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/ 2 February 2005
The Schabir Shaik fraud and corruption trial has been adjourned until Friday, when the state and defence will argue the admissibility of documents submitted by the state. These documents include the infamous encrypted fax as well as those confiscated during search and seizure operations in France and Mauritius.
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/ 2 February 2005
The Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) will meet its Zimbabwean counterparts on Thursday after the union federation was turned away at Harare airport on Wednesday. The 20-strong delegation was expected back at Johannesburg International airport on Wednesday afternoon.
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/ 2 February 2005
The official opposition has welcomed the South African Reserve Bank’s announcement that it will be changing the national payments system to create room for increased competition in South African banking. The Democratic Alliance said the move will encourage lower service charges.
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/ 2 February 2005
Mpumalanga Economic Empowerment Corporation chief executive Ernest Khosa has resigned again, the province’s finance department confirmed on Wednesday. Spokesperson Thomas Nkosi said Khosa resigned on Tuesday. He resigned last week, but withdrew his resignation over the weekend.
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/ 2 February 2005
The sex crimes trial of Pretoria advocates Cezanne Visser and Dirk Prinsloo is not to be used as a forum to discredit the police investigation, a Pretoria High Court judge warned on Wednesday. Judge Essop Patel questioned the relevance of questions put by the defence to investigating officer Captain Carel Cornelius.
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/ 2 February 2005
Health managers in the Eastern Cape face censure and possible dismissal if they do not deal with complaints about negligence at hospitals under their care, health minister Bevan Goqwana said on Wednesday. In a statement, Goqwana warned quality assurance managers to ”pull up their socks or ship out”.
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/ 2 February 2005
The Inkatha Freedom Party has expressed its shock at the suspension of Compensation Fund commissioner Bongiwe Ncube, apparently under investigation for management irregularities. ”The IFP demands that the case be discussed openly,” IFP labour spokesperson Prince Nhlahla Zulu said in a statement on Wednesday.
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/ 2 February 2005
A ”no-name brand” air gun was indeed the weapon pointed at her from the tree that murder victim Nelson Chisale was tied to in January this year, a domestic worker testified on Wednesday. She was giving evidence in the trial of three men accused of feeding Chisale to lions after assaulting him on a Limpopo farm.
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/ 2 February 2005
Former Springbok coach Nick Mallett had been appointed Western Province’s (WP) director of rugby, the president of the WP Rugby Football Union, Koos Basson, announced on Tuesday. The newly created position forms part of the strategic vision for WP rugby. Mallett has been appointed on a contract basis for three years.
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/ 1 February 2005
The South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) denied on Tuesday that it had been summoned to cover an international leprosy conference addressed by Minister of Health Manto Tshabalala-Msimang on Monday. SABC spokesperson Paul Setsetse said the SABC found it unethical that journalists were reporting on the minister’s private conversations.
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/ 1 February 2005
Minister of Justice and Constitutional Development Brigitte Mabandla formally introduced Vusi Pikoli, the newly appointed boss of the National Prosecuting Authority, to the institution’s staff on Tuesday, saying she expects the best from him. ”Advocate Pikoli, good wishes and I know you will deliver,” the minister told Pikoli.
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/ 1 February 2005
Murder charges against an elderly couple accused of killing five children at Molomini reserve near Msinga (Tugela Ferry) last month were withdrawn in the town’s Magistrate’s Court on Tuesday. The couple was arrested two weeks ago after the children’s bodies were found in an abandoned car at the couple’s home.
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/ 1 February 2005
Former president Nelson Mandela and his Mozambican-born wife, Graca Machel, are among the nominees for the 2005 World’s Children’s Prize for the Rights of the Child. The announcement was made in Johannesburg on Tuesday by 15-year-old Xola Dubula, who will form part of an international jury of children to decide who will get the prestigious prize.
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/ 1 February 2005
Unity Insurance — a new short-term insurance company owned 50,1% by Telesure Investments, the holding company of Auto & General, and 49,9% by a variety of black shareholders — has been launched in South Africa, the company said on Tuesday. Unity aims to bring black-empowered insurance products to the South African market.
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/ 1 February 2005
A state witness in the sex-crimes trial of advocates Cezanne Visser and Dirk Prinsloo aroused suspicions from the defence on Tuesday when he appeared to become ”very hot”. This happened while Prinsloo’s advocate, Piet Coetzee, was cross-examining Captain Carel Cornelius in the Pretoria High Court.
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/ 1 February 2005
South Africans have already topped the R10-million target the Red Cross set for aid to tsunami-ravaged Indian Ocean countries, the charity said on Tuesday. Meanwhile, an aircraft on a South African mercy flight to tsunami victims in Somalia landed in that country on Tuesday morning after being delayed in Uganda.
