South Africa’s ruling African National Congress has condemned the ”deplorable behaviour” and what it described as ”abusive utterances” of members of the HIV/Aids lobbyist group, the Treatment Action Campaign (TAC) at the Aids conference in Toronto, Canada.
Forty-four Treatment Action Campaign (TAC) members who occupied provincial government offices in Cape Town on Friday to call for the arrest of Minister of Health Manto Tshabalala-Msimang were themselves arrested. The protesters, who included TAC chairperson Zackie Achmat, were charged with trespassing and warned to appear in court on Tuesday.
Power utility Eskom on Thursday said that in the case of the recent power outages in the Western Cape it accepted that there were oversights regarding some of its practices and procedures. However, this did not mean that Eskom had been negligent. Every technical fault did not amount to a breach of a licence condition or negligence, it added.
There is no evidence of any organised group of any sort being the agent of an act of sabotage at Koeberg — which led to the shutdown of the nuclear plant earlier this year — South Africa’s Minister of Public Enterprises Alec Erwin told Parliament on Thursday. Erwin was speaking after months of controversy over remarks he made the day before the local government elections on March 1.
Despite the difficulties they faced, women’s struggles during apartheid resulted in South Africa today having one of the most progressive constitutional-legislative frameworks for women’s rights in the world. It is not, however, a time for complacency — there exist devastating compromises and crucial omissions, writes Pregs Govender.
Detailing the suffering of a late Durban Westville prisoner, Treatment Action Campaign (TAC) chairperson Zackie Achmat on Wednesday called for homicide charges to be instituted against two Cabinet ministers. Achmat, supported by a group of TAC activists, made the call after occupying the offices of the South African Human Rights Commission in central Cape Town.
The African National Congress in the Western Cape on Wednesday condemned overtures allegedly made to disgraced former party members, Truman Prince and Jeffrey Donson, by the Democratic Alliance. ”The ANC removed both Donson and Prince because they were an embarrassment to the ANC and the councils they lead,” Max Ozinsky, the ANC’s provincial deputy secretary said.
Two young baboons from Kommetjie in the Western Cape have died of suspected poisoning and a third is being treated at a veterinary clinic, the Cape Times reported on Wednesday. It was not immediately clear whether the animals were deliberately poisoned.
Roofs of houses and businesses were in danger of collapsing under the weight of snow in Barkly East and Elliot in the Eastern Cape, Arrive Alive said on Wednesday. Disaster teams and traffic authorities were using graders to clear snow off the road. ”But it is very, very cold and the snow is very thick,” said an Arrive Alive spokesperson.
The Western Cape is losing its tag as the murder capital of the country, provincial minister of community safety Leonard Ramatlakane said on Tuesday when announcing the intensification of a provincial crime-combating strategy. ”We are making a dent, an impact … We are winning the battle,” an upbeat Ramatlakane told reporters. He said Capetonians could look forward to the release of crime statistics in September.
Eskom on Tuesday disputed the findings of the National Energy Regulator of South Africa that the energy supplier’s negligence and breaches of licence conditions were causes of power outages in the Western Cape. Eskom CEO Thulani Gcabashe said it accepted certain shortcomings on its part but that these did not amount to a breach of licence conditions or negligence.
A probe by the National Energy Regulator of South Africa into the recent power outages in the Western Cape has found electricity provider Eskom guilty of transgressing its licensing conditions as well as negligence. As a consequence, the regulator said it will impose punitive sanctions against Eskom.
Minister of Arts and Culture Pallo Jordan welcomed a new board — nine women and 15 men — to the National Arts Council (NAC) at a ceremony in Newtown in Johannesburg on Monday. ”We see the appointment of the new board as a significant development in creating a stronger NAC that will make it easier for our artists to pursue their chosen professions,” said the minister.
Shoprite on Monday condemned "in the strongest terms" incidents of violence and vandalism allegedly involving striking members of the South African Commercial, Catering and Allied Workers’ Union at some of its stores in the Eastern and Western Cape over the last 48 hours.
Minister of Public Enterprises Alec Erwin "must apologise publicly" for misleading the South African public about sabotage at Koeberg power station, says the official opposition Democratic Alliance. Minerals and energy spokesperson Hendrik Schmidt said in a statement on Monday that this week he would introduce a motion in Parliament to censure Erwin "for this gross lack of discretion".
Negligence by Eskom — and not sabotage — led to the widespread power outages in the Western Cape, media reports said on Monday. Because of this and the fact that Eskom had breached its licence conditions, the parastatal could see its licence conditions re-evaluated. These findings are contained in the National Energy Regulator of South Africa’s final draft report.
