Índice para 2022-05-27 em Mercury

THE frantic search for former Verulam mayor Sagadava “Manna” Naidoo has ended tragically after he was found murdered yesterday. The 74-year-old was reported missing on Wednesday following a suspected farm invasion at his Canelands property. According to Reaction Unit South Africa (Rusa) his family realised he was missing after they conducted a check on Wednesday morning. “Naidoo’s body was recovered by a search team who were patrolling the cane fields. He appears to have been shot multiple times,” said Rusa’s Prem Balram. Since his disappearance his family, along with search and rescue teams, had been combing through the areas around his farm on foot, on bikes and with the use of helicopters. Naidoo’s daughter, Velash Lombaard, said: “My family is really in shock, we had so much hope that we…

EXCESS consumption of alcohol, drunkenness, vomiting, fighting, clashes with security, one booze session ending only at 4.20am … No, it’s not the Street Shelter for the Over-Forties here in Durban that we’re talking about, it’s Downing Street, in London, where civil servants and politicos routinely broke the anti-Covid regulations while the rest of Britain hunkered down. Senior civil servant Sue Gray has, at last, presented her findings on what went on. A chastened Prime Minister Boris Johnson insists he had no idea what was happening. A House of Commons committee is yet to rule on whether he lied to parliament about it. Two by-elections are coming up. As the old Chinese curse goes, may you live in interesting times. The jackdaw factor JACKDAWS use a “democratic” process to decide when…

THOUGH Africa was the cradle of civilisation, it was known as the dark continent. Steeped in tradition, culture and patriarchy the people led a laid-back life of contentment, counting their wealth in cattle, a little subsistence farming and hunting. When the white settlers arrived, they went about “civilising” the population by imposing their religion and Western lifestyle and culture on them. With their skills, expertise and the innovations of the industrial revolution, they built towns and cities, roads and bridges, dams, plumbing and lights which lit up the night sky. When the ANC came to power, euphoria gripped the country. At last the people were free. Surely, a black government ought to be better than the apartheid government? The ANC embarked on a grand policy of change. But the changes…

“My mother has been ‘gone’ for only a few years. My father wants to start dating. He is not ready for this. They were married for 42 years until her death. Whomever he dates will take him to the cleaners. What can I do?” Your father is an adult and he does not need your permission to date. Your father being ready (or not) to date again is fully your father’s business. I would suggest you attempt to focus on what is at the source of your anxiety regarding your deceased mother and your father’s desire to love again and then do what you can to get out of your father’s way. Try also to see what is at the core of your concern that “whomever dates him will take…

AS wage negotiations between public sector unions and the government continue, unions have issued a warning that they are prepared to do whatever it takes to ensure they get salary increases. Labour federation Cosatu said workers were extremely angry over the government’s attitude towards workers’ demands, labelling it as undermining organised labour. Cosatu KZN secretary Edwin Mkhize said the recent decision by the government to backtrack over the 2018 wage agreement had left a bitter taste among public servants. The government backtracked on an agreement to raise pay for about 1.3 million employees in 2020, the final year of the three-year wage deal. “We are approaching these negotiations with workers that are really angry at the decision to freeze salary increases after this had been agreed upon. This was a…

THE eThekwini Municipality has approved the hosting of a benefit concert to raise funds for communities devastated by the recent floods. Head of the economic development cluster in eThekwini, Phillip Sithole, said they had been engaging with the National Arts Council which wanted to host the concert in the city. The concert, the council hoped, would also lift the spirits of the city’s residents, many of whom had lost loved ones and homes. The concert will be held at the Moses Mabhida Stadium next month. It had been billed as a national fund-raising concert for the victims of the KwaZulu-Natal floods. It would include local and international artists and aimed to raise R10 million. The money raised would be given to the city for distribution as per internal processes, said…

A 40-year-old Durban Solid Waste (DSW) employee died in an accident while working on a refuse collection truck in the Durban CBD yesterday. Provincial police spokesperson Lieutenant-Colonel Nqobile Gwala said the incident occurred at 7am when the employee lost his balance and fell off the truck. “The driver, who wasn’t aware his colleague was under the truck, reversed and drove over him,” said Gwala. Gwala said the man died at the scene. EThekwini Municipality confirmed the incident and described it as unfortunate. “Our mayor (Mxolisi Kaunda) has sent his heartfelt condolences to the family of the deceased,” said municipal spokesperson Msawakhe Mayisela. Employees who were at the scene were receiving counselling, he said. The police said a case of culpable homicide was opened at the Durban Central police station. Meanwhile,…

