Indice dei contenuti per 2021-07-08 in Mercury

Siphelele Dludla siphelele.dludla@inl.co.za SOUTH Africa’s liquidity position remained stable in June as the country’s gross reserves increased marginally, though gold reserves slipped. The SA Reserve Bank (SARB) said yesterday that the country’s gross reserves ticked up 0.6 percent to $54.47 billion (about R778bn) in June, from $51.14bn in May. SARB said the gross reserves were boosted by a rise in foreign exchange reserves from $43.88bn to $44.82bn due to proceeds received from foreign borrowings from the New Development Bank. In mid-June, the government received its $1bn economic recovery loan from the New Development Bank to support economic growth through employment generation. At the same time, the forward position declined due to foreign exchange swops conducted for sterilisation and liquidity management purposes. Investec economist Kamilla Kaplan said South Africa’s…

Siphelele Dludla siphelele.dludla@inl.co.za SCHRODERS has warned that many countries, including South Africa, were fiscally ill-prepared for the next cyclical downturn as the world economy emerges from the great lockdown. The global investment manager said yesterday that economic growth progress remained patchy across the world. Schroders chief economist Keith Wade said the overall picture was one of developed markets outperforming emerging markets, with economies like India and Brazil struggling to contain the virus. Wade said the other fault line opened up by the pandemic had been inequality within economies, which has likely increased on both an income and wealth metric. “In emerging markets, Brazil, South Africa and Chile are expected to be running a deficit smaller than in 2019 by 2025, though Mexico and Indonesia will be close,” Wade said. “Brazil…

Ntombi Nkosi ntombi.nkosi@inl.co.za Suspended ANC member and Umkhonto weSizwe Military Veterans’ Association (MKMVA) spokesperson Carl Niehaus has confirmed that he is going to appeal his suspension immediately. Yesterday, Niehaus was suspended by the ANC’s national executive committee (NEC) with immediate effect. “I will appeal this suspension by the ANC with immediate effect,” Niehaus said. “I will remain a dedicated liberation fighter. I have been a member of the ANC for 42 years and the suspension is wrong. I was merely communicating a collective message of the MKMVA,” Niehaus said. The ANC confirmed the suspension after a letter from ANC deputy secretary-general Jessie Duarte said Niehaus’s utterances at Nkandla over the weekend brought the party into disrepute and, therefore, the party had decided to suspend his membership. “The NEC has noted…

“I’LL get you back”, “just you wait” and “don’t think I will forget this” are things you might recall saying at school during playtime or break when you were very young and there were many conflicts. Much of what urged such expressions was probably forgotten by the time the bell rang and you lined up for class, for such is often the way of children at play. Some adults still say these things, but often it is to themselves and, yes, they often do act upon the resolve to get someone back or get even. It can become a way of life, a lens through which life is lived and experienced. Such living turns some people into enemies, adversaries and, at the least, objects of score settling. “Return to no…

FAROUK ARAIE Benoni THE geo-strategic domain of world politics in the light of the rapidly changing balance of power has become increasingly complex and multidimensional. Since the Korean war, the US has lost about every war that it has fought in the developing world. It has epitomised the tragedy of the world’s sole superpower’s incapability in asymmetric conflicts. The hasty withdrawal from Afghanistan is a tactical retreat without having achieved it’s original objectives.The power vacuum created will begin a deadly contest for supremacy in this strategic area. The West and Nato would be foolish to open a new front by attacking Iran, any new massive military conflict in this area will usher in a war of immense proportions. Nato’s defeat in the Afghanistan conflict, serves as a sombre reminder, that…

Tourists visiting the picturesque port at Cassis, southern France, often see an unedifying sight – plastic bags, discarded drinks bottles, and even used surgical masks, floating in the water among the boats in the marina. But the port has found a solution, in the shape of a bright yellow remote-controlled electric-powered boat that weaves around the harbour sucking the rubbish into a net that it trails behind its twin hulls. The boat, called Jellyfishbot, is about the size of a suitcase and so can get into the corners and narrow spaces where rubbish tends to accumulate but are difficult for cleaners to reach. “It can go everywhere,” said Nicolas Carlesi, whose company, IADYS, created the boat. It is not the only device of its kind. San Diego non-profit Clear Blue…

