Indice dei contenuti per 2023-01-25 in Cape Times

SEASONED scribes have used terms such as “an exercise in obscenity”, “insensitive” and “plain stupid” in commenting on the proposed South African Naval exercise with Russian and Chinese warships next month in the so-called Operation Mosi II. The ministers of defence and international relations and their minions seem to deem Mosi II as being so important that the country is prepared to break international neutrality conventions to work with an aggressor-state. They have ignored widespread condemnation of the decision to undertake exercises with a warmongering country that has killed thousands of Ukrainian civilians, including many, many children. In their spin to justify the naval exercise, local defence folks blandly pointed to military exercises with France and other countries, conveniently omitting to mention that those countries were not engaged in savage…

CHARLES Thomas’s January 23 letter in the Cape Times refers. He writes about the decline in China’s population by 850 000 in 2022 but offers no explanation. Thomas Malthus’s Essay on the Principle of Population, written in 1798, said at the time, that population, when left unchecked increases in a geometric ratio while subsistence only increases in a mathematical ratio. Enlarging on the profundity of this pronouncement, Malthus goes on to say that there will always be a predicted perpetual struggle for room and food as a result of exponential population growth against linear growth of food. This wisdom was written in the midst of a global population explosion, led at the time by China, India and the Islamic nations. But today, these same nations, led by China – realising…

THERE is a shortage of more than 400 000 beds for student accommodation at South African universities, with rural-based tertiary institutions and TVET colleges being worst affected. This was revealed during a briefing yesterday, where Higher Education Minister Blade Nzimande provided an update on the state of readiness at higher-learning institutions for the 2023 academic year. It comes a week after basic education released the National Senior Certificate (NSC) matric results. The Matric class of 2022 saw 278 815 pupils achieve bachelor’s passes and 197 357 diploma passes. Nzimande congratulated these pupils, but he acknowledged universities might not have the capacity or space to absorb all of the candidates. He said challenges included students oversubscribing to universities, and also requirements for certain courses. More than 1.1 million enrolment spaces are…

Load shedding here to stay while politically connected people benefit from it While Eskom is contributing to the destruction of the economy through unending load shedding, it had the nerve to approach the National Energy Regulator of South Africa (Nersa) for an above-inflation 18.65% electricity tariff increase. It escaped Eskom that load shedding means the reduction of service delivery and the disruption of households and industries. Load shedding pushes the cost of production higher, without a corresponding increase in the quality and quantity of the product. The unfortunate result is that industries either close or pass the production costs on to consumers. That causes a rise in unemployment and poverty, as well as worsening inequality between the haves and have-nots. While Eskom and Nersa are not blameless for the…

France yesterday repatriated 15 women and 32 children held in a prison camp for suspected jihadists in Syria, the foreign ministry said, in the third major return of French citizens from the country. Rights groups have been pressing for years for France to take back the wives and children of alleged Islamic State group fighters held in the camps, since the jihadist movement was ousted from its self-declared “caliphate” in 2019. But the government refused a blanket repatriation, saying the return of potentially radicalised IS family members would pose security risks in France, which has seen a wave of jihadist attacks since 2015. Instead it said individual cases would be examined, leading to the first group repatriation of 16 mothers and 35 children from Syria in July 2022, and a…

LONDON: Britain’s Princess Eugenie, a niece of King Charles, is expecting her second child with her husband Jack Brooksbank later this year, Buckingham Palace said yesterday. Eugenie married Brooksbank at Windsor Castle in 2018 and their first child, a son named August, was born in February 2021. Eugenie, 11th in line to the British throne, is the younger daughter of the king’s brother Prince Andrew and his ex-wife Sarah Ferguson, the Duchess of York. “We’re so excited to share that there will be a new addition to our family this summer,” Eugenie said on her Instagram page. | Reuters…

