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/ 1 November 2006
South African politicians paid tribute on Wednesday to former president PW Botha, who died on Tuesday night at his home in the Western Cape. Messages were received from President Thabo Mbeki, former presidents FW de Klerk and Nelson Mandela, former parliamentarian Helen Suzman and many others.
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/ 1 November 2006
By the early 21st century, Pieter Willem (PW) Botha’s name had become a byword for unaccountable government and the autocratic exercise of power. Botha, who died on Tuesday night at his home Die Anker near the Wilderness in the Western Cape, aged 90, was the archetype ”kragdadige” Afrikaner and a worthy successor to John Vorster, whom he replaced as prime minister.
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/ 1 November 2006
PW Botha, the former prime minister and president of South Africa, long known as ”the Groot Krokodil”, died on Tuesday night at his home in the Wilderness, in the Western Cape. He was 90. His second wife Barbara found him dead in bed just after 8pm. He had seemed to be in good health.
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/ 31 October 2006
Provincial environment and planning authorities have given the go-ahead for Cape Town’s R2,5-billion 2010 soccer stadium to be built on the site of the golf course at Green Point. However, they have set tough conditions to limit noise and light pollution, and reduce its visual impact.
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/ 31 October 2006
The widespread use of prepaid services by South African households has thrown up lucrative business opportunities for banks to bring previously un-banked people into the financial services loop. Prepaid electricity and Telkom airtime — introduced in April 2006 this year — is increasingly becoming a key cellphone banking volume transaction driver.
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/ 30 October 2006
Crime levels on commuter trains are still unacceptable, but the dedicated rail-police unit is making a difference, government and commuter-rail officials said on Monday. They were speaking in Cape Town at the national launch of the South African Police Service Railway Unit, which began operating in the Western Cape in 2004.
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/ 30 October 2006
President Thabo Mbeki’s International Investment Council (IIC) endorsed the medium-term budget policy delivered by the Department of Finance in Parliament this week, the Presidency said on Sunday. It said the government’s goals for a higher gross domestic product and employment growth rates by 2014 were a step forward for South Africa
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/ 29 October 2006
Landing in Johannesburg from anywhere else in Africa can be a deeply disorienting experience, no matter how many times you do it. In fact the contrasts are so great, you can end up wondering if you are still in Africa at all. Confusion sets in as soon as you head into town along a network of fine roads that would put London to shame.
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/ 27 October 2006
The Cape Town city council has given mayor Helen Zille a mandate to declare an intergovernmental dispute if necessary in her battle with Western Cape local government minister Richard Dyantyi. The mandate takes the council a step closer to a court challenge to Dyantyi’s plan to strip Zille of her executive powers.
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/ 27 October 2006
Cape Town mayor Helen Zille met Minister of Provincial and Local Government Sydney Mufamadi on Friday for a second round of discussions on the African National Congress’s plan to change the city’s form of government. The two met last week, with Western Cape provincial minister of local government and housing Richard Dyantyi present.
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/ 26 October 2006
OR Tambo International airport is one of hundreds of South African place names that have been officially changed since 2000. The airport’s new name and a bust of Tambo are due to be unveiled on Friday by President Thabo Mbeki. The South African Geographical Names Council lists 833 new names approved since 2000, including at least 145 names that were completely changed.
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/ 26 October 2006
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The South African government is setting ”an appalling precedent” by paying former deputy president Jacob Zuma’s legal fees, said the official opposition Democratic Alliance (DA). DA justice spokesperson Sheila Camerer said on Thursday: ” … the government has finally admitted that the taxpayer will have to fork out R10-million to pay for Zuma’s highly publicised trials.”
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/ 26 October 2006
The South African Cabinet has given its approval to the proposal to create six regional electricity distributors (REDs) which will be established as public entities under the auspices of the Electricity Distribution Industry. This was confirmed on Thursday — after the Cabinet’s meeting on Wednesday.
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/ 25 October 2006
The government will be spending close to R2,3-billion on its HIV/Aids programme by 2010, according to the mini-Budget tabled in Parliament on Wednesday. The figure was contained in the Medium-Term Budget Policy Statement, which gave no breakdown of how the amount was arrived at.
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/ 25 October 2006
The African National Congress’s efforts to change Cape Town’s multiparty government is doing ”incalculable harm” to South Africa, city mayor Helen Zille said on Wednesday. ”They are not damaging the multiparty government, they are doing incalculable harm to South Africa,” she said in an opening speech at a full council meeting.
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/ 25 October 2006
South Africa’s nine provinces are to receive an additional R28,2-billion over the next three years, according to Finance Minister Trevor Manuel’s Medium-Term Budget Policy Statement. Provincial government is projected to get R178,3-billion this year — 2006/07 — including R150,7-billion from the equitable share and R27,5-billion in conditional grants.
