Feuding taxi organisations in the Western Cape have pledged peace as provincial transport minister Mcebisi Skwatsha announced the reopening of violence-racked taxi ranks closed a week ago. Skwatsha also said he has not been facilitating negotiations with a gun against his head.
Former Independent Democrats Western Cape leader Lennit Max on Thursday sought to link the party’s national leader, Patricia de Lille, to the Travelgate affair. De Lille heatedly denied any wrongdoing, and said that as one of a number of clients of one of the implicated travel agencies, she had given her full co-operation to investigators.
A planned media briefing on Friday morning to articulate the latest developments surrounding taxi violence in the Western Cape was called off at the last minute to accommodate a march by one of the protagonists, Codeta. Provincial transport minister Mcebisi Skwatsha decided to postpone the meeting to allow all parties a chance to express their concersn.
Child-rights activists on Wednesday called on Western Cape Premier Ebrahim Rasool to ensure controversial Central Karoo municipal manager Truman Prince is removed from office. Prince, who has been embroiled in a series of controversies, including involvement with child prostitutes, was suspended and then reinstated last month.
The Western Cape transport department is open to resolving the taxi conflict in the region amicably, provincial transport minister Mcebisi Skwatsha said on Tuesday. He was responding to a memorandum handed over after a march earlier in the day by disgruntled taxi operators and drivers.
A crowd of taxi drivers and operators besieged the Western Cape transport ministry building on Tuesday to protest against a proclamation closing several violence-wracked taxi routes. The proclamation, in effect since midnight on Monday, was issued by the provincial transport minister after months of shootings between rival taxi associations.
The Western Cape government has been asked to airlift food parcels to thousands of families affected by torrential rains in the Overberg region, particularly Arniston and Napier. Rivers burst their banks and towns were cut off from the outside world in Sunday and Monday’s deluge, with Bredasdorp among the worst hit.
Prices commanded by some of South Africa’s top wines at the 2005 Nederburg auction, which took place in Paarl on April 9, have skyrocketed by 90%, boosted by a more restricted, higher quality offering, with the average price per nine-litre case of wine rising to an all-time high of R2Â 145 from R843,36 in 2004.
A deluge in the drought-stricken Western Cape has been both welcomed and cursed, as early-morning traffic was severely disrupted on Monday. A weather forecaster said a black south-easter, caused by a ”cut-off low pressure system”, had brought heavy rainfall to the region over the 24 hours to 8am on Monday.
In an attempt to quell violence, the Western Cape transport department will close certain taxi ranks and routes in the Cape Town area from 4pm on Monday. The measure follows unsuccessful attempts at resolving a dispute between rival taxi associations. At least three people have died in shootings related to the dispute.
The Western Cape government was on Thursday finalising plans to close certain taxi routes and ranks to quell violence. The provincial transport minister said on Thursday that following an unsuccessful meeting with taxi associations, he ordered the closure and suspension of routes in Kraaifontein, Brackenfell and Bellville.
Billed as ”Africa’s grandest gathering”, the Cape Town International Jazz Festival has become a shining example of organisational professionalism, media excellence and technical sophistication, writes Mike van Graan.
Cape Town police were monitoring taxis in the city on Thursday following a decision to close some ranks to quell recent violence. Certain ranks were ordered closed on Wednesday, with the South African Broadcasting Corporation reporting that this was related to at least four recent deaths linked to disputes among local taxi organisations.
The Western Cape agriculture department will on Wednesday announce quarantine measures and other plans to curb the spread of the blue-ear virus among pigs, the department said on Wednesday. Western Cape agriculture spokesperson Ali van Jaarsveld said an assessment would be done on Wednesday to establish the exact area to be quarantined.
Two people died when a small aircraft crashed on to Vergelegen farm outside Somerset West in the Western Cape at about 2.20pm on Tuesday, police said. ”The pilot was performing flying techniques when one of the wings fell off,” said police spokesperson Captain Elliot Sinyangana.
Deputy Chief Justice Pius Langa expressed his impatience with the speed of transformation of the judiciary during his interview for the post of chief justice in Cape Town on Monday. Quizzed by fellow judges on the Judicial Service Commission and the minister and deputy minister of justice, Langa dismissed reports that he was a transformation ”gradualist”.