In an operation aimed at weeding out illegal mining, police have arrested three foreign nationals and a South African in Limpopo after they were found with heavy-duty trucks laden with unprocessed chrome. “The determination of members of the SAPS to eradicate activities of illegal mining led to the arrest of four suspects during operations that were conducted by members of public order policing on Tuesday night along the R37 road in the Apel policing area,” said Limpopo police spokesperson Brigadier Motlafela Mojapelo. “The members spotted three trucks along the road and pulled them over. The trucks were found with loads of suspected unprocessed chrome and it was confiscated. The suspects were then apprehended.” These arrests would go a long way in eradicating illegal mining activities in the province, said Limpopo…

Zintle Mahlati zintle.mahlati@inl.co.za The Unemployment Insurance Fund (UIF) will dip into its reserves to help finance an estimated R4.2 billion to R5.3bn extension of the Ters relief scheme. The fund has paid out billions of rand since the Covid-19 Ters benefit scheme was introduced in March 2020. It has been extended a few times since March 2020, with the latest extension expected soon. Partners at the National Economic Development and Labour Council (Nedlac), the labour negotiations centre consisting of labour, business and government, have agreed to extend the scheme. The partners had been in discussion over the issue for months, but calls grew louder with the announcement of a move to level 4 of the lockdown due to rising Covid-19 infections. Sectors that have been unable to operate include the…

There is concern over the H5N1 avian flu strain and the impact it could have on the great white pelicans population in the Western Cape. CapeNature and other conservation organisations – including the Southern African Foundation for the Conservation of Coastal Birds – are monitoring and taking action to effectively respond to the H5N1 strain of the highly pathogenic avian influenza affecting birds in South Africa. The H5N1 strain has been detected in sick and dead wild birds, but to date the impact had not been as severe as that of the 2017/18 H5N8 strain. There are only an estimated 370 great white pelicans breeding pairs residing in the province, and already 40 out of a group of 100 birds have succumbed to the flu. This strain of avian flu…

Jeremy Gordon | Sea Point About 20 countries are now using ivermectin to treat Covid-19 with good results, despite the fact the World Health Organization has not approved its use. They include Mexico, Guatemala, Argentina, Brazil, Bolivia, Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Portugal, Nigeria and Egypt. In South Africa, doctors are allowed to prescribe ivermectin but it is not being rolled out everywhere and in hospitals and clinics. According to Jackie Stone, a doctor in Zimbabwe, since January when ivermectin began to be used, it has cut Covid-19 hospital admissions and deaths over 70%. A meta analysis of clinical trials just released by the BIRD group in the UK concluded that ivermectin has an over 70% success rate in preventing deaths in hospitalised patients. Ivermectin can also be used…

A small pen-and-ink drawing attributed to Leonardo da Vinci, which lay buried unrecognised in a box for decades, is at the centre of a battle between its owner and France’s culture ministry that was set to play out in a Paris court yesterday. The court will begin hearing if the drawing of a martyred Saint Sebastian lashed to a tree is allowed to leave France for eventual purchase by a foreign buyer. The piece was among several drawings and engravings that Jean B, the owner, who is in his 80s and has asked not to be fully named, received as a gift from his father for passing his medical school exams in 1959. Being more of a rock enthusiast than an art lover at the time, the young doctor forget…

Lusaka: Zambia’s founding leader Kenneth Kaunda was laid to rest at the country’s presidential burial site yesterday despite an 11th-hour bid by some of his relatives to block the interment. Kaunda, who was also a hero of the struggle against white rule in southern Africa, died last month at the age of 97. Some of his relatives had wanted him buried at his farm next to his late wife Betty, with whom he had 10 children. But the burial proceeded without incident at Embassy Park, a special cemetery dedicated for the country’s leaders. His children paid glowing tribute to Kaunda, portraying him as a fighter and teacher whose attributes should be emulated. “Go well, you fought the good fight of faith, you have finished the race. We will miss you…

