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/ 29 February 2008
A Drum magazine journalist was beaten up in what is believed to have been a racial attack in a café in Bloemfontein on Thursday night, the magazine said. ”Drum condemns the incident and believes there is no place for such racist behaviour,” said deputy editor Elmari Rautenbach on Friday.
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/ 29 February 2008
South Africa’s monthly trade deficit widened to R10,2-billion in January, compared with December’s R1,2-billion gap, the South African Revenue Service said on Friday. Compared with the previous month, exports fell by 8% while imports increased by 13%, largely due to a rise in imports of minerals products and machinery.
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/ 29 February 2008
Private hospitals have rejected the minister of health’s call for CPIX (consumer inflation less mortgage costs) to be used as a benchmark for their tariff increases. ”CPIX is not an accurate benchmark of healthcare costs,” the Hospital Association of South Africa said in a statement on Friday.
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/ 29 February 2008
The first beneficiaries of the Delft homes that were invaded in December have begun moving in, Thubelisha Homes said on Friday. Prince Sigcawu, general manager of the N2 Gateway Pilot Project, said 10 families completed the move on Friday, another 20 would move in on Monday and Tuesday, and 100 per week would follow
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/ 29 February 2008
New Zealand’s Canterbury Crusaders maintained their winning start to the Super 14 season with a third successive victory in beating the Stormers 22-0 in Cape Town on Friday. They dominated all aspects of the game and denied the Stormers even the chance of a kickable penalty until the final 10 minutes.
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/ 29 February 2008
A passenger rail service between East London and Mthatha will be inaugurated this weekend, Eastern Cape provincial transport minister Thobile Mhlahlo said on Friday. The Kei Rail Service would start operating on Saturday, transporting 216 passengers between the two towns, he said.
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/ 29 February 2008
It was probably not meant for public consumption, but SuperSport United coach Gavin Hunt was overheard suggesting during the goalless Absa Premiership draw against Wits University at Bidvest Stadium on Friday night that ”the people watching the game should get their money back”.
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/ 29 February 2008
The issue of the Khutsong demarcation was not on the agenda of an African National Congress delegation visiting Carletonville, a media report said on Saturday. The eight-member team from the party’s national executive committee met other ANC members and community members behind closed doors in the troubled North West area.
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/ 29 February 2008
Murder accused Najwa Petersen made an unexpected appearance in the Cape High Court on Friday in a bid to find out what was happening with her legal representation. She and three alleged hit men are scheduled to go on trial on Monday for the slaying of her entertainer husband, Taliep, in 2006.
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/ 29 February 2008
Luthuli House — headquarters of the ruling African National Congress (ANC) — was evacuated on Friday after a man tried to torch the building, the party said. ANC spokesperson Steyn Speed said that the man entered the door of the building at about 10.30am, poured petrol on the floor and set it alight.
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/ 29 February 2008
Police had to land a helicopter near the Rivonia Road off-ramp on the N1 highway in Johannesburg on Friday morning to stop a shoot-out between two rival taxi associations. A taxi driver was shot dead in the gun battle. Members involved in the shoot-out moved away from the scene when police arrived. However, 13 people were arrested.
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/ 29 February 2008
Growth in demand for credit by South Africa’s private sector accelerated to 23% in January, official data showed on Friday, raising the chances interest rates may have to rise again. Figures from the Reserve Bank showed that year-on-year credit growth quickened from an upwardly revised 21,57% in December.
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/ 29 February 2008
Gold-mining stocks and other commodity counters helped keep the JSE’s head above the water by midday on Friday, as metal prices kept driving higher on the back of a weaker United States dollar. By 12.01pm, the JSE’s broader all-share index was up 0,24%, led by a 1,85% climb in the gold-mining index.
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/ 29 February 2008
The retail price of all grades of petrol will increase by 61 cents per litre on Wednesday March 5 after increasing by 17 cents a litre last month, the Department of Minerals and Energy announced on Friday. The retail price of a litre of 95 octane unleaded petrol in Gauteng increases to R8,25, and to R8,01 at the coast — new highs.
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/ 29 February 2008
South African Minister of Minerals and Energy Buyelwa Sonjica has confirmed that job losses at mines are unavoidable, the South African Broadcasting Corporation reported on Friday. Sonjica said this became apparent at Thursday’s meeting with labour unions and the Chamber of Mines, but she would not disclose the number of job losses that will take place.