South Africa’s largest land rights movement, the 20-year-old National Land Committee (NLC), has been brought to its knees by ideological infighting, financial mismanagement and an exodus of member organisations. The crisis, which was set to be debated at an emergency board meeting on Thursday, has already frightened off the foreign donors who funded the NLC’s umbrella structure since its inception.
A leading children’s rights organisation is concerned that two proposed laws on child protection could result in duplication and a waste of resources. A child’s general right to health care has been reduced in the Children’s Bill, and the right to health care after sexual assault has been removed from the Sexual Offences Bill.
South Africa’s robust economic growth made a small, hardly noticeable dent in the country’s massive unemployment rate. Yet those who are lucky enough to be employed in the formal sector saw earnings increase faster than the number of their peers. The latest figures show youth unemployment remains chronically high, while 60% of discouraged work seekers are female.
When a small piece of South African history was made recently in the coastal city of Cape Town, it looked as if the boys would have the last laugh. ”Girls can’t play! Girls can’t play!” several onlookers roared after every goal. But by the end of the game on Rocklands sports field the smirks were gone.
A shark-attack victim is recovering well in the Constantiaberg Medi-Clinic after four hours of surgery to his right leg and foot. Chris Sullivan (32), a British tourist on holiday in Cape Town, was attacked, presumably by a great white shark, at Noordhoek beach on Monday.
The funeral service of slain Free State government official Noby Ngombane will be held in Bloemfontein on Monday, a statement from Premier Beatrice Marshoff’s office announced on Friday. The funeral will start at 9pm at the Boet Troskie Hall at the Central University of Technology.
The acting CEO of the Border Cricket Board, Greg Hayes, and Warriors coach Mickey Arthur dropped a bombshell when they announced on Wednesday that Protea express bowler Monde Zondeki has decided to pursue his career with the Western Province-Boland franchise from next summer. ”He goes with our blessing,” Hayes said.
King Mazawattee the Jurassic, supreme monarch of Swaziland, has stocked his Cabinet with seriously bright okes. In fact, the manne had their ears pinned back by the intellectual vigour of Mpumelelo Hlophe, the Swazi High Commissioner to South Africa, as he explained that democracy is the government of the person, by the person, for the person.
Forty percent of drinking water used in South Africa is unaccounted for, Minister of Water Affairs and Forestry Buyelwa Sonjica said on Wednesday. Municipalities are the key to stopping this huge wastage, she said at the launch of the Department of Water Affairs and Forestry’s water-conservation strategy at Gallagher Estate in Midrand.
Education is one of the most important ”deposits” the government could make in building human capital and ensuring a better life for all, Western Cape Premier Ebrahim Rasool said on Wednesday, ”because it is through education that we give people the resources and the skills to make something of their lives and, in doing so, to contribute to the lives of those around them”.
Enforcing a human rights culture among South Africans remains the government’s main challenge, Deputy President Jacob Zuma said on Monday at an African National Congress human rights book launch. Meanwhile, the Freedom Front Plus on Monday accused the ANC of destroying minority rights under the guise of correcting the past.
Western Cape police were on Friday hoping someone will come forward with information on the murder of University of Stellenbosch student Inge Lotz. ”Nothing was taken, there was no forced entry and there are no leads,” Superintendent Billy Jones said. ”We are relying on someone to come forward with information.”
The Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) on Friday said that the recently announced closure of clothing manufacturer Rex Trueform’s Salt River plant threatened to put another 1Â 000 people out of work in the Western Cape and bring the clothing, textile and leather industries one step closer to complete collapse.
More than three-quarters of South African households receive free water and more than half receive free electricity, Statistics South Africa said in Pretoria on Thursday — but two million households are without toilet facilities. The figures are part of a non-financial census of municipalities for the year ending June 2003.
The truth is out at last. Those most affected by that truth cannot read this editorial, but there is at least reason to believe officialdom is about to act on the national emergency of adult illiteracy. The 11th year of our democracy is late in the day for the national government to have noticed that about 40% of South African adults — eight million to 10-million people — cannot read or write, and so face bleak futures.
Fiery Independent Democrats leader Patricia de Lille clashed with the lawyer of former ID Western Cape leader Lennit Max when Max’s disciplinary hearing resumed on Wednesday. She repeatedly told the lawyer, Leon van Rensburg, to ”keep quiet” as he cross-examined her, and told him she was laughing at his ”silly remarks”.