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/ 25 October 2006
President Thabo Mbeki warned earlier this month that strategic proposals conveyed by the South African Communist Party’s Blade Nzimande would result in the ”destruction of the African National Congress and the rest of the democratic movement”. But he decline of the ruling alliance was prophesied more than a decade ago, writes Ranjeni Munusamy.
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/ 24 October 2006
Provincial minister for local government and housing in the Western Cape, Richard Dyantyi, has turned down the city’s invitation to address the full Cape Town city council on Wednesday, according to a statement from Mayor Helen Zille’s office on Tuesday. Zille said he would have had the opportunity to provide substantive reasons for his proposed change of the system of governance in Cape Town.
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/ 20 October 2006
The Democratic Alliance (DA) has acquired another executive mayorship in the Western Cape, the party said on Friday. DA councillor Rudi Laws has been elected as the new mayor for the Eden district municipality in George following the resignation of Independent Democrats councillor Leon Dorfling.
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/ 18 October 2006
Cape Town mayor Helen Zille and Western Cape provincial minister of local government Richard Dyantyi are to hold further talks with Minister of Provincial and Local Government Sydney Mufamadi. This follows a 90-minute meeting between the three at Mufamadi’s Cape Town office on Wednesday.
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/ 18 October 2006
In 2001, the Jali Commission started its inquiry into alleged incidents of corruption, maladministration, violence and intimidation in the Department of Correctional Services. It is now 2006 and the report of commission, named after Thabane Jali, the chairperson of the commission, has been publicised.
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/ 17 October 2006
Cape Town mayor Helen Zille and Western Cape provincial minister of local government Richard Dyantyi will meet face to face on Wednesday to discuss Dyanti’s plan to strip Zille of her power. The meeting has been arranged by Minister of Provincial and Local Government Sydney Mufamadi, who will also attend.
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/ 17 October 2006
The Independent Democrats (ID) have accused Cape Town mayor Helen Zille of arrogance and contempt for her decision not to meet Western Cape local government minister Richard Dyantyi. Zille and her Democratic Alliance (DA), and the DA’s six coalition partners in the city government boycotted the meeting, which was attended only by the ID and the African National Congress.
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/ 17 October 2006
The Scorpions were conducting a selective prosecution in the parliamentary travel-voucher fraud case, the Cape High Court was told on Tuesday. ”In terms of the novel Animal Farm, some of us are less equal than others,” attorney Reuben Liddell, representing travel agent Soraya Beukes, told Cape Judge President John Hlophe.
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/ 16 October 2006
Workers on three wine farms in the Western Cape will take ownership of one of the farms, said the owners on Sunday. ”An innovative empowerment deal will transform employees on the three Franschhoek-based Solms properties into land owners after generations of tilling vineyards on which they had no claim,” said Paula Wilson, the spokesperson for the farms.
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/ 12 October 2006
Opposing views regarding a possible change in the type of governance of the city of Cape Town — the only metro area in the country ruled by parties other than the national ruling African National Congress (ANC) — have the potential to evolve into an intergovernmental dispute, says Minister of Provincial and Local Government Sydney Mufamadi.
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/ 11 October 2006
A bid by the African National Congress to wrest back power in Cape Town, a lone bastion of opposition to South Africa’s ruling party, has triggered a fierce backlash across the political spectrum. Western Cape minister of local government Richard Dyantyi has summoned members of the city council to a meeting next Tuesday where he will flesh out plans to amend the system of government.
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/ 10 October 2006
The Western Cape, already boasting some success in bringing down crime, hopes to better the crime-busting feats of New York mayor Rudi Giuliani. A five-year 40% drop in crime by 2008 ”is a target that can be achievable”, provincial police commissioner Mzandile Petros said in Cape Town on Tuesday.
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/ 10 October 2006
An attempted hostage-taking by a South African police officer backfired on Monday when he shot himself in the leg inside his boss’s office at a station near Cape Town. The incident happened when the 24-year-old constable held up his station commander and two other senior officers while he was on duty, police spokesperson Captain Elliot Sinyangana said.
South Africa and China have signed an extension to the memorandum of understanding in the labour field agreed to in 2002. Briefing the media at Parliament after the signing ceremony on Monday, Minister of Labour Membathisi Mdladlana said the agreement focused on human resources development, job creation strategies and cooperation in the International Labour Organisation.
Complaints against Western Cape Judge President John Hlophe for working outside his judicial functions would come under scrutiny again this week, media reports said on Monday. Hlophe and his relationship with Oasis Crescent Property Fund Managers hit the headlines this year.
Former New National Party (NNP) leader Marthinus van Schalkwyk should have been in the dock in the Roodefontein case alongside him, David Malatsi said on Friday. ”I personally feel somewhere, somehow, I was used as a fall guy by some people,” he told the Bellville Regional Court in Cape Town. Malatsi, a former Western Cape provincial minister of environment, was testifying in mitigation of sentence.