NEW DELHI: Three Indian farmers in the dry western state of Gujarat have been arrested for selling illegal alcohol after their own buffaloes got drunk on the hooch, police said. One of the men called a local vet after their buffaloes started to “act strangely and their mouths started frothing”, local police official Dilipsinh Baldev said. The vet then inspected the water trough that the animals had been drinking from and “observed a strange smell and found the water to be coloured”. This, it turned out, was because the men had hidden bottles of moonshine in the trough and some of them had broken, contaminating the water.…

THE British & Irish Lions tour seems to be on the precipice as Covid-19 continues to encumber the best laid plans of SA Rugby. Yesterday, SA Rugby officially cancelled the second Test match between the Springboks and Georgia, and to further compound matters, the B&I Lions also announced that one member of their management team had also returned a positive Test hours before their scheduled match against the Sharks. Four members of that squad, including two players, were entered into isolation, with the team undergoing a fresh set of tests to ascertain whether they would be able to honour the Sharks encounter. It was a second blow to the tourists' preparations. On Tuesday afternoon their tour match against the Bulls - originally scheduled to be played on…

Kim Kardashian West is shutting down KKW Beauty and will relaunch a “completely new brand” over the coming months. The 40-year-old star has told fans to bid farewell to her cosmetics range – which she founded in 2017 – as she’s planning to relaunch the line over the coming months. She announced in a statement shared to her social media accounts: “To our loyal customers, It all started with a contour kit and expanded to eyes, lips, body, and many incredible collections over the past four years. “On August 1st at midnight we will be shutting down the KKWBeauty.com site so that we can come back to you under a completely new brand with new formulas that are more modern, innovative, and packaged in an elevated and sustainable new look.”…

I HAD my second Covid-19 jab this week. This time I didn’t blub. Things went like clockwork down at Addington nurses’ home, even better than for the first jab. Who do we credit for this? I guess the provincial hospital service. You hear all these horror stories from elsewhere, but here it was like a well-oiled machine. The nurse asked if I’d had any adverse effects from the first jab. I told her none. Actually, having been vaccinated in my left arm, I’d kept feeling a corresponding tenderness and pain in my right. Weird or what? Could this be an awakening of the memory of a long-ago childhood vaccination? But rather not go down this path, they’re fighting Covid-19, not hallucinations. And now we fully vaccinated madalas expect that on…

NORMAN MAHLANGU Mpumalanga IF YOU were harassed and abused severely by a thug but then another tragedy befalls you and you hear the voice of the very same thug knocking at the door, alleging that they are here to help this time, would you happily jump up and open the door? The fact that the nation is sceptical about steps the government has taken regarding Covid-19 should serve as a lesson on how much trust it has lost. The citizens have languished for years due to the misuse of taxes, looting of the resources and corruption. Today the government whose municipalities continue to show no mercy is knocking at the door claiming to be a good Samaritan. Who is fooling who? Trust is earned, not demanded!…

FAROUK CASSIM | Cape Town As a councillor serving on the Energy and Climate Change Portfolio Committee, I spend a lot of time reading about energy and climate change. An article in Clean Energy Wire, October 25, 2018 showed tha t ordinary citizens in Germany have been involved in “Energiewende”. They are banding together to invest in large-scale installations in solar parks and wind turbines and are doing so mostly through energy co-operatives or limited liability companies. In the South Africa, a large group could band together to invest in a solar farm in the Northern Cape and “wheel” the electricity generated to the city. Excess energy could be converted into yellow hydrogen. Interestingly, citizens in Germany own 50% of voting shares in the energy projects they invest…

Billionaires around the world have seen their wealth soar during the Covid-19 pandemic while the most vulnerable people face poverty and years of hardship, according to a report by Oxfam International. The humanitarian agency said the 10 richest men, including Amazon's Jeff Bezos, Tesla founder Elon Musk, Microsoft's Bill Gates and Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, saw their net worth increase by $540 billion (R7.7 trillion). Meanwhile, in India and South Africa, where poverty has been a major challenge, the gap between the poor and the rich expanded further. The growth of billionaire wealth during a global pandemic that saw many individuals without jobs and income has drawn the ire of Oxfam International. On Tuesday CNN reported that Mukesh Ambani, chairperson of the conglomerate Reliance Industries, is now worth more than…

