The Springboks had to dig deep before they recorded yet another Vodacom Tri-Nations victory over the touring Wallabies, 22-16, at a packed Loftus Stadium in Pretoria on Saturday afternoon. Australia led 13-6 at half-time. The result was in the balance right until the last minute, when Andre Pretorius slotted a drop goal to seal the win.
It was like a bolt of lightning out of the clear blue sky as Bloemfontein Celtic scored the 91st-minute, injury-time goal that sent Premier League champions Kaizer Chiefs tumbling out of the Telkom Charity Cup before 70 000 largely shocked spectators at the FNB Stadium on Saturday afternoon.
They may have had almost enough well-known players to assemble three line-ups strutting on to the field at FNB Stadium on Saturday for the opening Telkom Charity Cup semifinal against Black Leopards, but a tepid game was anything but a stroll in the park for Mamelodi Sundowns.
Two gifted first-half tries — both the result of errors that arose from apparent touch-rugby tactics — gave the trampled Eastern Province Mighty Elephants 10 points they badly needed to give them a sense of respectability in their Absa Currie Cup rugby encounter against a rampant Sharks side on Friday night.
There was always a lingering suspicion that crusty Romanian-born coach Ted Dumitru had not left Kaizer Chiefs at the end of last season on the affable and harmonious note that was trumpeted about loud and clear. On Friday, Chiefs supremo Kaizer Motaung made a strongly worded attack on Dumitru on the club’s website.
South African Olympic silver medallist Mbulaeni Mulaudzi became the outright favourite to win the 800m at the upcoming World Athletics Championships in Finland when he recorded a hard-fought victory at the third IAAF Golden League Athletic meeting in the brand-new Bislett Stadium in Oslo on Friday night.
Minister of Labour Membathisi Mdladlana urged the South African Commercial, Catering and Allied Workers’ Union and Pick ‘n Pay on Friday to engage in meaningful discussions to resolve a pay strike. Ministerial spokesperson Page Boikanyo said Mdladlana is concerned over the protracted wage dispute.
A group of youths burnt tyres, barricaded roads and damaged a municipal stadium in Frankfort in the Free State on Friday in protest against poor municipal services, police said. Constable Christopher Mophiring said the group of about 20 marched from Namahadi and destroyed municipal property on their way into town.
White farmers can be assured that their views on land reform will be taken into account, the Department of Agriculture and Land Affairs said on Friday. ”We can assure them. They must be frank, fearless and open about their views,” said Director General of Agriculture Masiphula Mbongwa at the land summit in Johannesburg.
More than R32-million will be spent on improvements to the Kruger National Park over the next few months, a spokesperson for the park said on Friday. ”The developments and upgrades will include camps, day-visitor areas, reception buildings, entrance gates and facilities for scientific research,” the spokesperson said.
While opposition parties have questioned Public Protector Lawrence Mushwana’s report on the Oilgate scandal and pledged to take up the issue with the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA), the African National Congress says it accepts his findings. Mushwana said he found no evidence of wrongdoing in the scandal.
It will be business as usual on Monday for thousands of municipal workers who embarked on a three-day strike that ended on Friday. South African Municipal Workers’ Union Johannesburg branch chairperson Essawu Mbele told workers to go home and report to work on Monday, but added the fight is not over.
South African authorities on Friday declined to comment on a report that a suspected organiser of the London bomb attacks, Haroon Aswat, was under surveillance in this country before he was detained in Zambia. Aswat is suspected of playing a role in organising the July 7 suicide bomb attacks in London that killed 52 people.
A small group of striking municipal workers slowly made its way to the Civic Centre in Braamfontein on Friday morning, where police again barred them a few metres from the entrance. Holding placards, the group of about 300 workers tried to revive the militant spirit that has marked the past few days.
Successful land reform is not about how much land is transferred, but about how it improves the lives of South Africans, the Land Bank told the land summit in Johannesburg on Friday. Land Bank general manager George Oricho discussed the challenges of financing land reform in the country.
The Johannesburg Lesbian and Gay Pride Heritage Week’s Pride march will return to Johannesburg’s inner city on its 16th anniversary this year. Jo’burg Pride coordinator Paul Tilly said the festival, running from September 17 to 24, is themed Pride: Sweet Sixteen: the Right to Be, the Freedom to Express.
