Tabla de contenidos para 2022-03-14 en Mercury

Edward West edward.west@inl.co.za STANDARD Bank Group has appointed Liberty Holdings’s chief executive David Munro as its new group executive to lead the integration of the insurance and asset management company into the group. Insurance group Liberty delisted from the JSE on March 1, 2022, following the 100 percent acquisition of its shareholding by Standard. Standard chief executive Sim Tshabalala, said: “We will now be able to bring the group’s insurers, asset managers and bankers closer together to create a more united whole that will be far greater than the sum of its parts. Together, we will build a fiercely competitive African financial services giant.” Munro has a 26-year career with the group, first in corporate and investment banking, and then as chief execu- tive of Liberty. “David is widely…

Edward West edward.west@inl.co.za MONDI, the global paper and packaging group that operates in more than 30 countries, said on Friday that its operations in Russia represented 12 percent of its revenue by location of production in 2021. Over the last three years, the business in Russia had generated 20 percent of group underlying earnings before tax depreciation and amortisation – Mondi has operated in Russia for more than 22 years. The most significant facility was the pulp, packaging paper and uncoated fine paper mill located in Syktyvkar. The group also has three converting plants in Russia. These facilities, which employ more than 5 300 people, primarily serve the domestic market and have continued to operate through the heightened geopolitical tension, the group said on Friday. In Ukraine,…

Nomonde Zondi nomonde.zondi@inl.co.za HIS Majesty King Misuzulu KaZwelithini paid his respects to his late grandmother queen Thomozile Jezangani Ndwandwe, who is buried at Umkhumbane Freedom Park, in Mayville. This is after the prayer service to mark one year since the death of his late father, King Goodwill Zwelithini, on Saturday at KwaKhangalemankengane palace. King Misuzulu was accompanied by his wife, queen Ntokozo Mayisela Zulu, who said she felt honoured to be setting her foot where Queen Thomozile’s remains were stored. Queen Thomozile died in 1959 and her remains were lost at the Chesterville Cemetery before being found and reburied in Cato Manor in 2011. Speaking at the ceremony, Queen Ntokozo spoke about how proactive Queen Thomozile was, and said she also did not believe that women should sit around and…

CHARLIE MACGILLIVRAY | Karkloof ESKOM is just one of many of the spectacular failures that has effectively consigned our dream of an economy able to create job opportunities for all, to the trash heap adorned by the ANC party flag. Roads, municipalities, job creation, jobs for pals … et al. The blatant deceit, the implicit sense of impunity and entitlement, has become an all-too-common feature of comrades or cadres. The ANC’s arrogant self-adula tion, and the incessant outpouring of political speak is untruthful and seeks to con the population, continuing to suffer the effects of their spectacular failure, in either delivering or effecting basic standards of service to all citizens of our country. As we continue to be subjected to, and misled by the galling and sanctimonious claptrap,…

GABI MARAIS | Gillitts THE letter regarding double standards hits the nail on the head (The Mercury, March 11). While our thoughts and sympathies go out to the Ukrainian people, one does have to query the double standards. The International Criminal Court (ICC) is investigating whether Russian President Vladimir Putin should be considered guilty of crimes against humanity, (not that he cares), but we have to query the silence on other matters. How about the incarceration of Japanese Americans post-Pearl Harbour, Hiroshima and Nagasaki? Innocent civilians … And it wasn’t just standard bombing, it was an A Bomb, with terrible consequences that had an impact for a very long time. What about Vietnam and Agent Orange? There are most certainly different strokes for different folks. Look at…

AN AUSTRALIAN sign language translator is surely due an award for failing to flinch or give the sign language equivalent of “Crikey, that critter pooped!” while providing translation of an out-of-doors news event in Brisbane The unnamed translator was in full spate, according to Sky News, when an owl perched in a tree above him chose to empty its bowels. Splatt! The translator suddenly had an unsightly splodge on his shoulder. But he carried on gamely as if nothing had happened. Or maybe sign language translators in Australia don’t yet have that kind of thing in their vocabulary of signals – no “Stone the flamin’ crows, mate! Starve the flamin’ lizards!” which is normal Aussie lingo to express surprise. Scary maths SOME rather scary mathematics come this way. World War…