Ensuring fairness and justice in the global economy China recently celebrated the 70th anniversary of the China Council for the Promotion of International Trade. Addressing this council as well as the Global Trade and Investment Promotion Summit, President Xi Jinping called for fairness and justice for business communities across the globe. The Chinese president insisted on inculcating win-win co-operation and went further to state that the world should “uphold true multilateralism, embrace a global governance vision featuring extensive consultation, joint contribution and shared benefits, and mobilise resources from across the world, to meet global challenges and advance global development”. Yet, in the face of a global economy recovering from Covid-19, one of these global challenges that hampers global development is international debt. During the height of Covid-19, several multilateral institutions,…

Witnesses to the Texas school shooting rampage yesterday questioned the late police response to the massacre, as bereaved parents said they pleaded for officers to storm the building and stop the bloodshed, to no avail. As the town of Uvalde mourned 19 children and two teachers killed in America’s latest mass shooting, Jacinto Cazares, whose daughter Jacklyn died in Tuesday’s massacre, said he raced to Robb Elementary School in the small town of Uvalde when he heard about the shooting. “There was at least 40 lawmen armed to the teeth but didn’t do a darn thing (until) it was far too late,” Cazares said, joining other parents saying they urged police to act more forcefully, as the US’s worst school shooting in a decade unfolded. “The situation could’ve been over…

MADRID: A Spanish court has dismissed an appeal from Colombian singer Shakira and ratified a prior decision, which saw “sufficient evidence” for her to stand trial over alleged tax fraud, a court document showed yesterday. Prosecutors claim the singer failed to pay up to ¤14.5 million in tax on income earned between 2012 and 2014. They argue that Shakira, 45, was living in the Spanish northern region of Catalonia during those years, although the Colombian star’s representatives have said she moved to Spain in 2015 and has met all her tax obligations since then. The court still has to formally set a date for the trial. | Reuters…

MADRID: Spanish health authorities reported 25 new cases of monkeypox yesterday, bringing the total tally of infections in one of the main hot spots of the recent outbreak to 84. The Health Ministry, which now considers all non-human-origin pox infections as monkeypox after a positive test – while before only counting those confirmed by sequencing – also said there were 73 suspected cases. Minister of Health Carolina Darias said that Spain would buy monkeypox vaccines as part of the EU joint vaccine purchases and confirmed that the west African strain, which has a fatality rate in about 1% of cases, was the one detected in Spain. | Reuters…

AMAZULU Chairman Sandile Zungu has confirmed the club has signed Orlando Pirates striker Gabadinho Mhango, a deal that involves Usuthu defender Thapelo Xoki moving the opposite direction. Zungu spoke on Ukhozi FM and shared the details of a conversation between he and Pirates owner, Dr Irvin Khoza, one that revealed the Buccaneers interest in acquiring Xoki. “Dr Irvin Khoza did contact me personally about Thapelo Xoki, and we’ve spoken; I respect him for the way he handled it so that Xoki will leave us, he played his last game yesterday, and Gabadinho Mhango is joining us,” he confirmed. Mhango has been on the fringes of the Buccaneers set-up for majority of the season, despite having a stellar Afcon tournament earlier this year. The 29-year-old marksman spearheaded Malawi's campaign in Cameroon…

DELHI authorities yesterday ordered all sports facilities to stay open until 10pm after a media report claimed that one stadium shuts early every evening – so that an official can walk his dog. Built for the 2010 Commonwealth Games, athletes and coaches at the Thyagraj Stadium in the Indian capital New Delhi have to clear out by 7pm for the senior bureaucrat and his pet, The Indian Express reported. “We used to train till 8-8.30pm under lights earlier,” the newspaper quoted one unnamed coach as saying, publishing a photo of what it said was Delhi official Sanjeev Khirwar, a woman and a dog on the running track. “But now we are asked to leave the ground by 7pm so that the officer can walk his dog on the ground. Our…

