Staff Reporter

Three Tutsi parties from Burundi agreed to sign a peace accord, mediator Nelson Mandela said after talks.

A group of women gathered outside the Louis Trichardt Magistrate’s Court in Northern Province on Wednesday demanding that stiff sentences be handed to three people accused of painting a teenaged girl white. The accused – Thelma Strydom, Julia Munyai and Albert Mbezi – were not asked to plead on charges of theft, assault and crimen […]

More than 100 dangerous awaiting-trial prisoners were erroneously released from Pollsmoor Prison in the Western Cape, the correctional services department confirmed.Murder, robbery, rape and arson suspects did not qualify for the government’s early release programme to bring down overcrowding in South Africa’s prisons. The government plans to release 11 000 awaiting-trial prisoners countrywide by Friday, […]

NAVY and police divers have found the bodies of two fishermen who drowned when their trawler sank off the west coast, joint taskforce spokesman Piet Paxton said. The Pokki M, a 65-ton fishing trawler with a crew of nine sank shortly before 4pm on Tuesday. The trawler was heading for home when she capsized and […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Johannesburg | Wednesday SOUTH Africa has ranked 34th out of 90 countries in a Transparency International (TI) survey on perceptions of corruption. The 2000 Corruption Perception Index (CPI) released Tuesday, showed that South Africa had almost retained its position since 1998 when it ranked 32nd out of 85 countries. The least corrupt country […]

Radio 702 will invite Health Minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang to appear on talk show host John Robbie’s show again. The African National Congress on Tuesday accepted 702 owner Primedia’s apology for the way Robbie’s interview with the Minister ended last week. Robbie told her he had never heard “such rubbish” and told her to “go away” […]

An opposition alliance in Mauritius appears headed for a landslide victory in the general elections according to early results released on Tuesday. With about one third of the votes counted, the alliance looks poised to sweep all 60 of the National Assembly seats being contested. The race is chiefly between an alliance of Prime Minister […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Cape Town | Wednesday The Democratic Party’s Patrick Hill has taken over as metropolitan mayor of Cape Town after William Bantom was forced to resign from the New National Party after being caught with a pornographic video in his office. NNP provincial leader Gerald Morkel admitted on Tuesday that he had made “an […]

THOUSANDS of Mauritians took to the streets to celebrate the landslide victory of the opposition alliance, which could result in a first non-Hindu prime minister for the Indian Ocean island. Electoral Commissioner Irsam Rahman said the alliance between the Mouvement Militant Mauricien (MMM) and the Mouvement Socialiste Mauricien (MSM) had won 54 of the 62 […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Johannesburg | Tuesday SASOL, the listed fuel, gas and chemicals producer, has concluded a R14bn deal with petroleum companies in Nigeria, barely days after completing a R163m project to install a pipeline gas distribution network in KwaZulu-Natal. In the Nigerian deal, the joint venture with Chevron Overseas Petroleum and the Nigerian National Petrol […]

DE BEERS, the world’s largest producer of diamonds, has completed its successful 305m Canadian dollar bid for the takeover of diamond producer Winspear Diamonds.The offer saw 96.2% of Winspear shareholders accept De Beers’ bid of C$5 per share. De Beers last month concluded the agreement for the acquisition of Winspear, which counts among its assets […]

The Constitutional Court on Tuesday reserved judgment in jailed clergyman Allan Boesak’s application for leave to appeal against a Supreme Court of Appeal ruling. Boesak was imprisoned for three years in May after being convicted on charges of fraud and theft. His lawyers argued at the Constitutional Court that the Appeal Court breached the Constitution […]

MINING group Anglo American has unveiled surging first-half profits, with its operating result up 71% to $1.6bn, and attributed the strong performance to buoyant commodity markets. The group, which listed on the London Stock Exchange last year, said pretax profit was also up more than 70% to $2.08bn. Sales rose 5.5% to $10.31bn. South African-listed […]

AP and OWN CORRESPONDENT, Congo | Wednesday A TRIBAL militia loyal to Congolese President Laurent Kabila attacked a rebel-held market town on Congo’s border with Uganda, setting off a battle that left at least 30 attackers dead. Using spears and machine guns the pro-government fighters, known as the Mai-Mai, attacked at Butembo in the northeastern […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Johannesburg | Tuesday RADIO 702 talk show host John Robbie has thrown down the gauntlet to the ruling ANC government by suggesting that Health Minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang appear on his show to clarify the government’s view on HIV/Aids. Following his much-publicised on-air spat last week with Tshabalala-Msimang last week, Robbie admitted he had […]

THE London-listed base metals group Billiton plc has confirmed that it has offered shareholders of Rio Algom Limited CD27 (Canadian dollars), or R129,87 a share, in pursuit of its bid for the Canadian zinc and copper producer. Billiton said the company had posted the offer to shareholders on Friday. Billiton is competing for the stake […]