THE SA Revenue Service (Sars) has partnered with the US Internal Revenue Service Criminal Investigation Division (IRS-CI) to combat transnational crimes. In a joint statement issued by Sars and the IRS-CI, the organisations said their collaboration was aimed at identifying and investigating international public corruption, cyber fraud and money laundering, with a focus on non-compliant, wealthy individuals and offshore tax evasion. Sars commissioner Edward Kieswetter said one of their strategic objectives was to make it easy for taxpayers to adhere to their tax obligations and make it difficult and costly for those who intentionally refused to adhere. “We trust that this partnership will yield results, also in terms of augmenting our internal skill sets as we clamp down on illegal activities affecting both our countries,” said Kieswetter. IRS-CI Director of…

UN SECRETARY-GENERAL Antonio Guterres has spoken about his “concern” regarding the developments in the Kingdom of eSwatini. In a statement through spokesperson Stephane Dujarric, the UN chief said he was following developments in eSwatini “with increasing concern”. “The UN remains committed to working with the government and the people of eSwatini, and all partners, to ensure a peaceful resolution,” he said. The Swaziland Youth Congress (Swayoco) said the situation in eSwatini needed clear, decisive action to avoid a humanitarian crisis. On its Facebook page yesterday, Swayoco said there would be a march to the department of international relations and co-operation in Pretoria, today, to demand proper evaluation of the situation in eSwatini. Pro-democracy protests erupted in eSwatini in early May.…

Mercury Correspondent A STUDY led by a University of Pretoria (UP) master’s student, using South Africa’s MeerKAT telescope, has led to the discovery of a group of 20 galaxies. It is the first time this group has been identified, despite being in a very well-studied area of space, and is likely the most neutral hydrogen gas-rich group ever discovered. The research was led by Shilpa Ranchod, an MSc student at UP’s Department of Physics, supervised by Professor Roger Deane, founder of the UP Radio Astronomy Research Group. “The distribution of neutral hydrogen gas in these galaxies has revealed interesting, disturbed morphologies suggesting that these galaxies are group members and are being influenced by their cosmic neighbours in the group. “For example, we found an interacting pair of galaxies that will…

Mushtak Parker WILL he or won’t he go to jail? Millions of South Africans are pondering this following the country’s highest judicial institution, the Constitutional Court, handing former president Jacob Zuma a 15-month prison sentence for contempt of court last week. The next few days will bear witness to whether, in the words of Lord Hewart, the Lord Chief Justice of England in 1924, the judgment “is not merely of some importance but of fundamental importance that justice should not only be done, but should manifestly and undoubtedly be seen to be done”. Zuma has been showing two fingers to the Constitutional Court, South African justice and the Constitution for more than a decade. The usual mantra of “witch-hunts” and politically motivated actions are the refuge of scoundrels and based…

Sandra Thomas | Claremont The vaccination roll-out began in late May for those people who are 60 and over and those people are now due for their 2nd jabs. Unfortunately for them, the fifties and over were told to register from July 1 and that their roll-out would start on July 15. Not so, they have been encouraged to do walk-ins and the result is that sixties and over are being sidelined. The sixties and over are not able to get appointments close to their homes and if they phone the centres they are told to come on some date much later than the specified 42 days, because, not only are fifties and over doing walk-ins, they are also getting appointments earlier than the 15th of July.…

North Korea is facing a food shortage of around 860 000 tons this year, the UN’s Food and Agricultural Organisation forecast, warning the country could experience a “harsh lean period from August to October”. The impoverished country, which is under multiple sets of international sanctions over its nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programmes, has long struggled to feed itself, suffering chronic food shortages. Last year, the Covid-19 pandemic and a series of summer storms and floods put more pressure on the flagging economy, and Pyongyang admitted last month it was tackling a “current food crisis”. Pyongyang shut its borders in January last year to protect itself against the pandemic and as a result, trade with Beijing, its economic lifeline, has slowed to a trickle while all international aid workers have…

The Netherlands’ King Willem-Alexander yesterday condemned the attack on crime reporter Peter R. de Vries as an attack on democracy that had shocked him deeply. De Vries, the best-known crime reporter in the Netherlands and winner of an international Emmy award for his work investigating the disappearance of teenager Natalee Holloway in Aruba in 2005, was shot on an Amsterdam street on Tuesday evening. He was taken to a hospital, where he was fighting for his life, Amsterdam mayor Femke Halsema said. “This is an attack on journalism, a cornerstone of our rule of law”, King Willem-Alexander told reporters during a state visit to Berlin. “And as such it is an attack on our constitutional order.” The Dutch royal house does not generally comment on individual incidents, so the king’s…