THERE is going to be significant pain at the pumps for South Africa’s motorists come June 1 as the Central Energy Fund has forecast a R2.27 to R2.36/litre rise in the price of petrol which would push the fuel price close to R25 a litre. Adding more woes, the general fuel levy reduction of R1.50 announced in March by the government is expected to end on May 31. DA leader John Steenhuisen yesterday called for the scrapping of the General Fuel Levy, among other measures, including de-regulating the fuel price to mitigate rising fuel costs. Addressing the media yesterday, Steenhuisen said that to help struggling South Africans with the rising fuel costs, the levy needed to be immediately scrapped. “The General Fuel Levy accounts for around R 3.93 per litre…

Nasa has shared one last selfie taken by the InSight Mars lander that is about to retire soon as it is losing power due to dusty solar panels. The final selfie, taken on April 24, shows the lander completely covered in dust. “A dusty self-portrait,” Nasa’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which manages InSight, said in a tweet. “@NasaInSight took what is likely to be its final selfie on April 24,” it added. The tweet also added a GIF, which showed the spacecraft’s first selfie taken in December 2018 and the latest “where it’s covered in Martian dust”. Nasa had last week shared that InSight is gradually losing power and “is anticipated to end science operations later this summer”. “By December, InSight’s team expects the lander to have become inoperative, concluding the…

OVER the past few weeks, some South African newspapers have published disturbing and horrific reports about the abysmal plight and extent of malnutrition among children. On April 4, there was a piece by Paul Hoffman of Accountability Now – “Too corrupt to feed starving children – is this freedom?”. A most chilling account of what the ANC is doing to their own children. In a country that has enough food to feed the entire nation and more to spare, children are dying of starvation, as well as growing up severely stunted due to lack of food. Hoffman writes that nutritious food is being shovelled into landfills, while children are dying of starvation! William Saunderson-Meyer recently wrote about the disturbing number of deaths from malnutrition in South Africa. These past three…

Gender-based violence activist, Reverend June Dolley-Major has lodged a complaint with the Public Protector to investigate the parole board and parole officers, citing violent crimes like rape and murder of women and children at the hands of parolees. Public protector spokesperson, Oupa Segalwe confirmed they had received the complaint. “It will be assessed to determine jurisdiction. Only then will the decision on whether or not to investigate be taken.” Dolley-Major said criminals being released on parole and then re-offending, had spurred her action. “The criteria used for offenders to be eligible for parole needs to be investigated. What programmes are implemented to ensure offenders are ready to re-integrate into communities? Why are communities not informed when someone out on parole will be living in their neighbourhood?” she asked. Examples she…

Eleven newborn babies died in a hospital fire blamed on an electrical short circuit in the western Senegalese city of Tivaouane, authorities said yesterday. Diali Kaba’s mother woke her up yesterday morning with terrifying news: there had been a fire at the hospital in their town in Senegal where Kaba’s 2-week-old daughter was being cared for, and 11 babies were dead. The two women rushed to the Mame Abdou Aziz Sy Dabakh hospital together and Kaba was allowed in to find out if her child was among the victims, while her mother, Ndeye Absa Gueye, waited anxiously outside. “I have my grand-daughter here, she has been here for two weeks. I have come to see if she is one of them,” she said. A few minutes later, Kaba emerged in…

The death toll from four bombs that ripped through minibuses and a mosque in Afghanistan has risen to at least 16, officials said yesterday, with some of the attacks claimed by the Islamic State group. A UN expert called on Taliban authorities to probe Wednesday’s attacks and a series of previous deadly blasts that targeted members of the minority Shia and Sufi communities. At least 10 people were killed when three bombs placed on separate minibuses exploded in the northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif, a health official and police said. The Balkh health department said three women were among the 10 killed in the blasts. Hours after the explosions the Islamic State group (IS) said on Telegram that its “soldiers” were responsible. Later, one other bomb exploded inside a mosque in…

London: Hollywood actor Kevin Spacey, 62, is facing sexual assault charges in the UK, police and prosecutors said yesterday, after a review of allegations against him. The two-time Oscar winner was artistic director of The Old Vic theatre in London between 2004 and 2015. Allegations against him first emerged in the wake of the #MeToo movement. That prompted a probe by London’s Metropolitan Police, and a review by The Old Vic of Spacey’s time there. The Crown Prosecution Service said it had “authorised criminal charges” against the actor “for four counts of sexual assault against three men”. The Met said that the first two counts date from 2005 in London, and concern the same man, who is now in his 40s. The third is alleged to have happened in London…