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/ 1 February 2005
On the same day that the International Rugby Board confirmed the three host contestants for the 2011 Rugby World Cup — South Africa, New Zealand and Japan — the South African Football Rugby Union was warned that full and final government support for the event is not yet guaranteed.
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/ 1 February 2005
The reason the sex-crimes trial of Pretoria advocates Cezanne Visser and Dirk Prinsloo is in the high court rather than the regional court is for sensation, the defence argued on Tuesday. ”The sole purpose for the trial being heard in the high court is for sensation’s sake and to make an example of the accused,” Piet Coetzee argued for Prinsloo.
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/ 1 February 2005
A pathologist could not tell from Nelson Chisale’s broken bones whether he was dead or alive when thrown into a lions’ den in January 2004, the Phalaborwa Circuit Court heard on Tuesday. ”There was no flesh on the bones at all,” Dr Donald Mabunda told the court.
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/ 1 February 2005
Right-arm swing bowler Charl Langeveldt has been released from the South African squad for the next three matches in the Standard Bank one-day international series against England. Langeveldt broke a bone in his left hand during the third Test at Newlands on January 3.
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/ 1 February 2005
The opening of this year’s session of the South African Parliament by President Thabo Mbeki next week, on Friday February 11, is set to cost about R1,2-million, according to the government news agency BuaNews. It is "to be a spectacular affair, with South Africans from all walks of life expected to grace the event".
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/ 1 February 2005
Listed black economic empowerment fishing, medical equipment and information technology group Sekunjalo Investments has acquired 81,56% of the entire issued capital in the computer company Synergy Computing. The acquisition of Synergy boosts Sekunjalo’s strategic growth in its IT portfolio
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/ 31 January 2005
The African National Congress on Monday came out in support of the Congress of South African Trade Unions’ plans to visit Zimbabwe, while the South African government has criticised the trade federation’s plans. Said ANC spokesperson Smuts Ngonyama: ”Cosatu should go there, but respecting the laws of the country.”
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/ 31 January 2005
The Department of Justice and Constitutional Development will respond on Tuesday to a Sunday newspaper report that claimed an administrative bungle had resulted in the arresting powers of some peace officers being wrongfully withdrawn — rendering illegal certain of their actions, such as the issuing of fines.
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/ 31 January 2005
Giant soccer clubs Kaizer Chiefs and Orlando Pirates, together with the biggest church in the country, the Zion Christian Church (ZCC), have merged to form a cellular network distribution. ZOK, derived from the first letters of Zion, Orlando and Kaizer, was officially announced at a media briefing in Midrand on Monday.
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/ 31 January 2005
The Department of Public Works is compiling a shortlist of candidates to be interviewed to head the government’s R15-billion Expanded Public Works Programme. The programme’s aim is to create a million jobs over a five-year period — at least 200 000 each year. But the Democratic Alliance said it is all going too slowly.
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/ 31 January 2005
Gold Fields will continue to oppose Harmony’s hostile offer, the mining company said on Monday. ”This deal is far from over, not only has the fat lady not sung, she is nowhere near sight,” Gold Fields chief executive Ian Cockerill said at the release of the company’s December 2004 quarterly results in Johannesburg.
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/ 31 January 2005
South African exports rose by 7% in rand terms and 25,7% in dollar terms in 2004, as the strong rand failed to dent export growth due to strong demand from China and high commodity prices. Exporters are reporting buoyant demand, which is sadly constrained by bottlenecks on the railways and harbours, not by the strong rand.
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/ 31 January 2005
The African National Congress Youth League (ANCYL) thinks Deputy President Jacob Zuma should be the next president of the country, the organisation said on Monday. ANCYL president Fikile Mbalula said the league is satisfied that Zuma should succeed President Thabo Mbeki.
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/ 31 January 2005
A 20-month-old baby boy burnt to death on Monday morning when his mother’s shack caught fire in Orlando West, Soweto, police said. Police spokesperson Sergeant Richard Munyai said the 20-year-old mother was outside doing her laundry when the fire started.
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/ 31 January 2005
The government has officially given SA Rugby its support for the union’s bid for the 2011 World Cup tournament. Beeld newspaper reported on Monday that Minister of Sport and Recreation Makhenkesi Stofile has handed an official letter, in which the government’s support is stated, to bid committee chairperson Francois Pienaar.
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/ 31 January 2005
A police officer had to cut the skin off a finger found in a lions’ den in Hoedspruit in order to get a fingerprint, the Phalaborwa Circuit Court heard on Monday. The court is trying three men accused of murdering Nelson Chisale by feeding him to lions in January 2004.