Zama Ngcoya zama.ngcoya@inl.co.za The National Association of School Governing Bodies (NASGB) said that the funds allocated to the provincial Department of Education in KwaZulu-Natal are not sufficient to address all the shortcomings within the sector. General secretary of the association Matakanye Matakanya said that the amount allocated to the department was not enough to address all the pressing issues. “We feel that the budget is not enough. KZN is largely rural and deep rural, with working-class schools. Those schools must be modernised, improved and also they must really build additional schools so that more teachers can be hired, while also reducing the level of overcrowding in the classrooms,” said Matakanya. He said quality education would be achieved if the department ensures that all targets were met. Kwazi Mshengu, Education MEC,…

Sibusiso Mboto sibusiso.mboto@inl.co.za THE Zulu nation was eagerly awaiting the coronation of King Misuzulu, and no amount of opposition from the royal rebels would stop the process from reaching its logical conclusion, the royal house warned yesterday. This is after a faction opposed to the crowning of King Misuzulu mounted action to halt proceedings, leading to the coronation. The leader of the faction, Prince Mbonisi Zulu, was quoted in the media during the weekend as denying that there was a new king, insisting that there were only princes and princesses in the Zulu royal house, and that the rightful heir would be announced in line with royal traditions. It has since emerged that the faction has written to President Cyril Ramaphosa, denying that a new king has been appointed. The…

Households across North Africa are rushing to stock up on flour and other staples as food prices rise following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, both key wheat exporters to the region. The scramble is worse coming just weeks before the start of the holy month of Ramadaan, when Muslims traditionally break a dawn-to-dusk fast with lavish family meals. Tunisia, Morocco and Libya, along with several other Arab countries, import much of their wheat from Ukraine and Russia. Some fear the Russian invasion could lead to hunger and unrest – rising food prices played a role in several Arab uprisings in the past decade. In one supermarket in the Tunisian capital, the shelves were bare of flour or semolina, with only three packs of sugar. Store managers said the problem was “panic…

WASHINGTON: A woman in the US state of Nevada is charged with attempted murder after she stabbed her date in revenge for the assassination of Iranian top military official Qasem Soleimani, who was killed by a US drone attack in 2020, police said yesterday. According to the police, the suspect is 21-year-old Nika Nikoubin. She met the man on the dating site Plenty of Fish. The couple agreed to romantic date in a hotel on March 5. While at the hotel, Nikoubin blindfolded the man with a bandage and turned off the light. A few minutes later the man “felt a pain on the side of his neck”, the police said. The victim managed to call the emergency services.…

Thami Magubane thami.magubane@inl.co.za OPPOSITION party councillors deployed to the eThekwini Municipality’s economic development and planning committee have labelled the important body as dysfunctional, saying it was unable to discharge its mandate. The committee is the economic engine of the city and is supposed to drive economic growth. The councillors said meetings had been postponed and agendas arrived late, which had affected their ability to engage properly with items they were supposed to process. However, the municipality has dismissed allegations that the committee was dysfunctional, saying its operations were normal. DA councillor Siboniso Sibisi said he had resolved to write to the speaker of the municipality, Thabani Nyawose, to highlight the concerning issues. “That committee is on the verge of being dysfunctional and I have resolved to write to the…

Sibusiso Mboto sibusiso.mboto@inl.co.za The troubled Mangosuthu University of Technology (MUT) faces the huge task of settling a multimillion-rand water bill owed to eThekwini Municipality. A bill for March, which has been shown to The Mercury, indicates that the university was supposed to pay more than half-a-million rand for the month. According to the municipal bill, the institution owes the municipality a total of R7 879 977 and there were fears that MUT could have its water supply suspended if the account was not settled. It was unclear when the university last paid for its water account, but there are suspicions that it has been quite a while for the bill to have reached this frightening total. EThekwini Municipality would not indicate how much the institution owed the city and whether…

HEINZ DE BOER | DA KZN Spokesperson on Economic Development, Tourism and Environmental Affairs The public spat emerging between Msunduzi local residents and FFS Refineries over air pollution gives rise to more questions than answers. The people of Pietermaritzburg have not gone into this battle unarmed. They have extensively documented the significant and ongoing incidents of foul air in their neighbourhoods. This includes sore and burning eyes, burning nasal passages, difficulty in breathing and complaints of chemical and “burnt oil” smells which are reported on a daily basis. Whereas FFS Refineries has now strongly protested its innocence in the matter, it seems to not have provided any alternative sources as to what is obviously a serious health matter. Given that the FFS’s independent study allegedly established that other…