CANBERRA: Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese announced new restrictions yesterday to curb a crime crisis in central Australia. Albanese met with community leaders in Alice Springs, the largest city in the Australian Outback, to discuss a spike of alcohol-fuelled violence in the region. The visit came after days of intense pressure from the opposition for the federal government to intervene in the crisis. According to police, assaults in Alice Springs have increased by 43% over the past year. Alcohol sales will now be limited to one transaction per person per day. Monday and Tuesday will be “takeaway alcohol-free days”. | Xinhua…

ROME: Italy is mourning the death in a road accident of a rare brown bear that made international headlines when it broke into a bakery and feasted on biscuits. The Marsican bear, which had been named Juan Carrito, was hit by an Opel Corsa car on a mountain road near Castel di Sangro, in central Italy, on Monday evening. The 150kg bear was captured last year and taken to a more remote region after his bakery break-in but the 4-year-old liked to return to his old haunts in search of food. Before the accident, he had been seen at a ski resort at the weekend. There are believed to be only about 50 Marsican bears left in Italy. | Reuters…

from page 1 The Coal Operations manager was dismissed and the Contract Supply Unit manager resigned after being interviewed by the SIU and before a disciplinary referral was made. SIU boss advocate Andy Mothibi said: “If we look at the civil litigation process, the amounts of irregular contracts count up to more than R13 billion. “The legal team… are under instruction that we go back and identify all of those that have been implicated to date, we need to see action… As part of consequence management, all those assets they amassed illegally we must ensure we freeze them and recover.” The SIU has recommended stringent measures including routine voice stress analyses and lie detector tests for employees as part of stopping the malfeasance. “Thorough vetting of officials upon entering Eskom…

THE rot within Eskom was laid bare when the Special Investigating Unit (SIU) presented its report to the Standing Committee on Public Accounts (SCOPA) yesterday, detailing unlawful and irregular contracts awarded in key sectors and how the power utility’s employees apparently colluded with suppliers on a mammoth scale. In some instances Eskom officials approached complete strangers to set up subcontractors and bank accounts through which to channel funds to officials, according to the SIU. “These links can only be identified from a review of bank accounts, email communications, cell phone records etc. What further complicates the identification of conflicts is that Eskom vendors often pay kickbacks to officials indirectly e.g. by paying the creditors of the official directly (e.g. by paying the official’s child’s school fees or by paying the…

IT IS necessary to make the right choices in life. Under President Ramaphosa, however, the ANC has taken the wrong turn and South Africans but especially the poor, will bear the brunt. Russia has invaded Ukraine, a prosperous, civilised country and now Russian foreign affairs minister Sergey Lavrov has the audacity to pay us a visit. Russia does not count as an imperialist state but now they have seen the gap and they are certainly eyeing Africa and Ukraine`s riches. Don’t be fooled, President Ramaphosa. Putin does not have Africans’ wellbeing at heart. Putin is the pinnacle of a dangerous, corrupt empire where freedom of speech is taboo. Lately Putin is even regarded as the new “czar”. Lavrov is the representative of Putin’s evil system and we should slam the…

WITHOUT running water for nearly two weeks, Beaufort West residents are at their wits’ end and say the measures their municipality has put in place to address the situation are not sufficient. The municipality scheduled a community meeting that was to take place last night, addressing the water crisis as an agenda point. Resident Mayvie Johnson said the unhygienic state in which residents had to live reminded them of the drought about five years ago. “The situation is dire. People cannot live like this. It is a highly frustrating situation that the municipality cannot seem to solve. They have put water tankers in the area, but this only services certain areas, and sometimes not all of the people can get water. “It is disgraceful that we have to beg for…

THE LAWYER representing a man accused of assaulting an EFF member during a violent protest in front of Brackenfell High School in 2021 says his client has been cleared of all charges. Dante van Wyk, who recently appeared in the Kuils River Magistrate’s Court, was aquitted, according to his lawyer. Van Wyk was among those captured on video participating in clashes with the EFF outside the school over allegations of racism. The protest was triggered by reports of a matric dance that was only attended by white pupils. Van Wyk’s lawyer, Millie Westley, said he was acquitted of all charges against him. “The State failed to prove beyond reasonable doubt that it was indeed Mr Van Wyk who assaulted the complainant,” she said. Westley added that Van Wyk has received…