LONDON: British parliamentarians grilled Prime Minister Boris Johnson yesterday, following the announcement that Covid restrictions are to be lifted July 19. The leader of the opposition, Labour’s Keir Starmer has branded the Delta strain, “the Johnson variant”, suggesting that the PM allowed it to run rampant in the UK. Starmer’s point during the PM’s Questions was that Johnson failed to put the Indian variant on the red travel list soon enough. ​Johnson shrugged off the criticism, saying the government “will continue with a balanced and reasonable approach”, praising the mass vaccination programme.…

A business-like Novak Djokovic threatened to short-change over 14 000 fans who had forked out £170 for yesterday's Centre Court tickets when, after only 19 minutes of action, he stood on the cusp of bagging the first set 6-0. Trailing 0-5 and 15-40 on serve, it seemed like Marton Fucsovics's first foray into a grand slam quarter-final would be short and not very sweet. But somehow the 29-year-old avoided disappearing into a Wimbledon sinkhole for two hours and 17 minutes before Djokovic pushed him over the edge for a 6-3 6-4 6-4 win that secured him a place in the All England Club semi-finals for a 10th time. Playing in his 50th grand slam quarter-final, Djokovic recorded a century of tour-level wins on grass and his 315th victory at a…

Dineo Faku dineo.faku@inl.co.za THE DEPARMENT of Mineral Resources and Energy (DMRE) said yesterday that it planned to collapse existing state-owned entities in the oil and gas sector into a new national oil company that would become a key player in the entire value chain. The department said the entity, to be called the South African National Petroleum Company, would be formed from the merger of Central Energy Fund (CEF) subsidiaries PetroSA, IGas and the Strategic Fuel Fund (SFF) into the single entity. Ntokozo Ngcwabe, DMRE deputy director-general: mineral policy and promotions, said the new company would ensure that South Africa played in the petroleum space and maximised value of its own resource potential. Ngcwabe said the department wanted the company to play in the upstream space. “In the upstream space…

Thami Magubane thami.magubane@inl.co.za A FORENSIC investigation into the recruitment of more than 500 eThekwini metro police officers has arrived at damning findings, revealing that some of those appointed were allegedly not interviewed for the job. There were two recruitment processes between 2017 and 2019. During the first recruitment, 207 officers were appointed, and during the second recruitment process 383 officers were appointed. Among the irregularities the investigation found was that some of the applicants who were interviewed did not appear among the applicants who underwent a physical fitness test. Some applicants were allegedly given preferential treatment, with some men being allowed to run the women’s time during the fitness test, and some applicants underwent a physical training test after the official test had taken place. These allegations are contained in…

EBRAHIM ESSA | Durban ACTOR Dilip Kumar’s death yesterday marks the final finale to an India born, like Dilip, in the mid 1940s. Discovered by Bombay Talkies' co-owner Ashok Kumar, Dilip represented an India that promised to be secular in every respect. However, his change of name from Yusuf to Dilip was a contradiction to that idea. Nearly all his roles utilised a Hindu character. The glaring exception being the prince in Moghul-e Azam. With the exception of Sungursh his character never represented a strong religious Hindu. Being a Hindu character on screen made it easier for most to accept him as “one of theirs”, but his roles were never based on religious conflict. He was mainly a tragic romantic hero. While a young student in India, I…

GLEN CHRISTIE | Durban North THE mind boggles at those in charge in this country when it comes to spending the taxpayers’ money. I stand to be corrected but the tax base in this country is about 18% – which means this 18% is paying for the balance of 82% of the population and also bearing in mind that our country is broke. Now we have these Cubans here leeching away at the finances that do not exist. The following is the latest: Basic Education Department is paying maths and science specialists (19) R13.9 million. Water and Sanitation Department is paying R64.6m. Health Department is paying 119 medical people R83m. Defence Force has Cuban mechanics doing repairs. In total, excluding the undisclosed costs of those Cubans working…

