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”.
A prison warder on escort duty was shot dead and another injured in an attack by gunmen at Cape Town’s Groote Schuur hospital on Monday morning, police said. Police spokesperson Captain Billy Jones said the incident took place at the hospital’s outpatients reception area shortly after 10am, when four warders brought a prisoner in for medical treatment.
Western Cape Premier Ebrahim Rasool promised protesting taxi drivers on Monday to intervene personally if their negotiations with the provincial transport ministry fail. On Monday, taxi drivers made good on threats a few months ago to blockade tourist attractions, with a cavalcade of metered sedans disrupting traffic in central Cape Town.
The housing subsidy for the poorest of the poor — including the indigent, disabled and the elderly — has been raised from R28 279 to R31 900, starting in April this year. Minister of Housing Lindiwe Sisulu made the announcement in Pretoria — beamed by satellite to Cape Town — on Monday morning.
Attorneys representing ousted Independent Democrats Western Cape leader Lennit Max have queried the independence of the Scorpions in the latest development surrounding his disciplinary hearing. ID leader Patricia de Lille has testified that she became aware from a source in the Scorpions that criminal charges were being investigated against her.
At least 42 miners were stuck 2,4km underground at Hartbeesfontein gold mine late on Wednesday after an earthquake shook the Klerksdorp mining area in the North West province. ”Rescue teams are working to open entry tunnels that were closed by rock falls,” said Ilja Graulich, spokesperson for DRDGold, which operates the mine.
A number of buildings had to be evacuated in Stilfontein, near Klerksdorp in the North West, on Wednesday after an earth tremor preliminarily measuring five on the Richter scale. About 3Â 200 miners at DRDGold’s operations near Stilfontein were being evacuated after the tremor. Thirteen miners were injured in the tremor.
A new draft fishing policy has failed to consider the plight of thousands of subsistence fishermen, a Western Cape body working with the poor said on Wednesday. ”I think it is a pie in the sky … It’s a myth that small scale fishermen will be given greater access rights,” said Naseedh Jaffer, director of the Masifundise organisation.
The federal executive of the New National Party, which ruled South Africa in the form of the apartheid National Party from 1948 to 1994, met in Johannesburg on Monday afternoon and took the unanimous decision to disband. The party opted to fall under the umbrella of the ruling African National Congress shortly after the national election in April last year.
With almost half the Cabinet comprising women, the face and shape of power has changed in South Africa. Many of the women lead the clusters, the groupings of individual ministries through which policy implementation increasingly takes place. The country is a world leader in female public representation and last week’s briefings by the full Cabinet provided an opportunity to assess their performance.
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/ 25 February 2005
The African National Congress and the Presidency are singling out Afrikaans single-medium schools for interference, harassment and demonisation, says Democratic Alliance leader Tony Leon. He condemned the Western Cape education minister for trying to compel an Afrikaans-medium primary school to create a special English-medium class.
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/ 25 February 2005
The granting of a court order to obtain information from the government about genetically modified organisms (GMOs) was welcomed by the Environmental Justice Networking Forum on Friday. A Pretoria High Court order was obtained by environmental lobby group Biowatch on Thursday and compelled the government to divulge details of all GMOs brought into or manufactured in the country.
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/ 23 February 2005
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Total expenditure, excluding interest costs and a contingency reserve, rises from R363-billion in 2005/06 to R428-billion by the end of the medium term expenditure framework period in 2007/08, South African Finance Minister Trevor Manuel said on Wednesday.
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/ 23 February 2005
<img src="http://www.mg.co.za/ContentImages/197779/special_rep_icon_template.gif" align=left>The maximum old age, disability and care dependency grants will rise by R40 to R780 a month from April 2005, Minister of Finance Trevor Manuel announced on Wednesday. In his national Budget speech he said that foster-care grants will be increased by R30 to R560 and the child-support grant goes up by R10 to R180 a month.
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/ 23 February 2005
Simphiwe Mbalula’s home was saved last month when a runaway fire razed about 3Â 200 shacks in the Joe Slovo informal settlement outside Cape Town. Instead of relief, he feels unlucky, as all the victims of the fire have been fast-tracked to the front of council housing lists. They will receive houses as part of the first phase of the N2 Gateway Project.