle of the desperate,” says the Buccaneers’ Serbian coach. ”Both teams need a victory badly to stay in contention in the competition.”
There were fears within the African National Congress that big business could take over the ANC, Finance Minister Trevor Manuel told the Mail & Guardian this week. Manuel said this was a key reason for the ANC’s national executive committee pushing for a code of conduct on wealth acquisition binding ANC members.
Two Yfm women DJs suspended after refusing to work on Women’s Day should be reinstated, the African National Congress Youth League said on Thursday. DJs Unathi Nkayi and Cleo Meshoro were reportedly suspended on Monday for refusing to work on Wednesday. They now face a disciplinary hearing.
A South African anti-mercenary Bill under discussion in Parliament is discriminatory, the Freedom Front Plus said on Thursday. The new Bill would require citizens seeking to enlist in foreign military services to obtain permission from the national conventional arms-control committee.
National Treasury figures showing that KwaZulu-Natal’s education department had only spent 1% of its capital budget did not take into account work done by the public works department, the province’s education chief said on Thursday. He said the department had spent R75-million of its annual infrastructure budget of R807,2-million.
The second phase of construction on the Gautrain will proceed in Johannesburg after judgment was reserved in a recent court application to stop work for an environmental impact report, the rail construction company said on Thursday. Last week, Pretoria residents applied to the Pretoria High court to halt construction immediately for an environmental impact report.
The Ministry of Health has slammed Democratic Alliance leader Tony Leon’s Women’s Day speech in which he said that the ministers of health and foreign affairs were ”letting women down”. ”Leon is the last person to speak on racial and gender transformation in this country,” said the ministry in a statement on Thursday.
The former joint chief executives of the now-defunct LeisureNet group, Peter Gardener and Rodney Mitchell, were on Thursday acquitted on the main charge against them, one of fraud involving an alleged R1,9-million kickback. However, acting Judge Dirk Uijs ruled that they had a case to answer on the alternatives to the fraud charge.
Johannesburg metro police will clamp down on motorists not displaying number plates on their vehicles. ”Many motorists remove their number plates in order to avoid being caught for speeding through speed cameras,” metro police spokesperson Wayne Minnaar said on Thursday.
Lectures scheduled to resume at the University of Pretoria’s Mamelodi campus have been suspended, university management announced on Thursday. ”The cancellation of classes follows the assurance by several student groups that classes would resume on Thursday as normal. However, things have not turned out so,” said Mamelodi campus director Edwin Smith.
Immigration officers have threatened to go on strike after an unresolved dispute over salary levels, the Public Servants’ Association (PSA) said on Thursday. ”The department [of home affairs] should accept sole responsibility for the situation, as well as the impact of the strike, which will cripple all points of entry into the country,” said PSA deputy general manager Manie de Clercq.
Sasol is increasing its investment in community energy centres by R8-million, bringing the total to R23-million, the company said on Thursday. Sasol, in partnership with the Department of Minerals and Energy, has already launched three centres, and two more will now follow in Mafikeng and Qunu.
South Africa’s power parastatal has reported that during the last financial year, ending March 2006, R16-million worth, or 144km, of power line was stolen. The annual report — which was tabled at Parliament on Thursday — notes that these losses were considerably down on the previous financial year when 374km of line was stolen, worth nearly R40-million.
The body of an initiate buried in a secret mountain grave could be exhumed in a criminal probe into the cause of his death, the North West provincial government announced on Thursday. Justice Naane’s father, Kereng, insisted that his family needed to bury him to have closure, said government spokesperson Cornelius Monama.
The number of executives leaving South Africa in 2005/06 rose despite higher pay packages, underlining the country’s struggle to retain a skilled labour force, a new study shows. It says 39% of respondents in the marketing and sales sector lost senior staff members between August 2005 and July this year, up from 24% the year before.
South African police have found the bodies of three men who were assaulted and burnt to death near Nelspruit in what is believed to be a case of mob justice, a spokesperson said on Thursday. Superintendent Benjamin Bhembe said police discovered the bodies on Wednesday after an anonymous tip-off in the township of Kabokweni, about 350km east of Johannesburg.
South African Airways (SAA) passengers flying from the United Kingdom back home will be subjected to strict security screenings and the carriage of normal cabin luggage will not be allowed after United Kingdom police thwarted a plot to blow up aircraft in mid-flight. SAA has also warned of inevitable delays.
Thousands of South African Commercial, Catering and Allied Workers’ Union (Saccawu) members took to the streets on Thursday in a strike against Shoprite Checkers, the union said. Saccawu’s negotiator Thoko Mchunu said the action was a protected strike and involved 35Â 000 members and thousands of non-members who also shared the same view as the union.
South Africa’s economy will grow more slowly than expected in 2006 and 2007 but will weather a weaker currency, higher interest rates and emerging-market jitters, the Bureau for Economic Research said on Thursday. The independent research body lowered its latest quarterly growth forecasts for the continent’s biggest economy to 4,3% in 2006 and 4,1% in 2007.
The appeal hearing for Durban business man Schabir Shaik in the Supreme Court in Bloemfontein has been postponed by more than a month, the court said on Thursday. The hearing was expected to take place from August 21 to 25, but has been postponed to September 25 to 29.
Two men believed to have been part of a contract murder of a 36-year-old woman at the Germiston taxi rank in January were arrested after a tip-off on Wednesday, Ekurhuleni metro police said. Inspector Jimmy Maboko said two other men believed to have been involved in the murder are still at large.
A man who was arrested in the Strand, near Cape Town, on Tuesday on theft and housebreaking charges was found dead in the cell where he was kept two hours after his death, police said. The man was arrested at 1pm and was found dead at 3pm, Captain Elliot Sinyangana said on Wednesday.
Three lions killed two security guards at a game farm near Virginia in the Free State on Wednesday, police said. Captain Rosa Benade said the two men — one aged 36 and the other 70 — worked as security guards at the farm, which is situated 7km from Hennenman.