Plans for South Africa’s first public naked bicycle ride, to protest against global warming, have fallen foul of the public-service strike. So, it appears, has a jobs-for-youth march that the African National Congress Youth League hoped to hold in central Cape Town on Wednesday.
With a new burst of local flavour, the long-anticipated musical, the Lion King, will officially open on Wednesday in Johannesburg. This is the tenth production of the musical worldwide, and the tenth year since it started its first run on Broadway. But many feel that with the South African run, the production has now come home.
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African National Congress deputy president Jacob Zuma on Tuesday declared his support for a call for press freedom in Zimbabwe. ”I support what the head of this organisation has said in terms of press freedom in Zimbabwe,” he told media representatives from around the world at a World Editors’ Forum lunch in Cape Town.
Newspapers hoping to retain their readers and survive in the technological age must venture into the online and mobile phone spheres, a World Association of Newspapers meeting heard in Cape Town on Tuesday. Speakers at a workshop said the newspaper was a dying breed but could avoid extinction by modernising its approach and extending its digital reach.
Samoa coach Michael Jones acclaimed South Africa on Tuesday as potentially the best side in the world after naming his team for Saturday’s one-off Test. ”To play against the might of the Springboks at Ellis Park is the ultimate and it will provide a benchmark for the players as we look at the bigger picture, which is the World Cup in September,” Jones told reporters.
South African Airways (SAA) has paid R55-million in penalties imposed on it by the Competition Tribunal, the Competition Commission said on Tuesday. SAA made the payment on Friday, the Commission said in a statement. The penalties included two for R20-million and one for R15-million, concluded under a consent agreement between SAA and the commission, it said.
South Africa is on a strong financial footing, despite ”huge economic and social challenges”, Finance Minister Trevor Manuel told an International Monetary Conference meeting in Cape Town on Tuesday. ”The economy is performing well, but we still have millions living in poverty and many more unable to get jobs,” Manuel said.
Residents of Gauteng earn more, are better educated and are likely to live longer than people in other provinces, a South African Institute of Race Relations study has found. In a report released on Tuesday, it identified ”glaring inequalities” in service delivery and living conditions across the provinces.
A 10-year-old Durban boy accidentally shot dead his 13-year-old friend after finding a gun in the garage where they were playing, police said on Tuesday. Superintendent Danelia Veldhuizen said that Khanyisani Mngadi and his 10-year-old friend were playing in the garage at another friend’s house on Monday when the younger boy found the gun behind a sofa.
A 31-year-old man accused of keeping girls as sex slaves in an underground hideout is expected to appear in the Cape High Court on Wednesday. Johannes Mowers was believed to be behind a two-year reign of terror in the Hemel en Aarde community in Hermanus and is believed to have kept under-aged girls as sex slaves in a hide-out.
Diamond giant De Beers said on Tuesday that its 2006 Diamond Trading Company sales reached $6,15-billion — the second highest figure ever achieved. The 2006 sales were down from 2005’s record $6,5-billion, reflecting reduced purchases from Alrosa in line with the commitments given to the European Commission.
Motorists should not put ”pressure on the pumps” ahead of Wednesday’s fuel-price hike as some filling stations may run dry, the South African Petroleum Retailers’ Association said. Spokesperson Peter Noke said Gauteng has been experiencing fuel shortages, and on Monday 23 Engen petrol stations were without fuel for the entire day.
When it comes to money, Bafana Bafana coach Carlos Alberto Parreira clearly thinks in big figures. But after Parreira had criticised the South African Football Association for balking over meeting Uruguay’s pay demands for a friendly game against Bafana, the national association countered with an equally firm, if veiled, rebuke.
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A South African court on Tuesday granted the state permission to obtain documents from Mauritius which prosecutors want for a possible new corruption case against ex-deputy president Jacob Zuma. The Durban High Court decision could be a blow to the resilient and controversial politician.
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The National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) is allowed to retrieve documents from Mauritius that relate to Jacob Zuma’s alleged role in the multibillion-rand arms deal. Judge Jan Hugo of the Durban High Court gave his ruling on Tuesday granting the NPA permission to continue to proceed with a letter of authorisation.
Unions appealed on Tuesday to striking public servants to remain disciplined after clashes at schools and hospitals in some provinces. ”The unions are doing everything possible to make action peaceful, disciplined and legal and condemn any attempts to use violence and intimidation,” said Congress of South African Trade Unions spokesperson Patrick Craven.