COMETH DUBE-MAKHOLWA Midrand We are dealing with a hopeless, catastrophic situation in which the people in charge simply have no understanding of how deadly and critical our health-care services have become. Everyone knows without a doubt that no politician is endowed with the gift of knowing everything, but the principle of cadre deployment assumes that politicians can handle any portfolio they are assigned to; hence we have a tourism minister acting as a health minister at the height of a highly virulent Delta variant of the coronavirus, which places tremendous stress on all kinds of resources. There is a demand for extra ICU and high care beds, ventilators, oxygen and other supplies which are ordinarily never mentioned, disposable gowns, gloves, syringes, intravenous infusion, needles, masks and many other consumables that…

The SAPS Covid-19 vaccination programme is gaining momentum with 1 000 more employees vaccinated on the second day after the launch of the large-scale project, it said yesterday. By Tuesday, 2 055 vaccines had been administered to officers and support personnel at the Orlando stadium in Soweto and the SAPS Tshwane Academy vaccination site after Monday’s launch of the programme, police national spokesperson Colonel Athlenda Mathe said. Among those to receive their jabs was Constance Makhaye, 58, a cleaner at the SAPS Tshwane Academy. “I feel very happy, I was initially scared to vaccinate, now that I’ve received my vaccine I’m going to encourage my colleagues,” she said. Captain Daniel Dhanarajan, 48, a trainer attached to the SAPS Atteridge- ville academy in Pretoria, said he was also excited…

Chevon Booysen Chevon.booysen@inl.co.za THE Health Department says it is working hard to resolve the matter involving 153 unplaced junior doctors and medical interns, after it failed to respond to a letter of demand by the Junior Doctors’ Association of South Africa (JDASA) this week. The South African Medical Association (Sama) said they planned to take the department to court, but no legal papers have been filed yet as they wait to hear back from the department’s legal team. JDASA acting chairperson Tshepile Tlali said: “With regards to (the initial) deadline being missed, it’s sad but not surprising. The department is failing junior doctors and ultimately the people of South Africa.” Sama chairperson, Dr Angelique Coetzee, said: “The department had received our letter of demand and were given seven days to…

Nonhlanhla Nozizwe Hlatshwayo nozizwe.hlatshwayo@inl.co.za LEADING figures in business in KwaZulu-Natal have called for the government to fast-track the Covid-19 vaccine roll-out, cautioning that an extended level 4 lockdown will lead to businesses collapsing. With the president expected to address the country on Sunday, there are worries that more jobs will be cut because of the impact of the lockdown. Local entrepreneur and DJ, Sthembiso Ngcobo, who is in charge of entertainment at Max’s Lifestyle, expressed his concerns that should the lockdown be extended, they would have to let go of more staff. “We are already working with restricted staff as they are serving only takeaways. We missed out on making money this past weekend of the Durban July. What normally would have been good business – we had no activity…

Xolile Bhengu xolile.bhengu@inl.co.za KwaZulu-Natal Premier Sihle Zikalala has expressed concern about the Amajuba, uThukela, uMzinyathi, uMgungundlovu and Zululand districts recording high Covid-19 case numbers and said this showed a pattern of a resurgence. A special sitting by the Provincial Command Council yesterday received the latest report on the Covid-19 infection rate in KwaZulu-Natal, which paints a bleak picture of approaching danger as KZN districts cross the third wave line. The province had a percentage change of 45% in the number of new cases received in the past week. The average number of cases recorded daily had increased from 859 to 1 261 within a seven-day period. The numbers of daily hospital isolations were also reported to be showing a steady increase in both private and public hospitals, including in…

There is material evidence for the Communist Party of China (CPC) to celebrate its centenary. China’s unfolding history since the 1978 opening-up period deserves praise and appreciation. The CPC’s achievements in securing for Chinese citizens and communities record-high standards of decent living are worthy of commendation, and emulation – even if the objective conditions of China are relatively unique in terms of political leadership, governance model, population expectations and societal values. President Xi Jinping’s speech to mark the centenary was a moment of legitimate celebration since his political party has considerably improved people’s basic living conditions. Xi was justifiably confident since the CPC, using human development indicators, has attained political, economic, technological and military success. He was not exaggerating in boldly affirming that modern-day China has traversed a pioneering path,…