Ukraine dismissed more than a dozen senior officials including governors of several major battlefield provinces yesterday in the biggest shake-up of its wartime leadership since Russia’s invasion last year. Separately yesterday, a long-awaited decision on whether allies could send German-made heavy tanks to Ukraine finally confronted Berlin, after Poland said it had formally sent its request to the German government. Among Ukrainian officials who resigned or were dismissed yesterday were the governors of the Kyiv, Sumy, Dnipropetrovsk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions. Kherson, Zaporizhzhia and adjacent Dnipropetrovsk are front-line provinces now; Kyiv and Sumy were major battlefields earlier in the war. A deputy defence minister, a deputy prosecutor, a deputy head of President Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s office and two deputy ministers responsible for regional development were among the others who left. Some,…

The judge probing the 2020 Beirut blast has charged Lebanon’s top public prosecutor, the then-premier and other senior current and former officials in connection with the devastating explosion that killed 220 people and shattered parts of Beirut, judicial sources said and court summons show. Judge Tarek Bitar unexpectedly resumed an inquiry this week after it was paralysed for more than a year by political resistance and legal complaints filed by top officials he was seeking to question. The explosion on August 4, 2020 was caused by hundreds of tons of ammonium nitrate that had been stored at the port in poor conditions since it was unloaded in 2013. So far, no senior official has been held to account. Bitar has charged former prime minister Hassan Diab, former interior minister Nouhad…

Wellington: A teary-eyed Jacinda Ardern yesterday made her last speech as the Prime Minister of New Zealand with successor Chris Hipkins beside her. The outgoing Labour leader on her last day as prime minister said her departure should not be viewed as a negative commentary on New Zealand. “I have experienced such love, compassion, empathy and kindness when I’ve been in this job, that has been my predominant experience,” Ardern said while visiting the Ratana temple with Hipkins. Ardern said she would still be an MP for Mt Albert, but would be away from the centre of politics. Hipkins said he and Ardern had reflected on the past few years, adding “it’s a bittersweet moment”. Inflation and social inequality saw Ardern’s popularity fall to all-time lows, according to opinion polls.…

ADDIS ABABA: After five consecutive years of below-average rains, the humanitarian crisis in the Horn of Africa is expanding and deepening, the UN World Food Program (WFP) has warned. The impact of the drought on food and nutrition security has been devastating, it said. Across Ethiopia, Kenya and Somalia, an estimated 22 million people are now acutely food-insecure because of the drought. It warned of the critical malnutrition situation affecting some 5.1 million children across drought-hit areas of the three countries. The WFP appealed for $2.4 billion (R41.4bn) to help avert a major crisis across the Horn of Africa. | Xinhua…

from page 1 “I will try (and) answer (by) referring to risk. The 9200MW coming online, (we) anticipate that the trend will continue to grow with huge activity investing in new capacity, (so) risk will diminish in the next 18 months. On whether load shedding would be eliminated, De Ruyter said that would be a “brave” forecast to make. EFF MP Nazier Paulsen asked: “The poor pay more the wealthy pay less, why is that? Mr De Ruyter, you telling me an end to load shedding is out of (your) hands, is not very comforting to me as a citizen. ”The President said his hands are tied, (you say) it’s out of your hands so who’s going to be our saviour and give us our electricity?” De Ruyter responded that…

Juan van Schalkwyk of the Freedom Front Plus (FF+) was sworn in as the new speaker of the DA-run Swellendam Municipality yesterday along with DA councillors Agnes Bokwana and David Julius. The officials were appointed, replacing ousted speaker Bongani Sonqwenqwe, deputy mayor Gcobisa Mangcu-Qotyiwe and councillor Abraham Pokwas whose DA memberships were terminated last month after they voted against a caucus decision. The municipality said the party informed it that the councillors’ memberships “had been terminated”; they therefore no longer hold office at municipality on behalf of the DA. The three positions were declared by the municipal manager as vacancies to the IEC, and in the case of Pokwas, additionally, to Local Government MEC Anton Bredell, municipal spokesperson, Bianca McKechnie had said. Meanwhile Sonqwenqwe, Mangcu- Qotyiwe and Pokwas were at…