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/ 29 February 2008
Popular Afrikaans singer Jurie Els, now living in New Zealand with his athlete wife Hestrie Cloete, has broken the silence around accusations of sexual abuse levelled against him by another, younger singer, Robbie Klay, media reports said on Friday. Klay has alleged that he was for seven years sexually molested as a child.
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/ 29 February 2008
France will renegotiate all its defence accords with African countries, President Nicolas Sarkozy said on Thursday in a move that could scale back France’s military support for some of its closest allies. France has defence cooperation agreements with several former colonies under which its forces provide varying degrees of military assistance.
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/ 29 February 2008
The worst Premier Soccer League side will, at the end of this season, have made at least R12,7-million in revenue. And if one club were to be dominant and win all the trophies on offer, it would bank at least R32-million — and that is excluding revenue from sponsors and gate takings.
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/ 28 February 2008
Summer grain crops have been badly affected by the limited rainfall and hot weather during February, said Grain SA on Thursday. Moisture deficiency would have an ”immensely negative effect” on a crop initially regarded as ”above average,” said Grain SA chairperson Neels Ferreira.
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/ 28 February 2008
Hospitals will not be protected from power cuts in the new load-shedding plan, contrary to an assurance given to the Johannesburg Hospital by City Power. Hospital chief executive Saggie Pillay said he was ”surprised” by the information that his hospital would not be excluded from the load-shedding.
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/ 28 February 2008
Two University of the Free State students apologised on Thursday for their involvement in a racist video which has sparked a national outcry. RC Malherbe and Schalk van der Merwe said they acted without malicious intent, and expressed sorrow for the embarrassment they might have caused any individual or group.
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/ 28 February 2008
France will invest about R114-billion (€10-billion) in sub-Saharan Africa over the next five years, creating about 300 000 jobs, French President Nicolas Sarkozy told Parliament on Thursday. He said there is a need for renewed African-French relations based on transparency and contemporary realities.
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/ 28 February 2008
Health Minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang is to seek changes to legislation in a bid to contain spiralling private healthcare costs. She made the announcement at a meeting in Cape Town on Thursday with representatives of the country’s leading private hospital groups. She also held a separate meeting with medical-aid industry representatives.
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/ 28 February 2008
The row between Cricket South Africa president Norman Arendse and chief executive Gerald Majola is likely to be a major item on the agenda at the meeting of the CSA general council on Friday. Senior members of the council are believed to be planning to introduce a motion of no confidence in Arendse.
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/ 28 February 2008
The Johannesburg city council’s new provisional general valuation roll is now up for formal objections, executive mayor Amos Masondo said in his State of the City address in Braamfontein on Thursday. He also detailed plans to save electricity in the city, address inner-city crime and boost housing provision.
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/ 28 February 2008
The Cape High Court on Thursday rejected the alibis of two young men who last year gunned down Woodstock police detective Inspector Lourens le Roux, who had been investigating them for another murder. The men were both found guilty on two counts of murder each.
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/ 28 February 2008
Health Minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang is taking her department’s healthy lifestyle campaign seriously, according to her spokesperson. The campaign encourages at least 30 minutes of physical activity five times a week, whether it be jogging or merely household chores such as sweeping the yard or gardening.
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/ 28 February 2008
South Africa’s high crime rate and prevalence of firearms were dissuading some people from visiting the country, a Pietermaritzburg High Court judge said on Thursday before passing sentence on two armed robbers. Acting Judge Sipho Nxumalo sent Sipho Zitha of Durban and Sydney Yende of Soweto to jail for 20 years.
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/ 28 February 2008
Four young men in the Free State could hardly have known that their video of a demeaning mock initiation of black university employees would be flashed on the world’s TV screens.
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/ 28 February 2008
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Mauritian Attorney General Rama Valayden has formally objected to a request by African National Congress president Jacob Zuma to withhold information from investigators in South Africa, a media report said. The evidence relates to his impending fraud, corruption and money-laundering trial.
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/ 28 February 2008
France is giving a R15,5-billion (â,¬1,4-billion) coal-fired power station to South Africa as a gesture of friendship. The agreement was signed on Thursday between Buyelwa Sonjica, the Minister of Minerals and Energy Affairs, and Jean-Marie Bockel, the French Deputy Minister for North-South cooperation.
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/ 28 February 2008
The Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) on Thursday said it will no longer take a ”triumphalist” approach to the outcomes of the African National Congress (ANC) Polokwane conference. ”The campaign to save the ANC from the clutches of the technocrats who sought to bureaucratise the liberation movement is far from being over, ” he said.