LIKE Hamlet’s moral dilemma, “to be or not be”, the West faces the Ukrainian conundrum. Should it stand and watch Ukraine disappear from the face of the Earth or should it take up arms and drive the Russians out of Ukraine? Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has made impassioned calls to the West to help his country. But Nato has drawn the line in the sand and says it cannot help it militarily as it is a non-Nato country. Even when Ukraine has repeatedly asked Nato to protect its skies from Russian planes, it has refused for fear of triggering a world war. Poland wanted to hand over all its MiG-29 fighter planes to Ukraine but the US refused to be party to it. It would mean that Nato was…

Zelda Venter zelda.venter@inl.co.za A SOUTH African mother scored a legal victory that will enable her to keep her son with her following an application by her estranged husband that the child be returned to him in the UK. The husband is a UK citizen and his wife South African. They were married in terms of Islamic rites. The parties later experienced marital problems and have been embroiled in litigation regarding their son, who turns 5 later this year, at the Swansea Family Court. The court issued an order that the parties will have shared custody. The mother brought her son with her to South Africa to obtain a work visa. This was refused, which meant that the woman could not return to the UK with her son. Her husband, however,…

PARIS: Princess Charlene has returned to Monaco to be with her husband, Prince Albert, and her children as her health improves, the royal palace said. Charlene, who married Monaco’s ruler Prince Albert in 2011, has been absent from the principality for months due to health problem. “The next few weeks should allow for Princess Charlene to further strengthen her health, before gradually resuming official duties,” the palace said in a statement. The palace has consistently denied media reports of a rift between Charlene and Prince Albert.…

LOS ANGELES: Matthew Lawrence, 42, avoided drugs because of Robin Williams. The actor starred alongside the late comedian – who took his own life in 2014 after years of struggling with addiction and depression – in the 1993 hit Mrs Doubtfire and remembers how Robin would open up to him about his pain when the cameras were off. “He was the first adult who really let me in on his condition … I’d visit him in his trailer to talk to him – it was really painful for him. He didn’t hide it. He talked to me about it” Matthew starred as Christopher in Mrs Doubtfire which saw Robin star as his out-of-work father who develops an alter-ego as an elderly woman to spend time with his children following…

Tehran: Iran’s Revolutionary Guards yesterday said that they targeted an Israeli “strategic centre” in Iraq with missiles, after Kurdish authorities in northern Iraq reported cross-border missile fire. A “strategic centre for conspiracy and mischiefs of the Zionists was targeted by powerful precision missiles fired by the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps,” said a statement on Sepah News. Earlier, security forces in Iraq’s autonomous Kurdistan region said “a dozen ballistic missiles” targeted Iraq’s northern city of Arbil, including US facilities, causing damage but no major casualties in the early hours of Sunday.…

Edward West edward.west@inl.co.za AN ACCELERATION of structural reforms could boost confidence, investment and drive faster economic growth, Sim Tshabalala, chief executive of the biggest bank on the continent by assets, Standard Bank Group, said on Friday. Geopolitical tensions, particularly in Ukraine, presented risks to this outlook he said at the release of the group’s results. The group operates in more than 20 African markets. “The situation in Russia and Ukraine is complex and evolving. We are monitoring the events to comply with all relevant local and international laws and guidelines,” he said. The group has limited direct exposure to Russia and Ukraine. However, potential secondary impacts across the countries where the bank operates were being assessed for example in financial markets, trade, transport logistics, commodity, and food prices. The Industrial…

MALCOLM MITCHELL | Hillcrest THERE is probably no one in South Africa who is not aware of the poor state of our provincial and urban roads. Almost daily this matter is highlighted in media outlets. Many professional engineers and eminent economists have opined that the state of these roads has a severe effect on our economy, because of excessively high road-user costs. In fact, good roads have worldwide been identified as the most significant catalyst, after education, in building a sound economy. Detailed condition surveys have classified a large portion of our provincial and municipal road networks as “not fit for purpose”, while our national roads are generally of world-class standard. The condition of road networks worldwide is judged by the percentage of the network falling into the…