MAMA Joyce Manyonga, the late mother of now-banned long-jump star and Olympic medallist, Luvo Manyonga, must be turning in her grave at how her son’s career has taken a major blow. It’s been a heartbreaking sight seeing Luvo’s life turn upside down, not only because of his role-model status, but because we know how much his domestic worker mother invested in his career with the little she had. We remember the touching stories she shared with us about how she would give up her last R5 for bread to have Luvo travel by train from his Mbekweni home in Paarl to practise in Stellenbosch. We recall her beaming with pride when Luvo stunned the world and won a Silver medal at the Rio Games six years ago. It was a…

New York: Ex-policeman Eric Adams was on track yesterday to become New York’s next mayor after the city’s elections authorities released new results showing he had maintained his lead in the Democratic primary. The 60-year-old Brooklyn borough president claimed victory after the Board of Elections said he held a lead of one percentage point over nearest rival and fellow moderate Kathryn Garcia. If confirmed the winner, Adams will take on Republican candidate Curtis Sliwa in November’s mayoral election.…

Malaysians struggling to make ends meet during a worsening coronavirus outbreak have hoisted white flags outside their homes in a desperate plea for help that has swept the country. Authorities imposed a second strict nationwide lockdown last month in response to a surge in Covid cases, and many low-income workers who live hand-to-mouth have lost their jobs again after a ban on non-essential businesses. The flags – often little more than strips of cotton or T-shirts – have sprung up outside homes of the needy around the country in the past week, prompting an outpouring of sympathy and donations from the public. “This month I have not paid the rent... I am afraid that I might not be able to find another place to stay in this critical situation,” said…

WELLINGTON: New Zealand’s closed borders have helped keep Covid-19 out of the Pacific nation, but a critical shortage of migrant labour is now fuelling protests among businesses and workers struggling with a staffing crisis. About 2 000 eateries stopped service and turned off lights across the country on Tuesday and are planning other stop work events as part of a two-month campaign to draw the government’s attention to the severe shortages in skilled labour. The labour crunch comes after New Zealand sealed its border in March last year in response to the raging coronavirus pandemic.…

IT makes sense that Pitso Mosimane should be a little conflicted as he anticipates next weekend’s CAF Champions League final. How can he not be when he is on a mission to break the hearts of his fellow countrymen? As coach of African football superpower Al Ahly, Mosimane is tasked with delivering the 'aleushria/El Ashra' - a 10th title - for the Egyptian giants. That wouldn’t be so bad, for winning championships is - after all - common for Jingles. But the fact that he has to do it against a team from South Africa complicates things a wee bit. “There’s a little bit of a conflict,” Mosimane said yesterday as he looked ahead to the clash with Kaizer Chiefs during a virtual Zoom interview with members of…

GROWING up with both his parents ensconced in the sport of lawn bowls, and his father serving as the president of what is now Bowls Gauteng North, it was inevitable that Charles Levy would become a doyen of the legal intricacies of the game. Forty-six years ago Levy’s interest in sport and the administration thereof commenced with the challenge presented by 18 holes of golf. His focus moved to lawn bowls and he began a long association with the sport as a player and administrator. From 1996 to 1998 he was a member of the Port Natal Bowling Association executive, during which time the district’s men’s and women’s associations were unified. In 1999 he was elected vice-president of the association and subsequently served as president. Levy is…

EMILIANO Martinez was the hero for Argentina as he saved three times in a shootout to take his team into a Copa America final match-up with Brazil after Tuesday's semi-final against Colombia finished 1-1 after 90 minutes. Martinez, who tried to distract Colombia's players in the shootout with a barrage of trash talk, saved from Davinson Sanchez, Yerry Mina and Edwin Cardona. Lionel Messi, Leandro Paredes and Lautaro Martinez scored for Argentina as they booked a spot against the host nation in Saturday’s final at Rio de Janeiro's Maracana stadium. “I’m speechless,” said Argentine keeper Martinez. “They took us to penalties and that’s a question of luck, today it was my turn for glory.” Both sides had chances to win in an intense, end-to-end match punctuated by 46 fouls and…