I MUST say I disliked seeing the photo in the Cape Times yesterday of both our Minister of International Relations and Co-operation Naledi Pandor and her Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov in Pretoria grinning away, so happy to see one another. Well I, being a South African, am not happy to be inviting the Russians for chats! When I see what is going on in Ukraine our government needs to take a step back. Instead, we are vowing to maintain and strengthen our 30-year economic relations with Russia. We need to say what is right and what is wrong. How can the crushing of another country be right? By allowing the Russians here we are saying we agree with them on their stance in Ukraine. Well, here is one South African…

AFRICAN democracies have often battled with the concept of democracy and this is why I am particularly proud that the AU has a well-established principle of rejecting unconstitutional changes of government. It is this instrumental fact that sets the organisation apart from its predecessor, the Organisation of African Unity. The principles of rejection are best captured through frameworks that are noted in the AU instrument. These include the Lomé Declaration of 2000, the constitutive act of the AU; the African Charter on Democracy, Elections and Governance; the Ecowas Democracy and Good Governance Protocols; and the Protocol on Amendments to the Protocol on the Statute of the African Court of Justice and Human Rights, also referred to as the Malabo Protocol. The frameworks have been rigorously expanded in recent years, to…

Just two days after a gunman killed 11 people at a Los Angeles-area dance studio, seven more victims were shot dead in an agricultural area near San Francisco, as California suffered one of its bloodiest spates of mass gun violence in decades. Authorities said they had not identified the motive for either of the rampages. The attacks seemed especially baffling in part because the suspects in each were men of retirement age, much older than is typical for perpetrators of deadly mass shootings that have become numbingly routine in the US. California Governor Gavin Newsom said he was visiting wounded survivors from Saturday night’s massacre in the Los Angeles suburb of Monterey Park when he was informed of Monday’s killings in northern California. “Tragedy upon tragedy,” Newsom wrote on Twitter.…

Russia’s top diplomat yesterday pledged security training to Eswatini, just days after the brutal murder of a leading human rights lawyer and opposition politician. Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov was speaking in Africa’s last absolute monarchy two days after Thulani Maseko was shot. “Russia is prepared to assist Eswatini in training of security personnel, improving food production and also assistance on other issues of mutual co-operation,” Lavrov said. After talks with Eswatini’s prime minister and other cabinet members, he said 50 Eswatini security personnel were studying at Russian defence universities. Responding to a question on the political crisis in Eswatini, the minister said: “As a matter of principle, we do not interfere with the political situations of any country.” | AFP…

Bangkok: Fighting has flared in recent days between Myanmar junta forces and rebels opposed to their rule, officials and locals said yesterday, with reports that large numbers of civilians have fled the violence. Myanmar has been in turmoil since Aung San Suu Kyi’s civilian government was toppled in an army coup almost two years ago. Long-established ethnic rebel groups, as well as dozens of “People’s Defence Forces”, have emerged in opposition and clash frequently with the military. The last few days have seen intense clashes in south-east Karen state, around Kyonedoe and the border town of Payathonzu. | AFP…

London: Two hundred children who arrived in the UK seeking asylum without their parents in the past 18 months are missing, Immigration Minister Robert Jenrick said yesterday. Thirteen of them are under 16 and one is a girl, he told parliament, adding that they were mostly Albanian. The Observer newspaper said young asylum-seekers were being “kidnapped” by criminal gangs outside their hotel in Brighton in southern England. Jenrick acknowledged that since July 2021 there had been “440 missing occurrences”, where asylum seekers did not return to their hotels, where they are staying voluntarily. | AFP…