Recent media reports on unemployment and poverty, among whites especially, indicate the African National Congress is not succeeding in distributing wealth, the Freedom Front Plus said on Monday. ”Current trends point to a redistribution of poverty instead,” FF+ labour spokesperson Willie Spies said in a statement.
Johannesburg police believe they are making good progress in the investigation into the kidnap and murder of student Leigh Matthews, a spokesperson said on Monday. Matthews’s naked body was found in the veld at Walkerville Manor, south of Johannesburg, last Wednesday.
A European Union body will donate about R4,2-billion to the South African Medical Research Council (MRC) to help combat HIV/Aids, the council said on Monday. ”This is the initial amount. Out of those [donated] amounts, we will conduct trials and others things,” MRC spokesperson Julian Jacobs said.
A year after he was expelled from Zimbabwe as the correspondent for The Guardian, Andrew Meldrum has written a book that predicts a bright future for the country despite the havoc brought by President Robert Mugabe. Where We Have Hope: A Memoir of Zimbabwe chronicles Meldrum’s beginnings as an American journalist in Zimbabwe after its independence from Britain in 1980.
MDC faces crucial by-election
Four of the 22 Boeremag treason trialists lost their bid on Friday in the Pretoria High Court to secure bail. Acting Judge Peter Mabuse dismissed the bail applications of Mokopane medical doctor Johan Pretorius Jnr and Bela-Bela farmers Gerhardus ”Oom Vis” Visagie, Rudi Gouws and Herman van Rooyen.
The Tshwane University of Technology has obtained a court interdict barring students from its GaRankuwa campus, where they caused hundreds of thousands of rands’ damage on Thursday. The interdict was obtained in an urgent application in the Pretoria High Court on Thursday night, a university spokesperson said.
South Africa is expected to take over the chair of one of the Southern African Development Community’s (SADC) crucial organs from Lesotho on Thursday, according to the Department of Foreign Affairs. The reigns of the SADC’s politics, defence and security organ will be handed to Minister of Defence Mosiuoa Lekota.
The Development Bank of Southern Africa’s chief financial officer, Abdul-Kader Mohamed, has been appointed the chief operating officer of broadcast signal distributor Sentech. The appointment was among several approved at Wednesday’s Cabinet meeting in Pretoria, a statement read.
Trade unions at Telkom plan to tackle ”shareholder fundamentalism” at the communications monopoly that plans to lay off thousands of workers after record profits. The mooted retrenchments form part of Telkom’s strategy to reduce staff costs as a percentage of revenue to 17% from 22,6%.
Former police commissioner Johan van der Merwe has rejected allegations by former Vlakplaas commander Eugene de Kock that he is protecting police generals of the apartheid era, it was reported on Thursday. De Kock testified in the amnesty rehearing of Gideon Nieuwoudt and two others regarding the death of the Motherwell Four.
The government should not adopt a ”one-size-fits-all” approach to upgrading informal settlements across South Africa, a leading housing development NGO has cautioned ahead of Minister of Housing Lindiwe Sisulu presenting a comprehensive housing plan for informal settlements to the Cabinet.
The body of Leigh Matthews, believed to have been kidnapped almost two weeks ago, was found south of Johannesburg on Wednesday, police confirmed. Johannesburg police spokesperson Superintendent Chris Wilken said she was found in the veld at about 3.30pm.
A patient suffered a broken leg and several others were injured on Wednesday when the ceiling of a Vanderbijlpark hospital caved in, Vaal Rand police said. Captain Maria Mazibuko said the ceiling of the outward patients department at the Medi-Vaal private hospital suddenly gave way and fell on patients.
The South African government gave the signal on Wednesday that the public debate about foreign ownership of land in the country will continue. President Thabo Mbeki backed the national discussion of the issue of foreign land ownership during his Budget vote in the National Assembly in June.
A Lutheran Church elder was killed and two others critically injured while travelling to Pretoria on Wednesday afternoon to buy new chairs for their church. The accident happened on the Ben Schoeman highway in Centurion, Gauteng. When the church’s bishop arrived on the scene, he found the church’s money had gone missing.
An impasse in free trade talks between the Southern African Customs Union and the United States is unlikely to be resolved before the US presidential elections. ”The political climate leading up to elections may not lend itself to any material shift in US positions,” the Department of Trade and Industry official said on Wednesday.