Radio and television personality Manu Padayachee died in his sleep in the early hours of June 5 in Johannesburg. His girlfriend Feroza Kathrada said Padayachee, who had been receiving treatment for an upper respiratory tract infection, died peacefully shortly before 4am.
No country in the world has been able to flout international law as much as Israel in the four decades since the Six Day War. Speaking at a reception for Arab ambassadors posted to Pretoria, South Africa’s Deputy Foreign Minister Aziz Pahad said the international community had failed the Palestinian people by not putting an end to the occupation of their land.
Businessman Tokyo Sexwale confirmed he had been lobbied by African National Congress (ANC) members to stand as party president but said he had not yet decided whether to do so. ”I’m not in the running yet because I told you there’s no track,” Sexwale told veteran broadcaster John Perlman.
African song and dance welcomed delegates on Monday to the 60th World Newspaper Congress and 14th World Editors Forum in Cape Town – the first time the events have graced Africa, as keynote speaker President Thabo Mbeki pointed out to journalists, editors and media practitioners gathered from 109 countries.
Public-service unions rejected a revised offer of a 6,5% pay rise by the government on Monday, saying it was nothing new. Union leaders said at the end of pay talks in Centurion on Monday night they would come up with a counter proposal. It was not immediately clear when negotiations would resume.
South African President Thabo on Monday noted a worrying trend of jailing journalists in Africa as leaders try to balance sometimes competing interests of press and governments, especially in young democracies. While acknowledging difficulties journalists working in Africa face, Mbeki also urged them to report accurately on the region.
Newspapers around the world saw a 2,3% rise in circulation in 2006 and a growth in advertising revenue despite the rise of digital media, a report by a global industry body said Monday. Sales have increased 9,5% in the last five years, the World Association of Newspapers (Wan) said in a report, while advertising revenues in paid dailies rose 3,8% last year and 15,8% since 2002.
South African Airways (SAA) is to undergo comprehensive restructuring aimed at a R2,7-billion improvement in profitability within 12 to 18 months. ”That [R2,7-billion] is the improvement we need to put this airline into a profitable situation,” CEO Khaya Ngqula told reporters in Johannesburg.
The use of a teenager in the murder of baby Jordan-Leigh Norton was ”exploitation, and the worst form of child labour”, it was contended in papers before the Cape High Court on Monday. The papers were filed by Susannah Cowen, on behalf of the Community Law Centre of the University of Cape Town, which took up the plight of Bonginkosi Sigenu.
They may be united in their demand for better pay, but when it comes to the national anthem, public-service unions are not necessarily all singing from the same song sheet. This emerged on Monday at a mass report-back meeting in Cape Town called by unions participating in the public-sector strike.
What’s in a scrum? Put that question to rugby league fans, and the answer would probably be, ”not much”. Ask a rugby union fan, and it would almost definitely be ”everything”. Ask a beneficiary of the Chris Burger/Petro Jackson fund, and it might be a bit of both.
Sentencing procedures in the Baby Jordan murder trial were postponed in the Cape High Court on Monday as reports needed by the defence had not been finalised. Dina Rodrigues is in the dock with four men whom she hired to murder baby Jordan-Leigh Norton, who had been fathered by Rodrigues’s then-boyfriend, Neil Wilson.
Former Johncom boss Connie Molusi has been appointed to chair Telkom Media — one of 17 companies applying for a commercial satellite and cable broadcasting licence, it was announced on Monday. His experience leading one of the country’s largest media organisations made him ”a brilliant candidate” for the position, Telkom CEO Mandla Ngcobo said.
The Jali Commission into prison corruption has left prison staff demoralised, the Civil Society Prison Reform Initiative (CSPRI) said on Monday. ”… the public [and honest, hard-working officials] had to endure revelation after revelation of dishonest, criminal and corrupt acts by officials of the [Department of Correctional Services],” the CSPRI said in a statement.
Three miners died in a mud rush at Rustenburg Platinum mine on Monday morning, the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) said. It said the men were all from the mine’s Paardekraal shaft. ”The miners were swamped in an underground mud fall, apparently caused by water that flowed down the shaft,” NUM spokesperson Lesiba Seshoka said.
Union negotiators boycotted talks to end South Africa’s nationwide public-sector strike on Monday after police used stun grenades to crack down on nurses demanding a living wage. The Congress of South African Trade Unions said in a statement that police fired rubber bullets that injured striking nurses at a hospital in Durban, calling it a ”brutal” attack.