Two dinosaur embryos discovered in the Free State in the 1970s have been identified as the world’s oldest ”rotten eggs”. Dr Michael Raath, a palaeontologist at the University of the Witwatersrand, said the two embryos are the oldest known embryos for any terrestrial vertebrate from anywhere in the world.
Donovan Moodley, the man who confessed to kidnapping and murdering student Leigh Matthews, will be told by a Johannesburg High Court judge next week how long he will be removed from society. Judge Joop Labuschagne on Friday postponed the case to Thursday next week.
An 80-year-old teetotaller who has never had alcohol in his life had a nightmare experience when two police officers from Kwaggasfontein north of Pretoria arrested him for driving under the influence. Fanie Otto, of Vrede walks very slowly, but the officers apparently marched him from counter to counter, pistol to his back, at the police station to which he was taken.
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Durban businessman Schabir Shaik was given leave on Friday to go to the Supreme Court of Appeal against one of two corruption convictions and one of fraud. Durban High Court Judge Hillary Squires granted Shaik leave to challenge his convictions on the two charges on limited grounds.
Amiable Peter Manda has seemingly discovered that all is not gold that glitters at Mamelodi Sundowns and is relinquishing his position as CEO of the Brazilians to return to club president Patrice Motsepe’s ARMGold mining consortium. The quietly spoken CEO has only been at the helm of Sundowns for little more than a year.
Renosi Denise Mokate has been appointed deputy governor of the reserve bank, the office of President Thabo Mbeki announced on Thursday. Having been chairperson and chief executive of the Financial and Fiscal Commission since July 2004, she is a former chief executive of the Central Energy Fund.
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Durban businessman Schabir Shaik will know on Friday whether he will be granted an opportunity to appeal against his fraud and corruption conviction and 15-year jail sentence. High Court judge Hilary Squires is to hand down judgement at 10am following Shaik’s application for leave to appeal against his convictions, all of which involved financial dealings with former deputy president Jacob Zuma.
The Competition Tribunal fined South African Airways (SAA) R45-million — the largest fine in the history of the Competition Act — on Thursday for abusing its dominant position in the domestic airline market. The national carrier, which has just seen the end of a massive strike, has 20 days to pay the fine.
A strike by South African Airways’ (SAA) 800 pilots is looming, in a further blow to the airline’s widely criticised ”emperor”, CEO Khaya Ngqula. The SAA Pilots’ Association started its strike ballot on Wednesday this week, over what it alleges is a unilateral attempt by SAA management to change the terms of its contracts.
Ongoing conflict in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has underscored the difficulties of bringing lasting peace to this vast Central African country. Nearly 3,5-million people have died, mostly from malnutrition and preventable diseases such as diarrhoea and malaria, since civil war first began in the DRC in 1996.
The Scorpions continue to suffer setbacks in their battle to remain independent of the police. A top official, implicated in the misappropriation of funds meant for informers, resigned this week just as President Thabo Mbeki began considering Judge Sisi Khampepe’s interim report on the mandate and location of the unit.
The worst thing for South Africa is to have a failed or rogue state for a neighbour, Minister of Finance Trevor Manuel said on Thursday. Manuel was addressing University of the Witwatersrand students, who peppered him with questions about Zimbabwe.
”That’s disgusting!” shouted a family member of slain student Leigh Matthews when murderer Donovan Moodley reached out to touch his fiancée’s hand as he passed her when the court adjourned for tea on Thursday. Final arguments in the trial of Moodley will be heard in the Johannesburg High Court on Friday.
The City of Cape Town, rocked by allegations of corruption and tender irregularities, is a target for fraudsters, a leading forensic investigator said on Thursday. Steven Powell, a director at Sonnenberg, Hoffmann and Galombik forensics, spoke on corruption and white-collar crime at a Cape Press Club function.
If land reform does not happen fast enough, people will organise themselves and force redistribution to occur, a Zimbabwean professor said on Thursday. ”If the state does not move when it is challenged, it will be challenged,” Professor Sam Moyo, of the African Institute for Agrarian Studies, told the national land summit in Johannesburg.
Public Protector Lawrence Mushwana is expected to release his findings on the probe into the so-called Oilgate affair on Friday. The investigation into claims about the alleged misuse of public money involving state oil company PetroSA — reported by the Mail & Guardian — was launched last month.