A NORTHERN Province mining supervisor accused of shooting dead a farm worker while taking pot-shots at a beer can has been released on R1 500 bail by the Phalaborwa Magistrate’s Court. Byron Dennis, 46, of the Phalaborwa Mining Company, was not asked to plead on a murder charge and the case was postponed to October […]

TANZANIA’S national electoral commission has revealed that 97,87% of targeted voters have registered for the multi-party elections scheduled for October 29. NEC chairman Judge Lewis Makame said a total of 10,07 million targeted voters had registered on both mainland Tanzania and the island of Zanzibar. Of these, 9,6 million were on the mainland, while just […]

HUNDREDS of endangered giant sable antelope have fled Angola’s Cangandala National Park and run into a region where government and rebel forces have fought over the last week, Angolan radio has reported. The rare antelope is a symbol of Angola, used as an emblem both by the national airline and the national football team. In […]

STEVEN MANN, Cape Town | Tuesday WILLIAM Bantom, the mayor of Cape Town’s metropolitan council, resigned on Tuesday after being caught for the second time viewing pornography in his office. Bantom, an ordained and widely respected minister, was first caught downloading porn sites from the Internet and watching pornographic videos in his office in October […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Cape Town | Tuesday MUSLIM vigilante group Pagad’s shadowy G-Force core has been described by police as a “golden thread” running through various acts of terror – including the fatal bombing of Cape Town’s Planet Hollywood – in the Western Cape in the past two years. Police investigating the August 1998 bombing of […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Helsinki | Tuesday ONE or more of the women among the hostages recently released by the Abu Sayyaf group on the Philippine island of Jolo was raped by the rebels, released Finnish hostage Risto Vahanen has revealed to Finnish television MTV3. The hostages included South African couple Callie and Monique Strydom. “We talked […]

CHARLES MANGWIRO and HOBBS GAMA, Maputo | Tuesday PROSTITUTES in the Mozambican capital of Maputo have banded together and threatened to parade naked through the city unless police immediately improve public safety at night. The prostitutes, speaking as a citywide alliance for the first time, warned they would also investigate funding their own private security […]

AN urgent application made by Skyway Management to compel Telkom to resume the provision of telecommunication services to Skyway has been rejected with costs by the Pretoria High Court. This followed Telkom’s termination of its services to Skyway on the grounds that Skyway offered voice services via its data network. In terms of telecommunications legislation […]

OWN CORRESPONDENTS, Cape Town | Monday THE government is stepping up its efforts to stamp out the wave of terror gripping Cape Town, announcing plans to fast-track tough new anti-terrorism legislation and sending security reinforcements into the bomb-wracked city. Spurred into action by the drive-by shooting on Thursday of a city magistrate and a car […]

MATRIC pupils at a secondary school in Thohoyandou, Northern Province, are boycotting classes in an attempt to stop teacher-pupil affairs, which they say contribute to the high failure rate at the school. Students’ Representative Council president Livhuwani Mugumo said the school authorities were doing nothing about two teachers who openly boasted about having affairs with […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Vienna | Monday OPEC ministers have agreed to raise oil supplies by 800 000 barrels a day in a bid to tame runaway crude oil prices and avert a consumer scare over fuel costs – but it could be months before prices ease. The Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries agreed to lift […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT and REUTERS, Harare | Monday RELATIVES of three people killed and one who was allegedly assaulted in the run-up to Zimbabwe’s elections have filed a $400m lawsuit against President Robert Mugabe in the United States. The lawsuit accusing Mugabe of human rights abuses was filed in US District Court in Manhattan on behalf […]

NDIVHUWO MUSETHA and JUSTIN ARENSTEIN, Johannesburg | Sunday PRESIDENT Thabo Mbeki is expected to announce the axing of two provincial premiers as well as a major cabinet reshuffle when he returns to South Africa from the United Nations Millenium 2000 Summit of world leaders in New York. Speculation is mounting that the African National Congress […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT and REUTERS, Johannesburg | Monday SOUTH African President Thabo Mbeki has restoked the ongoing controversy over Aids in an interview with US-based news magazine Time, in which he reiterates that he believes HIV is not the only cause of the disease. “No, I am saying that you cannot attribute immune deficiency solely and […]

EGYPTIAN President Hosni Mubarak has set October 18 as the date for launching the country’s “free” parliamentary elections. Voting has been divided into three stages to ensure compliance with an electoral law adopted in July, requiring a magistrate to be present in each of the country’s 15 000 or more polling places. Voters will choose […]

THE London-listed base metals group Billiton plc has confirmed that it has offered shareholders of Rio Algom Limited CD27 (Canadian dollars), or R129,87 a share, in pursuit of its bid for the Canadian zinc and copper producer. Billiton said the company had posted the offer to shareholders on Friday. Billiton is competing for the stake […]