EBRAHIM ESSA | Durban Jock Leyden was the master. A new cartoon every day. Excellent drawing. Amazing caricature. And most important – absolutely on point with some current political issues. I cannot draw, so I try writing about serious stuff in a hopefully tongue-in-cheek style. Perhaps some people will take this in the right spirit, smile, bite their tongue, and find it in themselves to improve some service delivery or examine inner prejudices that have a disastrously hurtful effect on people that feel marginalised. For instance the subject of potholes may seem like a problem that riles the motor vehicle driver only. But we must not forget the thousands of poor pedestrians who are forced to walk to work or return home on dangerous “pavements”. But a…

“OUR daughter, 16, has been seeing a young man of 17 for about 18 months. Our families have become really close and we like him a lot. They seemed perfect together. Our daughter has decided to end it which has been tough for him and his family and for us, her parents. “More for me, her mom, than her dad. I feel like she is breaking up with him because we like him so much. “She says there are things we don’t see about him. Should we encourage her to get back with him?” Listen to your daughter. Support her decision. If her breaking up with the young man means you cannot continue being friends as families, perhaps the friendship was not as close as you might have thought. Your…

Thami Magubane thami.magubane@inl.co.za THE latest report by the administrator of the Msunduzi Municipality detailing the state of the municipality has painted a bleak picture of a municipality that is still battling to stay afloat and deliver basic services, despite having been under administration for years. The report by the administrator, Scelo Duma, speaks of failure to deliver basic services, such as fixing potholes. The Mercury understands that the report was tabled before the executive committee last week and is to be tabled again before a full council meeting on Wednesday. The report has left councillors fuming, saying the intervention (putting the municipality under administration) had not achieved anything on behalf of the city’s residents. However, city officials said despite there being challenges, the report had not captured what had…

A COMMITTEE of expert advisers to the World Health Organization (WHO) will meet next month, as they have done every three months since January 2020, and they are expected to maintain that the Covid-19 pandemic is still a pandemic. As the virus wanes in some countries and spikes in others, global experts are of the opinion that it will be around for some time. Putting a timeline on how much longer the pandemic will merit that label is where these experts differ in their opinions. According to the article “When is a pandemic ‘over’?” published in the journal Science earlier this month: “At some point – estimates range from months to years from now – WHO will make a different call. Already, nations such as Denmark, the Netherlands, and the…

LVIV, Ukraine: A Russian missile attack on a large Ukrainian military facility near the border with Nato member Poland yesterday killed 35 people and wounded 134, a Ukrainian official said. Regional governor Maksym Kozytskyy said Russian planes fired about 30 rockets at the Yavoriv International Center for Peacekeeping and Security, and that some were intercepted. The 360km² facility less than 25km from the Polish border is one Ukraine’s biggest, and the largest in the western part of the country. The Kremlin did not immediately reply to a request for comment on the reported missile strike so close to the border with Nato, and a short video briefing by Russia’s defence ministry spokesperson yesterday made no mention of such an attack. Nineteen ambulances were seen by Reuters driving from the direction…

BANGKOK: Thailand: Nearly 60 elephants enjoyed a huge fruit banquet at a Thai botanical park yesterday as the country marked its annual Elephant Day. Elephants are a source of national pride and cultural identity for Thailand and are used for labour, transport, and battlefield triumphs by warriors and kings. The event is observed across the country, but due to the pandemic and economic woes, some regions have scaled down celebrations this year. At Nong Nooch Tropical Garden in eastern Chonburi province, elephants were treated to two tons of fruits and vegetables laid out on an 8m wide table.…

MANAGUA, Nicaragua: Cristiana Chamorro, the most prominent of dozens of political activists arrested by Nicaragua’s government, has been found guilty of money laundering and other charges, as part of a judicial offensive that could derail any serious challenge to President Daniel Ortega for years. Chamorro, 68, is the daughter of former president Violeta Chamorro and a member of one of the best-known political dynasties in Central America. She was placed under house arrest in June, as she was emerging as a leading candidate in presidential elections. After locking up his potential opponents, Ortega cruised to a fourth term in November. Cristiana, her brother Pedro Joaquin Chamorro, and three other people who were involved with the foundation were found guilty on Friday. She faces up to 13 years in jail,…