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/ 10 October 2005
Workers in Gauteng and the North West stayed off work and held demonstrations on Monday to protest unemployment and job losses. Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) spokesperson Patrick Craven said demonstrations were being held in Pretoria, Rustenburg, Klerksdorp and Mafikeng.
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/ 10 October 2005
The condition of a 46-year-old Southern Cape farm labourer hospitalised with Congo fever was deteriorating on Monday morning, said Western Cape health official Dr Keith Cloete. The unnamed man, a farm labourer from the Riversdale area, was admitted to Groote Schuur hospital on October 5.
Recently the Pension Funds Adjudicator (PFA), Vuyani Ngalwana issued rulings on a further 22 retirement annuities (RAs). Life companies have chosen to settle 15 of these rather than face the negative publicity. This brings to 54 the total number of RA rulings since March. The life companies are appealing seven of these in the High Court.
An immediate investigation by the Department of Health and the Medicines Control Council into the activities of anti-Aids-drug lobbyist Matthias Rath in the Western Cape township of Khayelitsha is needed, says the University of the Witwatersrand. "What he does is actually against the law," said a director at the university.
Cool and conditions moving over the northern parts of the country brought some relief on Wednesday for firefighters still battling veld fires in Mpumalanga. Earlier in the day, a fire that raged through the North West veld overnight was brought under control near the Vredefort Dome. However, the fire risk remains high in the northern parts of the country.
The grieving father of murdered mining magnate Brett Kebble told mourners at his son’s funeral service in Cape Town on Tuesday that he would do everything in his power to get to the bottom of his son’s murder. ”Of one thing I am sure, I will do all within my power to get to the bottom of Brett’s death,” vowed Roger Kebble.
The Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) claimed to have shut down the clothing industry in the Western Cape on Monday during a one-day strike in the province and in the Eastern Cape. But a Western Cape clothing-industry spokesperson described the shutdown claim as ”a joke”.
Only a few thousand people turned up to march through central Cape Town on Monday as the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) called a one-day strike in protest against job losses. About 27 000 turned up for a similar march in June this year, but police said Monday’s total was only about 5 000.
About 50 Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) members on Sunday shackled themselves to railings at Parliament in Cape Town to highlight their jobs and poverty campaign. Cosatu’s Eastern Cape provincial secretary said marches would start at 10am on Monday in East London, Port Elizabeth, Mthatha and Queenstown.
Four people died when a Red Cross helicopter crashed near Uniondale in the Western Cape, the South African Red Cross Air Mercy Service said on Monday. The Eurocopter BO105 helicopter crashed on Sunday night with a patient and three crew members aboard. The wreckage was found at first light on Monday.
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/ 30 September 2005
Without institutional autonomy and bold leadership, diversity of language in higher education in South Africa will not survive, says Democratic Alliance leader Tony Leon. Furthermore, the autonomy of universities is in itself important, he said in his weekly newsletter on the DA’s website on Friday.
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/ 28 September 2005
Financial website Moneyweb reported on Wednesday that murdered mining magnate Brett Kebble was in the wrong place at the wrong time and said it appeared that his death was the result of a failed car hijacking, and not an assassination. Earlier, reports quoted business partner Andile Nkuhlu as saying Kebble had been the victim of a callous, premeditated crime.
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/ 28 September 2005
”There is a saying that goes ”pessimism of the intellect, optimism of the will”. This might be a useful refrain when considering the Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza Strip. A Palestinian state, it seems, is increasingly in the interest of the Zionist project,” writes Suren Pillay, a lecturer in the department of political studies at the University of the Western Cape.
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/ 27 September 2005
Fires that have killed two people and ravaged large areas of land have largely been contained, but now the provinces are starting to count the costs. Crews from the Western Cape, Eastern Cape, Gauteng, Free State, Mpumalanga, KwaZulu-Natal and Limpopo have been fighting fires since September 23.
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/ 27 September 2005
The African National Congress in the Western Cape is acting against branches and members involved in a series of violent scuffles at party meetings in Khayelitsha on Sunday. At least eight party members have been suspended and face further disciplinary action after a branch meeting in Khayelitsha turned violent on Sunday.
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/ 26 September 2005
Wildfires began claiming lives — both human and animal — on Monday as they ran unabated across the hot, dry countryside, fanned by heavy winds. A six-year-old girl, Bonakele Ngema, burnt to death in a house where she was trapped while seeking refuge from a roaring blaze that bore down on her in Mntanenkosi reserve, KwaZulu-Natal.
