The Freedom Front Plus joined other political parties on Friday in welcoming the South African Reserve Bank’s reduction of the repo rate by half a percentage point to 7,5%, but expressed concern about the strong rand. "It … will contribute to a more realistic value for the rand on international markets," the FF+ said.
<li><a class=’standardtextsmall’ href="http://www.mg.co.za/Content/l3.asp?ao=120354">’Mboweni has shown foresight'</a>
The United Democratic Movement says South African Reserve Bank Governor Tito Mboweni and the monetary policy committee have shown foresight and courage by lowing the repo rate by 50 basis points. The UDM finance spokesperson said for more than a year the UDM has been advocating against an excessively strong currently.
The situation at Bloemhof is reported to be tense after pupils rampaged through the streets of Boitumelong outside the town in the North West on Thursday, South African Broadcasting Corporation radio news reported on Friday. Pupils at Thutolore High School on Friday continued with a class boycott.
A group of youngsters brought a hush to Parliament chamber this week when they spoke about their lives of poverty and hardship and how they think the Children’s Bill could create a happier future for them. They call themselves Dikwankwetla, meaning heroes, and this is how they see themselves in the face of the Aids epidemic.
The Boeremag wanted to throw poisoned oranges in the streets of Soweto as part of its strategy to create chaos in the country, the Pretoria High Court heard on Wednesday. Free State potato farmer Henk van Zyl testified about events leading up to "Operation Popeye", a trigger for a Boeremag plan to take over the government.
<li><a class=’standardtextsmall’ href="http://www.mg.co.za/Content/l3.asp?ao=120126">Boeremag had breeding plans</a>
The interests of the country will be central to any decision on the strength of the rand, South African Reserve Bank Governor Tito Mboweni said on Wednesday.
He was addressing mine and textile workers protesting in Pretoria against job losses resulting from the currency’s strength.
<li><a class=’standardtextsmall’ href="http://www.mg.co.za/Content/l3.asp?ao=120185">Union asks for urgent rand summit</a>
The Pan Africanist Congress has denied reports that, like the New National Party, it will join the African National Congress, saying on Wednesday such speculations are foolish. PAC president Motsoko Pheko said: ”I don’t understand why people are making such assumptions out of the blue.”
A 24-hour hotline for concerned members of the public and farmers became operational on Wednesday, as the culling of thousands of ostriches entered its second day in the Eastern Cape. A media photographer was earlier on Wednesday turned away from a farm where the culling of the infected birds is taking place.
Ostrich meat is still safe for consumption despite the outbreak of avian flu on two farms in the Eastern Cape, the Klein Karoo group, which represents producers of ostrich meat and ostrich products, said on Tuesday. A spokesperson said the outbreak of the disease has been contained to the two farms in the Middleton area.
Ostrich culling to start in E Cape
The Boeremag dreamed of using a building like that of Armscor in Pretoria as a sort of breeding farm for ”a new [Afrikaner] nation”, the city’s High Court heard on Tuesday. Free State potato farmer Henk van Zyl also told the court of a plan to blow up Afrikaans comedian Casper de Vries because ”he was not on the right path”.
The Democratic Alliance has again urged the Speaker of Parliament to publish the list of MPs implicated in the so-called travel scam, involving the alleged fraudulent use of parliamentary travel vouchers. ”The scam surrounding MPs’ travel vouchers is doing great damage to Parliament,” DA chief whip Douglas Gibson said.
South African arms maker Denel will not immediately benefit from a new United States Army contract to test its ammunition, the company said on Tuesday. The US Army needs projectiles for its advanced conventional artillery ammunition programme and the artillery projectiles are of a South African design.
A nationwide strike against Telkom’s plan to retrench workers will be organised by the Communication Workers’ Union (CWU). CWU president Joe Chauke said on Tuesday the union is not convinced by the telecommunication utility’s rationale for retrenchments. The CWU said the strike is scheduled for August 27.
The death toll from an accident at an illegal drag race at the Odi airstrip in North West on Sunday rose to six when a second man died in hospital on Tuesday. A spokesperson at George Mukhari hospital said Lucky Simbambo (19) died of multiple injuries in the hospital’s intensive-care unit.
The buyout of Secureco Armed Response (Gauteng) by Stallion Security has transformed Stallion into the largest privately held black economic empowerment (BEE) armed-response company in South Africa, according to Stallion Security CEO Clive Zulberg.