The National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa said on Wednesday it is negotiating with striking workers from petrol stations, car dealers and panel beaters following discussions with the Automobile Manufacturers Employers’ Organisation. The strike started on Tuesday.
Strong leadership, access to life-prolonging drugs and reducing infections will be the main challenges facing Southern Africa in the next decade, Aids campaigners say. About 70% of people living with HIV are in sub-Saharan Africa, with the majority of them in the 14-nation Southern African region.
A passenger died on a London-bound South African Airways (SAA) flight on Tuesday night, forcing the aircraft to return to Johannesburg, the company said on Wednesday. SAA said flight SA238 left Johannesburg International airport at 8.30pm on Tuesday but returned two hours later due to the woman’s death.
The South African government has welcomed the announcement by the United States State Department that the debarment of Armscor, Fuchs and Denel has been rescinded. The debarment was originally instituted in 1994 as a result of activities undertaken in the US by these companies during the pre-1994 arms embargo era.
<li><a class=’standardtextsmall’ href="http://www.mg.co.za/Content/l3.asp?ao=119078">SA can now sell arms to the US</a>
The government should be bolder in its approach to making South Africa’s flagship industrial initiative at Coega in the Eastern Cape a ”sure thing”, the Democratic Alliance said on Tuesday. The area is currently defined as an industrial development zone, but the DA said it should be defined as an export processing zone.
The last surviving member of the infamous 1980s Stander gang will appear before a parole board shortly for consideration of his possible release from jail. Allan Heyl (52) was a member of the Stander gang, led by former police captain Andre Stander, that committed a string of robberies in and around Johannesburg in 1983 and 1984.
The Food and Allied Workers Union has voiced fears of ”Zimbabwe-style land invasions” should an attempt by a black economic empowerment consortium to buy stakes in the wine industry succeed. The union opposes plans of the group to acquire a multimillion-rand majority stake up for grabs in the KWV restructuring deal.
Protesting workers from petrol stations, car dealers and panel beaters warned their employers on Tuesday to prepare for a long battle in their campaign for better wages and allowances. The National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa marched to the offices of the Fuel Retailers Association and the Retail Motor Industry.
The state argued in the Constitutional Court on Tuesday that it has no duty to intervene in the case of 69 South Africans currently being held in Zimbabwe and facing extradition to Equatorial Guinea for an alleged coup plot. On Monday lawyers for the 69 argued the state indeed has such a duty.
‘Mercenaries’ in a ‘lion’s den’
A child was burnt to death when about 40 shacks caught fire at George Goch near central Johannesburg on Monday night. Johannesburg Emergency Services spokesperson Malcolm Midgely said another child was treated for minor burns. Emergency services brought the blaze under control.
The proposed system of electronic prisoner tagging has been put in abeyance by South Africa’s Department of Correctional Services "as one of its long-term projects", says Minister of Correctional Services Ngconde Balfour. But the Democratic Alliance says this is code for the end of the programme.
Negotiating parties played a waiting game in Pretoria on Monday as South Africa’s two top statesmen attempted to broker a Burundian power-sharing agreement. Generally regarded as the most powerful party in the talks, the CNDD-FDD was not sure if a conclusion would be reached before its departure on Tuesday.
The United States is offering South Africa defence equipment and training to upgrade its forces. Outgoing US Ambassador Cameron Hume said on Friday that South Africa has agreed to the US training and equipping two of its infantry battalions for peacekeeping duty.
No staff will be retrenched when the South African Social Security Agency starts operating next year, Minister of Social Development Zola Skweyiya said on Monday. "[Under] the Labour Relations Act, all staff in the social security function will be transferred to the agency," Skweyiya told reporters in Cape Town.
<li><a class=’standardtextsmall’ href="http://www.mg.co.za/Content/l3.asp?ao=118944">Govt outlines social security agency</a>
The JSE Securities Exchange (JSE) was haemorrhaging just before midday on Monday as the strong rand continued to thump heavyweight resources stocks. Negative sentiment spilled through to the rest of the market and decliners outnumbered advancers on the all-share index by about four to one.
Equatorial Guinea is preparing an extradition request for 69 alleged mercenaries to be sent to that country for trial, the Constitutional Court in South Africa was told on Monday. The court was hearing arguments why it should intervene in the trial of the group, which is facing various charges. They are currently being held in a prison in Zimbabwe.