OWN CORRESPONDENT, Cape Town | Monday TOTAL wine sales at the annual Nederburg Auction in Paarl have reached a record R6 449 640 – the highest in the 27-year history of the auction. On the first day sales amounted to R3.7m and auctioneer Patrick Grubb, within the first hour, passed the R50m mark for total […]
ASYLUM seekers in South Africa face arrest and deportation if they fail to meet the “unrealistic deadline” of acquiring new permits by April 30, activists warned on Monday. Bruno Geddo, the senior protection officer in Pretoria for the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, said that between 19_000 and 20_000 refugees were seeking asylum. Most come […]
ZENZELE KUHLASE and JUSTIN ARENSTEIN, Nelspruit | Tuesday MPUMALANAGA’s second most powerful official, deputy director general Hussein Verachia, has been labelled a ‘pathetic’ liar who attempted to obstruct justice. Nelspruit Magistrate Jacqueline Boshoff ordered that Verachia’s entire testimony in a fraud case be struck from the record because it was obvious that he had tried […]
A 40-year-old man who was to have testified in the murder trial of members of People Against Gangsterism and Drugs was shot dead in the driveway of his home in Mitchell’s Plain, Cape Town on Sunday. Captain Rod Beer said Mogamat Abrahams was shot in the neck. Abraham’s death brings to five the number of […]
AUTHORITIES at the University of Benin, in Nigeria’s southern Edo State, have expelled 70 students for forging their credentials, an official statement said on Monday. The expelled students were listed in the statement. The University of Benin is one of the country’s largest and oldest universities. The expulsions bring to nearly 400 the number of […]
A NEW variety of rice could help impoverished Africans reap a harvest that is 50% more bountiful, the UN has announced. Promoters tout the new supergrain – known by the acronym NERICA, for “New Rice for Africa” – as the combination of a host of strengths: It is hardy and resistant to disease and insects, […]
OWN CORRESPONDENT, Pretoria | Tuesday THE South African government is aware of 467 of its citizens serving prison sentences in 40 countries abroad, the Department of Foreign Affairs said this week – of which three are on death row. The countries where most South African prisoners are being held are Brazil (54), Botswana (41), Swaziland […]
MORE than half the diamonds sold in government-held areas in southeastern Sierra Leone are mined in zones controlled by Revolutionary United Front (RUF) rebels, an NGO said. A local NGO, the Campaign for Just Mining (CJM), said “nearly 60% of miners in Bo and Kenema are in league with rebels in the continuing smuggling and […]
IRAQ has appealed to South Africa, as chair of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), to act to lift the decade-old embargo imposed on Baghdad, newspapers reported. Iraq’s deputy foreign minister Nizar Hamdun delivered the request to his South African counterpart Aziz Pahad, who arrived in Baghdad at the head of a humanitarian mission. It is the […]
MWU Solidarity, a majority white member trade union, will take Eskom to the Commission for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration in Cape Town on Monday on a charge of neo-racism. The dispute concerns car benefits allocated only to black workers, and their white colleagues in the same job categories, MWU Solidarity representative Dirk Hermann said in […]
THE Johannesburg High Court will on Monday begin hearing arguments relating to the Asset’s Forfeiture Unit’s (AFU) seizure of R60m worth of assets owned by former Wheels of Africa head Billy Rautenbach. In March Judge Jonathan Heher ordered that the AFU had the right to reply to Rautenbach’s opposition to its seizure of his assets. […]
OWN CORRESPONDENT, Johannesburg | Monday A US-based “Aids dissident” appointed by President Thabo Mbeki says Africans are not dying from Aids, but from illnesses that have gripped the continent for centuries. “Africans are suffering and dying from the same things they have been suffering and dying from for generations before Aids. They are not suffering […]
A SHIP carrying 23 200 tonnes of wheat has been diverted to Sudan from a neighboring country amid heightened efforts to avert a new Sudanese famine, the World Food Program (WFP) said on Sunday. The WFP-chartered ship will arrive in Sudan in the next 10 days and its cargo will be distributed quickly to the […]
SENEGALESE President Abdoulaye Wade has told Chad’s former dictator Hissene Habre to leave Senegal, a month after a court here refused to try the ex-ruler on charges of torture and murder during his eight years in power. Habre, who fled to Senegal after being toppled in 1990, is accused by human rights groups of being […]
OWN CORRESPONDENTS, Johannesburg | Monday A EUROPEAN company involved in a multi-billion rand arms deal with South Africa has acknowledged that it “rendered assistance” to some 30 VIPs to obtain vehicles, local newspapers reported at the weekend. The disclosure came in a statement from the European Aeronautic Defence and Space Company (EADS), a joint venture […]
SOUTH Africa received R15.57m from the Danish government to improve its capacity to manage indigenous forests, government officials said on Friday. The agreement was endorsed by the Department of Water Affairs and Forestry as well as the Danish Co-operation for Environment and Development (Danced) in Pretoria. Indigenous Forest Management director Jabulani Mjwara said the money […]