The Ministry of Health has slammed Democratic Alliance leader Tony Leon’s Women’s Day speech in which he said that the ministers of health and foreign affairs were ”letting women down”. ”Leon is the last person to speak on racial and gender transformation in this country,” said the ministry in a statement on Thursday.
Western Cape Premier Ebrahim Rasool said on Wednesday that Women’s Day amounts to nothing if the celebrations take place against a backdrop of lack of delivery. "Women’s Day celebrations should be accompanied by the delivery of services … ," Rasool told thousands of women who had gathered at the Gugulethu sports complex to celebrate Women’s Day.
Forensic auditors have uncovered records of more than R25-million listed as having been paid to the ruling African National Congress (ANC) and its structures by Brett Kebble and companies linked to the slain magnet, the Sunday Independent reported. The ANC says it has not been quizzed about any such alleged funds.
This week South Africa experienced weather extremes starting with a berg wind and a tornado, and ending with snow and floods. A report by South African Weather Service meteorologists Luis Fernandes and Lee-Ann Clark — from the National Forecast Centre in Pretoria — detailed the week’s strange weather.
A Tuberculosis (TB) Crisis Plan to increase the number of people cured of the infection was launched on Friday by the Gauteng health department, the department said. ”In 2005 there were 18Â 275 new reported TB cases in Johannesburg alone,” said provincial health minister Brian Hlongwa in a statement.”
The towns flooded in the southern Cape and Eastern Cape this week are being assessed for aid, provincial officials said on Friday. All except one of the national roads in the Eastern Cape are now open. Meanwhile, a three-night ordeal for eight people trapped in their cars by snow in the mountains in Lesotho has finally come to an end.
The City of Cape Town on Thursday signed a 20-year contract to buy wind energy from a yet-to-be-built generating farm at Darling on the West Coast. ”Ultimately we would like to see Cape Town become one of the world’s leaders in sustainable energy,” said city mayor Helen Zille in a statement issued at the signing ceremony.
Minister of Housing Lindiwe Sisulu had a penchant for the "phantom openings" of non-existent projects and for ignoring the fundamental problems facing housing in the Western Cape, said official opposition Democratic Alliance (DA) leader Tony Leon at the Delft settlement on Thursday.
Fourteen people were rescued from a truck in a flooded river in Plettenberg Bay using a front-end loader, the National Sea Rescue Institute said on Wednesday. A massive cold front has brought freezing conditions and flooding to the country. Four bodies were recovered after a car was washed away in floods in George.
A massive cold front sweeping across South Africa has brought freezing conditions to much of the country, with snow reported as far north as Bloemfontein in the Free State and parts of Gauteng, as well as reports of serious flooding in the southern Cape and a tornado in Dullstroom in Mpumalanga.
South Africa’s official opposition Democratic Alliance is holding simultaneous public events outside five South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) provincial offices as part of its nationwide campaign to highlight what it views as television-news reporting bias. In a statement, spokesperson and MP Donald Lee said on Tuesday: ”The DA will erect posters and distribute stickers outside each provincial SABC office.”
South Africa’s population was estimated at approximately 47,4-million at mid-year 2006, Statistics South Africa (Stats SA) said on Tuesday. In addition, Stats SA said the estimated overall HIV-prevalence rate is approximately 11%, from less than 9% in 2001, with the HIV-positive population estimated at approximately 5,2-million.
Whip out your winter woollies, put on thick socks and boots and stock up on firewood — it is going to be cold and wet in the entire country this week. The South African Weather Service said on Tuesday a strong cold front was moving in over the interior with snow already being reported in the Western Cape.
Five years ago, in an article titled "Scent of the plague", published in the <i>Mail & Guardian</i> (June 29 2001), I summarised my experiences as a doctor working in a health service faced with the plague of HIV infection among children in South Africa. I wrote about how difficult it was to break the news of a deadly infection to the parents, whose likely HIV status was revealed by the illness of their baby.
A temporary ban on the movement of ostriches and other poultry in Mossel Bay and Riversdale has been lifted, the Western Cape department of agriculture said on Friday. However, this did not apply in areas between the N2 in the south and the Langeberg mountains in the north, and the R232 and R238, said provincial minister of agriculture Cobus Dowry.
The African National Congress accused the media on Friday of distorting its policies in a bid to sow racial division among South Africans — particularly residents of the Western Cape. Recent ”gross distortion” of the ANC’s position on equity and restitution had been no innocent mistake, the party claimed in a statement.