Charges have been withdrawn against former Springbok rugby player ”Vleis” Visagie who accidentally shot dead his daughter when he mistook her for a car thief, his lawyer confirmed on Monday. The charges will formally be withdrawn on September 6, Visagie’s next scheduled court appearance.
South African mobile operator MTN and the South African National Taxi Council on Tuesday launched the Ring’uvaya (phone while you travel) initiative, which will equip South African taxis with pay phones, enabling commuters to make phone calls in the taxi. KwaZulu-Natal is the first province that will get Ring’uvaya phones.
The majority of Burundian parties early on Friday signed a power-sharing deal brokered by South African Deputy President Jacob Zuma to pave the way for elections in the Central African nation which has been ravaged by war. Twenty parties inked the deal in Pretoria but 10 did not sign — a fact which did not faze either Zuma or Carolyn McAskie, the head of the United Nations mission in Burundi.
Zimbabwe’s Grain Marketing Board has received about 119 000 tons of maize, out of an expected 1,2-million tons since the beginning of the marketing season in April, the United Nations’ Integrated Regional Information Network (Irin) on Friday quoted Zimbabwe state newspaper The Herald as saying.
Police and soldiers are manning roadblocks in the Somerset East area of the Eastern Cape to enforce a quarantine following a suspected outbreak of avian influenza. Test results determining the nature of the virus are expected by the end of the week. A particular strain of the avian flu virus can be transmitted to humans.
Torrential rain on Thursday brought chaos to Cape Town, flooding shack areas and roads and causing major traffic snarl-ups. Several people were ferried to higher ground by boat from the aptly named River Club in Observatory when the nearby Liesbeeck River burst its banks. Informal settlements were also affected.
A basic income grant is affordable, sustainable and desirable, a coalition arguing for the adoption of such a scheme said on Thursday. The coalition told journalists at a press briefing at the Turffontein racecourse that giving every South African a basic income of R120 a month would cost between R10- and R24-billion a year.
The South African government vowed on Thursday to continue exerting diplomatic pressure to gain access to two of its citizens being held in Pakistan since July 25 on terrorism accusations. Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Aziz Pahad reiterated that South African authorities have no indication of any terrorist threat against the country.
The private health sector needs to be restructured as its current structure allows financial interests to take precedence over the interests of patients, Minister of Health Manto Tshabalala-Msimang said on Thursday. She said it is a system that has been abused by some and detracts from the constructive role that the private sector plays.
Road-rage accused Edward Kekana appeared in the Johannesburg Magistrate’s Court on Thursday. The 34-year-old man from Sophiatown, Johannesburg, was arrested over a road-rage incident at the weekend that left three people dead and one wounded. The case was postponed until next Tuesday for a bail application.
The Democratic Alliance on Thursday called on the minister of environmental affairs and tourism to investigate why a permit was granted for the export of live elephants to a zoo, among other destinations — in apparent contravention of South Africa’s policy and commitments to the Conference on the Trade in Endangered Species.
The deputy mayor of Buffalo City, which includes East London, collapsed and died in his office on Wednesday afternoon, a spokesperson said on Thursday. Colleagues heard a noise in 49-year-old Des Halley’s office at the end of a day packed with meetings, and on investigation found that he had collapsed.
The family of Paul Meintjes of Hertzogville, whose resurrection was predicted by a "prophet" after his death about five weeks ago, has not yet made arrangements to remove the body from the town’s mortuary, mortician Nico Foulds said on Thursday. Meintjes’s body has been kept frozen in the town’s mortuary since July 1.
Western Cape Premier Ebrahim Rasool on Wednesday welcomed the provincial auditor general’s report into a R227 532 car-allowance overpayment to him, saying the findings are a vindication and manifestation of his commitment to transparency. However, the DA said the report raises two important questions.
A suspected outbreak of avian influenza (bird flu) in the Eastern Cape province has halted all movement of ostriches to the Western Cape until a confirmed diagnosis has been made regarding the cause of serious mortalities at three ostrich farms in the Cradock-Somerset East region of the Eastern Cape.
More than 20 000 workers are to get average wage hikes of 7,5% thanks to a deal signed by the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa and the Automobile Manufacturers Employers’ Organisation. The agreement was signed in Pretoria after three months’ negotiations.
A high level of violence and intimidation in Zimbabwe has made it ”increasingly difficult” for citizens to participate freely and fairly in elections next year, the Media Institute of Southern Africa said Wednesday. The institute released a report compiled after a fact-finding mission to Zimbabwe in June.