Paris: The former president of the Louvre museum in Paris has been charged with conspiring to hide the origin of Egyptian archaeological treasures which investigators suspect were spirited out of the country during the Arab Spring uprisings in the early 2010s. Jean-Luc Martinez was charged Wednesday after being taken in for questioning along with two French specialists in Egyptian art, who were not charged. The case was opened in July 2018, two years after the Louvre’s branch in Abu Dhabi bought a rare pink granite stele depicting the pharaoh Tutankhamun and four other historic works for €8 million. | AFP…

ONE could argue fairly that 2022 – when looked back upon by future generations – could be the watershed year when South African women’s rugby finally built a strong foundation upon which to erect its legacy. Spear-headed by SA Rugby’s high-performance manager for women, Lynne Cantwell, the women’s game – with director of rugby Rassie Erasmus in the wings – finally seems to have a roadmap, purpose and objective. Yesterday, Cantwell gave an update on where the national teams – the Sevens and the XVs - are currently as they both prepare for showpiece events in the coming months. “Preparations are going really, really well,” said Cantwell. “The XVs go into camp for two Tests for the Africa Cup in June, two against Japan in July and two at home…

THE fishing offshore has been good. With some late season dorado, couta, snoek and tuna there is plenty to catch. The North Coast was hit hard by the rains but the fishing before was going well. There have been good sized couta taken by the boats and skis in the last few weeks. Bigger baits have been the most successful with bonito and walla-walla the two best dead baits. As with all the baits you troll, make sure the baits are tracking true and not spinning. A fish will not eat a bait that is spinning in circles. Of the northern spots, Salt Rock has been particularly effective and would be my choice for the fishing skis. Snoek have been feeding well on the colour and current lines in the…

DEPUTY mayor of the eThekwini Municipality Philani Mavundla has taken city officials to task over the ballooning cost of overtime for the metro police, saying their poor planning is to blame for runaway overtime costs. He was speaking during the executive committee meeting yesterday where it was revealed the unit needs an extra R60 million to cover overtime costs. The unit had an original overtime budget of R120m, it has blown that in seven months and needs an additional R60m to top up the budget. Mavundla said that with better planning, the money being used to fund overtime could have been used to employ more metro officers. The unit has repeatedly said it is very short staffed. The full staff complement of the unit is about 2 800, but only…

THE arrest of a clerk in the water and sanitation unit in the eThekwini Municipality on charges of fraud and corruption has been welcomed by opposition parties while mayor Mxolisi Kaunda said it was in keeping with the city’s resolve to make corruption its number one target. The city said yesterday that a clerk in the water and sanitation unit and two service providers were arrested on Tuesday on allegations of manipulating supply chain processes. They appeared in court on Wednesday and were released on bail. The details of the alleged crimes were not immediately available yesterday, but the municipality said the three were facing charges of fraud, corruption, money laundering, contravention of various sections of the Municipal Finance Management Act and contravention of the Competition Act. ADeC leader Visvin…

ONE of the characters of Ernest Hemingway was asked how he went bankrupt and he answered, “slowly and suddenly”. This is exactly the dynamics of all our crises in South Africa; in other words, our problems start small, grow slowly and erupt suddenly and violently. It is proven in behavioural economics that our mind is designed in a way to underestimate small changes and we always wait for something big to act. The threat of climate change is a good example of this. Unemployment, poverty, crime, inequality, poor public service delivery, corruption, etc are all rising and going from bad to worse. This is not a healthy environment for our economy to grow at a high and sustainable rate as we wish. Despite all of the above, our president and…

WHITE supremacy and racism have become two sides of the same coin in the lexicon of the non-racial, progressive Left, whether here or in Biden’s America. But the sub-text of that lexicon is hate, which the rant by the ANC’s Mogomotsi Mogodiri (The Mercury, May 25), ostensibly aimed at AfriForum, Theuns du Toit, the old South African flag and everything before 1994, does well to emulate. Incidents such as the recent shooting in Buffalo, New York state, and the despicable act of Du Toit at Stellenbosch University are seized upon by the Left to brand whites as incorrigible racist supremacists. Mogodiri actually goes one better by proclaiming the old South African flag as the equivalent of the swastika. But what Mogodiri effectively demonstrates is residual hate. The preamble of…