OWN CORRESPONDENT, Cape Town | Monday PRESIDENT Thabo Mbeki has refused a pay hike because he is “embarrassed” by the proposed increase – and although he didnt want it made public, Education Minister Kader Asmal told everyone about it anyway. Asmal, writing in the Sunday Independent to refute criticisms of the presidency, said the statutory […]
THE Malian government has signed an agreement with four international pharmaceutical companies to reduce the cost of anti-Aids drugs by up to 89% from current prices. “A treatment therapy which costed $480 per patient per month will now cost between $60 and $110 monthly per AIDS sufferer,” Malian Health Minister Traore Fatoumata Nafo told reporters […]
AFINTA Motor Corporation (AMC), has been named the top bidder for the R20bn taxi recapitalisation project, The Star newspaper reported on Monday. However, AMC has been placed under provisional liquidation after a creditor applied to the High Court. The court application follows a directive issued by the SA Bureau of Standards which all but halted […]
ROBBERS tied up a Sudanese diplomat in his home in Pretoria on Saturday and ransacked his house and stole his car. Policeman Morne van Wyk said 39-year-old Mohammed Abdaua, the third secretary to the High Commissioner of Sudan, was overpowered by three robbers armed with carving knives from his cutlery drawer in the early hours […]
THE trial of the US drugs company Pfizer over a 1996 drug test that killed 11 children in northern Nigeria has stalled due to the absence of a victim’s lawyer. Three Nigerian families have filed suit against Pfizer over tests it carried out of a new drug, Trovan or Trovafloxacin, during a meningitis epidemic in […]
PAKISTAN will send 4 000 troops to reinforce UN peacekeepers in Sierra Leone, the United Nations has announced. The UN said Nepal also would provide a battalion of 800 troops to UNAMSIL, the UN mission in Sierra Leone. The reinforcement should allow the UN force – embarrassed last year by rebels, who captured some peacekeepers […]
A PLANE delivered by a Russian company to the Nigerian air force crash-landed in the southern oil-rich city of Warri the very next day, airforce officials said this week. The aircraft was among nine attack and trainer planes Russian company Midwest Aviation had delivered to the Nigerian air force at the beginning of the week. […]
MOZAMBIQUE on Friday became the first African nation to receive children’s vaccines under a global campaign launched in January at the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos, Switzerland. The first delivery of some 1.3m doses of a vaccine against hepatitis B, diphtheria, tetanus and whooping cough were accepted by the government at a ceremony in […]
CUBAN teachers are to come to work in South Africa to relieve a shortage of qualified staff in the country’s schools, a representative for President Thabo Mbeki said on Saturday. “Cuba will help us fast track an answer to this problem of not having enough qualified teachers by bringing people in,” Bheki Khumalo told e.tv […]
TWO prominent Johannesburg businessmen have been arrested by the Scorpions on allegations of fraud, theft and money laundering amounting to tens of millions of rands, SABC radio news reported on Sunday. According to the report Anthony Simon Bock, former chief executive and finance director of the Molope Group, and Stephen Michael Davis, former company secretary, […]
ANOTHER South African is on death row in Botswana. SABC radio news reports that 41-year-old Lehlohonolo Bernard Kobedi was convicted in 1998 for the murder of Botswana policeman Sergeant David Tlhankane. Kobedi’s fiancé claims that he did not receive fair trial and that he is a victim of a miscarriage of justice. Priscilla August also […]
Former South African President Nelson Mandela will be guest of honour at a spectacular rock concert in London.
DEMOCRATIC Republic of Congo (DRC) President Joseph Kabila has sacked his entire cabinet, according to a statement from cabinet chief Theophile Mbemba. Outgoing ministers “are charged with carrying out current business” until the nomination of a new cabinet. All state visits by cabinet ministers have been suspended, except those already in progress. Kabila took power […]
A NEW variety of rice could help impoverished Africans reap a harvest that is 50 percent more bountiful, the UN has announced. Promoters tout the new supergrain – known by the acronym NERICA, for “New Rice for Africa” – as the combination of a host of strengths: It is hardy and resistant to disease and […]
THE United States has declared itself “dismayed” by the slow pace of political reform in Swaziland and says it expects the tiny kingdom to replace its current political order, under which party politics are banned and the monarchy wields absolute power. The US embassy said American support for Swaziland depended on the countrys commitment to […]
A FORMER Louis Trichardt Pep Stores manager smiled and hugged her husband when she was acquitted on charges of painting a 14-year-old girl white. Thelma Strydom’s former colleague, Albert Mbezi, also looked relieved when the Louis Trichardt Magistrate’s Court fined him R1 500 as an alternative to a six-year jail sentence suspended for four years. […]