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/ 26 September 2005
Firefighters were put on standby in the Eastern Cape and Western Cape on Monday after fears that blazes in four other provinces could spread, a public-private firefighting organisation said. Working on Fire spokesperson Val Charlton said fires are raging in Limpopo, KwaZulu-Natal, the Free State and Mpumalanga.
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/ 26 September 2005
The Government Printing Works (GPW) which prints identity documents and passports could collapse if state departments failed to pay about R150-million that it is owed, media reports said on Monday. GPW chief executive Tom Moyane warned of the possibility of closure, saying ageing printing machinery needed millions of rand to replace.
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/ 16 September 2005
Jeffrey’s Bay, the well known Western Cape surfing destination, is to be the site of a new R1,2-billion commercial and residential development being planned by Buchner Propvest, the company said on Friday. The first phase of the development, targeting 150ha of the total 600ha site, is due to start later this year.
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/ 15 September 2005
Fifty-two Western Cape government officials will appear in court on Thursday and Friday, the national and regional departments of social development said in a joint statement on Wednesday. ”The 52 will be appearing in court for allegedly defrauding the social-grant system,” said spokesperson Lakela Kaunda.
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/ 14 September 2005
The Independent Democrats suffered a setback on Wednesday with the defection of two of its seven MPs, Cecil Burgess and Chris Wang, to the African National Congress. Western Cape MPL Mzwandile Manjiya also defected to the ANC along with Burgess and Wang.
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/ 14 September 2005
Western Cape police are investigating cases of murder, assault, arson and public violence after a crowd turned violent in St Helena Bay on Tuesday evening. The violence followed a gathering by about 300 people in Laingville, St Helena Bay, at about 6pm, Inspector Bernadine Steyn said.
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/ 14 September 2005
The ostrich industry in South Africa has welcomed Tuesday’s announcement by Minister of Agriculture and Land Affairs Thoko Didiza, declaring the country free of avian influenza. However, it warned that this does not translate into an automatic resumption of ostrich-product exports.
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/ 14 September 2005
The Cape High Court on Wednesday overturned a decision of the United Democratic Movement to expel seven of its members, including deputy leader Malizole Diko. The ruling means that two MPs and five MPLs can cross the floor before the floor-crossing period ends at midnight on Thursday evening.
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/ 14 September 2005
South Africa’s chief rabbi emeritus Cyril Harris succumbed to cancer on Tuesday in Hermanus in the Western Cape, a Jewish Board of Deputies spokesperson said on Tuesday. ”His body will be taken to Jerusalem and buried either on Wednesday evening or Thursday morning,” Zev Krengel said on Tuesday night.
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/ 14 September 2005
The finances of most Eastern Cape municipalities are in such a poor state that they cannot calculate how much they are owed in arrears, media reports said on Wednesday. Local government MEC Sam Kwelita said only two municipalities out of more than 40 had received unqualified audit reports from the auditor-general.
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/ 13 September 2005
South Africa has been declared free of notifiable avian influenza, says Minister of Agriculture and Land Affairs Thoko Didiza. The disease was discovered in ostriches in the Eastern Cape and Western Cape in July last year. ””This extremely serious threat to the whole poultry industry has thus been curbed,” said Didiza.
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/ 9 September 2005
Six police officers implicated in taking bribes from illegal immigrants at Booysens police station, in Johannesburg, in a recent television documentary have finally been suspended — five days after Gauteng police management were alerted to the alleged corruption.
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/ 9 September 2005
Listed clothing manufacturer and retailer Rex Trueform Clothing Company has reported a jump in headline earnings per share for the year to the end of June 2005 to 62,5 cents from a restated 19,3 cents a year earlier. The board declared a dividend of 25 cents per share for the year, up from 20 cents in 2004.
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/ 8 September 2005
The African National Congress won two wards and the Democratic Alliance one in Wednesday’s ward elections in the Western Cape, the ANC’s provincial spokesperson said on Thursday. Lionel Adendorf said the ANC won the Witzenberg municipality, which was previously held by the DA.
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/ 8 September 2005
Change your partner, two by two. We have had a week now, to watch our elected representatives doing their dosi-do across the legislature floor. And our worst expectations have largely been confirmed. The case of Louis Marneweck, sole representative of the Freedom Front Plus in the Mpumalanga legislature, is emblematic.
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/ 5 September 2005
SA’s black winemakers are making huge strides as wine farm owners, but are still facing the challenge of expensive capital outlays.