The Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) says it is to take up the issue of racial transformation in cricket following the Proteas’ loss to India last week. ”The white wonder boys are not as invincible as they would have us believe,” the federation said in a statement issued from its Western Cape office.
The informal motor mechanic industry is big in most townships and it comprises specialists in different mechanical areas. These include panelbeaters, electricians, welders, gearbox fitters, engineers, wheel alignment and diff adjusters. Most of these specialists operate on street corners and in backyards and employ several helpers each.
The City of Cape Town has launched a high court challenge to the legality of the Erasmus commission, city speaker Dirk Smit announced on Tuesday. The commission was set up by Western Cape Premier Ebrahim Rasool last year to probe the city’s own investigation of renegade councillor Badih Chaaban.
Gerhard Zandberg’s South African swimming contingent was caught up in the chaos at Terminal 5 at London’s Heathrow airport in London, which caused the swimmers to miss their connection flight to Manchester. The terminal opened recently only to descend into disorder as its baggage-handling system broke down.
In the latest blow to South Africans already reeling from scheduled load-shedding, entire cities will now be plunged into darkness as Eskom institutes even more extreme power cuts. The shock development, which will be known as sector-sharing, will see the country divided into four vertical zones, each spanning many thousands of square kilometres.
The Western Cape’s economy remains extremely healthy, although some factors are hampering accelerated growth. This is one of the key findings of the new Sake24 Western Cape Barometer (WCB) launched in Cape Town on Monday. The WCB is a unique statistical index that measures business activity in the province.
Proteas batsman Herschelle Gibbs has been released on R500 bail after he was arrested for allegedly driving under the influence of alcohol in Sea Point, Cape Town, Western Cape police said on Friday. Superintendent Billy Jones said the 34-year-old cricketer was released at 8am on Friday after he was detained at 3.35am.
Nobel Peace Prize laureate Archbishop Desmond Tutu on Thursday added his voice to calls for a judicial inquiry into the multibillion-rand arms deal. In the text of his speech for the Dullah Omar memorial lecture at the University of the Western Cape, he said South Africans could not pretend corruption was no longer a serious problem.
You will be paying an extra R20-billion to Eskom this year — over and above the R40-billion collected last year — for it to buy billions of litres of diesel to fuel its peaking power plants. Further steep tariff increases are likely as new peaking power becomes available and is relied upon more heavily.
Remember the days when, as inaugural transport minister, Mac Maharaj insisted that he would continue to drive his beat-up old Jetta? It struck a chord, for it spoke of a government that would live comfortably yet simply. Those days died quickly as the new democrats dusted off old protocol books designed for a venal order.
Cape Town’s director of health, former anti-conscription campaigner Ivan Toms, was found dead in his home on Tuesday morning, police said. Police spokesperson Superintendent Billy Jones said foul play was not suspected at this stage. He said police used a key from a neighbour to gain access to Toms’ Mowbray home at about 9.30am.
The Western Cape’s Koeberg nuclear power station is firing on all cylinders again, the South African Broadcasting Corporation reported on Monday. Eskom spokesperson Andrew Etzinger said one of the Koeberg units, which had been taken offline for maintenance, was recommissioned over the Easter weekend.
Two people died and three were injured — two of them seriously — in a three-car pile-up on the N1 south near the Grasmere toll plaza on Saturday night. Netcare 911 has responded to more than 280 accidents on the country’s roads since the start of the Easter weekend, said spokesperson Nick Dollman.
Four people died and 16 were injured — one critically — in Cape Town on Saturday morning in one of more than 285 accidents on the country’s roads since the start of the Easter weekend. In Durbaniville, Netcare 911 spokesperson Nick Dollman said a car collided with a minibus taxi in the early hours of Saturday.
Racism, discrimination and the cultural divide were causes for concern in South Africa, political parties and organisations said on Human Rights Day. Western Cape acting premier Leonard Ramatlakane said a number of projects would be implemented to combat racial discrimination in the province.
The Easter weekend promises to be a busy one for lovers of live music, with festivals offering diverse line-ups around the country.
Western Cape premier Ebrahim Rasool says he has scrapped the Erasmus commission and reappointed it with expanded terms of reference. Rasool appointed the commission, headed by judge Nathan Erasmus, in December last year, to probe allegations that Cape Town mayor Helen Zille’s administration illegally spied on renegade councillor Badih Chaaban.
The rumours that have persistently swirled around President Thabo Mbeki’s meeting with arms bidders, together with allegations that he himself received ”commissions” or channelled money to his party, are extremely damaging to the Office of the Presidency and need to be confronted.
South Africa’s once notorious Robben Island penal colony risks ghost-town status as its last residents trickle off in search of creature comforts on the mainland. The population of penguins, seals and feral cats far outnumbers the 112 human inhabitants of the present day heritage site — mostly former prison warders and their families.
While Robbie Hunter was first across the line at Sunday’s Pick n Pay Cape Argus cycle tour, the next face of South African cycling may well be the slightly obscured young development rider we saw flanking Hunter’s right at the finish. If he had his way, Nolan Hoffman (22) would have been born with a bicycle between his legs.
"About half the pupils in my class suffer in some way or another from the effects of alcohol abuse by their parents and people around them."
Most South Africans say they don’t drink — about half the men and almost 80% of women claim to be abstainers.
Games such as ”hit me, hit me” and ”rape me, rape me”, where schoolchildren chase each other and then pretend to hit or rape each other, are being played at South African schools, the South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC) said in a report on school-based violence, which was presented in Johannesburg on Wednesday.
Bestselling author Eoin Colfer, whose Artemis Fowl series of action-fantasy novels has sold more than nine million copies worldwide, may well wish to operate under a cloak of secrecy — as his famous teenaged creation does — when he arrives in South Africa this week.
The Cape High Court on Monday gave the go-ahead for the eviction of several thousand residents of the Joe Slovo informal settlement to make way for a housing development. Hundreds of Joe Slovo residents, who had gathered in the street outside the court, chanted angry slogans after the judgment was handed down.
If you’re worried about rocketing petrol prices — which hit R8,25 a litre in Gauteng last week and are set to increase further — you can take some comfort from the fact that reform of the fuel sector is finally under way, with the promise of a freer, more efficient fuel market kicking in early next year.
While large industry has met its 10% power-reduction commitments, the rest of South Africa is lagging behind, saving less than 5% on its electricity consumption. The continued strain on the national grid has meant that there remains the threat of load-shedding for South Africans.
The Unyazi 2 Festival takes the latest in local and international sound exploration on the road, writes Lloyd Gedye.
The government is considering the division of South Africa into two time zones. This is according to Portia Molefe, Director General of Public Enterprises, who was on Wednesday briefing the minerals and energy committee in Parliament on the present electricity crisis.
Incandescent lamps will be exchanged for energy-saving lamps in all provinces from April onwards, Eskom said on Wednesday. The exchange programme for compact fluorescent lamps is already under way in several of the country’s provinces and has seen more than 12-million lamps distributed in three years.
Madiba’s 90th birthday celebrations have already begun and will continue throughout the year, the Nelson Mandela Foundation said on Wednesday. Mandela was joined by his wife and daughters in Johannesburg to hear what events have been planned around his 90th birthday, which falls on July 18.
The emergence of the Forum of Black Journalists (FBJ) indicates there are problems in the media, South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC) CEO Tseliso Thipanyane said on Tuesday. ”What is going wrong in media rooms to lead to the establishment of the FBJ?” he asked at a discussion on how the media cover race and racism