Stellenbosch University has finalised its investigation report into suspended student Theuns du Toit who was captured on video urinating on fellow student Babalo Ndwayana’s study material, and the matter will be referred to a disciplinary hearing. The university suspended Du Toit earlier this month, charging that expulsion and/or criminal charges were not excluded from the possible available options based on the investigation’s findings. He is also facing criminal charges of housebreaking, malicious damage to property, and crimen injuria. A petition calling for the expulsion of Du Toit reached more than 100 000 signatures this week. Ndwayana’s father, Mkhuseli Kaduka, said they were patiently waiting for the law to take its course. “We are just patiently waiting. We’ve heard nothing and today was just another day where we rested and did…

President Cyril Ramaphosa’s Cabinet has approved the publication of the Constitution 18th Amendment Bill for public comments, which will pave the way for South African Sign Language (SASL) to become an official language. The bill amends Section 6(1) of the Constitution of 1996, which proclaims that South Africa’s 11 official languages are Pedi, Sotho, Tswana, Swati, Venda, Tsonga, Afrikaans, English, Ndebele, Xhosa and Zulu. The amendments will now give recognition to the SASL as the 12th official language. Minister in the Presidency Mondli Gungubele said Cabinet had decided that this would advance its cultural acceptance and affirm equal rights for all South Africans, irrespective of their disabilities. The Department of Basic Education already recognises SASL as a home language. Gungubele was delivering a post-Cabinet media briefing yesterday when he announced…

WITH the ANC KwaZulu-Natal elective conference just weeks away, another name has emerged for the position of provincial chairperson. ANC Member of the Provincial Legislature Siboniso Duma’s name has been raised for KZN chairperson. While many people believe the competition for the position will be between current chairperson Sihle Zikalala and current provincial executive committee member Nomusa Dube-Ncube, Duma’s lobbyists have other ideas. An ANC member from the eThekwini region said they had looked at the possible individuals who could lead the province, and were convinced Duma was the ideal candidate to succeed Zikalala. ANC John Mchunu branch member Malusi Mchunu said they believed Duma possessed the qualities required to lead the ANC in the province, pointing to his experience in government over the years. The Mchunu branch in eThekwini…

WE celebrated Africa Day this week with enthusiasm on the continent and in Türkiye (Turkey). We remember with appreciation African nations coming together under a single roof on May 25, 1963. This day signifies a tough journey for independence and freedom and a common consciousness based on solidarity and unity of the continent. The success story attained in the following decades in this spirit, through the efforts of powerful and acclaimed African leaders, attests to the bright future of the continent. Turkey is in a privileged position. In the last 20 years, it has become an “African hub” in its region, with its ever-increasing number of African diplomatic representations along with its dynamic African diaspora of students, business people and tourists. Our 44 embassies on the continent, as well as…

Ukraine said yesterday that the war in the east of the country had hit its fiercest level yet as it urged Western allies to match words with support against invading Russian forces. Moscow’s troops are pushing into the industrial Donbas region after failing to take the capital Kyiv, closing in on several urban centres including Severodonetsk and Lysychansk. Russian forces also shelled Ukraine’s second city, Kharkiv, killing four residents, after Moscow’s efforts to capture the north-eastern hub were repelled by heavy battles early in the war. Britain and Germany both said yesterday that Russian President Vladimir Putin must be defeated in the conflict, now in its fourth month, but Kyiv called on the West to supply more heavy weapons for its outgunned forces. “The fighting has reached its maximum intensity,”…

Twitter agreed to pay $150 million (about R2.3 billion) in a settlement related to allegations that the platform gave advertisers some user information that was supposed to be employed to strengthen account security, US authorities said this week. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and the Department of Justice accused Twitter of taking phone numbers or email addresses provided to tighten privacy and then letting advertisers use the details to make money. In a five-year period ending in 2019, more than 140 million Twitter users gave phone numbers or email addresses to the San Francisco-based service to help secure accounts with two-factor authentication, regulators said. The security technique involves augmenting passwords with one-time codes sent by text or email messages. Without telling users, Twitter let advertisers use the personal information to…

New York: Israel has told the US it was responsible for the killing of an Iranian Revolutionary Guards colonel last week, The New York Times reported this week. Colonel Sayyad Khodai was shot dead on Sunday by a gunman on the back of a motorcycle as he sat in a car outside his home in Tehran. Iran’s President Ebrahim Raisi has vowed to avenge the killing, and the Revolutionary Guards blamed it on “elements of global arrogance” – a reference to the US and its allies, including Israel. The Times reported a source saying that “Israel has informed American officials that it was behind the killing”. | AFP…