Indholdsfortegnelse for 2024-07-15 i Mercury

DA-controlled uMngeni accuses ANC-led Msunduzi of encroaching on its territory The uMngeni and Msunduzi local municipalities are locked in a bitter battle over the management of electricity supply by Msunduzi in areas that fall under the uMngeni municipality. The DA-controlled uMngeni has publicly complained about this state of affairs, accusing the ANC-led Msunduzi of encroaching on its territory. The area in dispute is the “rates rich” Hilton, home to some of the wealthiest residents in the Midlands with homes selling for R10 million or more. The area falls under the uMngeni Municipality and all its services are provided by uMngeni, while its electricity is supplied by Msunduzi, something uMngeni wants to put a stop to. This is not the first time the matter has come up. A few years ago…

IRONICALLY, I once again totally agree with “Ouboet” Bachtis regarding school predators. But one has first to look at the factors contributing to this problem. Our education experts, sex therapists, psychologists and bleeding hearts firmly believe that bombarding children with sex education from the age of four through to matric will stop all sexual activity among the youth. Well, this approach has been tried for at least 25 years with the result that we have thousands of teenage pregnancies (some as young as nine and 10) every year. It hasn’t worked, but another approach is never mooted. Absolutely mind-boggling. Then there is the consensual sex between the ages of 12 and 16 that has been an absolute disaster. The young studs satisfy their desires with no comeback, responsibility or accountability.…

AS LONG as the minister of finance allocates an extremely deficient budget for health care nationwide, there will always be a perceived inequality between public and private health-care services. For financing just one province R62 billion would not be adequate. Financing all nine provinces requires a much bigger budget. The health budget must cover all hospitals according to their individual status – regional, tertiary and academic. The training of all health professionals. All primary health-care centres in all provinces. Equipment of all kinds. Paramedical staff – radiography, physiotherapy, dieticians, occupational therapists, dentistry, pharmaceuticals. Besides payment of salaries, all these departments need to be properly equipped with specially required equipment. Different kinds of medical supplies, including drugs and many consumables. Laboratories, blood banks, food supplies for patients and special dietary requirements…

THE Pietermaritzburg Economic Justice and Dignity (PMBEJD) group says despite the inflation rate dropping, consumer spending is still low owing to external factors such as the high interest rates and high electricity costs. This follows the PwC Voice of the Consumer Survey 2024: South Africa findings, which focused on more than 1 000 South Africans and which indicated that 75% of local consumers rank inflation as the number one risk that could impact the country over the next year. PMBEJD programme co-ordinator Mervyn Abrahams said that despite headline and inflation dropping, consumer confidence was at an all-time low. “Food prices have definitely come down. But consumers still face high interest rates and high electricity costs. “Just recently we had an electricity tariff increase, which has led to the consumer having…

MINISTER in the Presidency Khumbudzo Ntshavheni’s justification that the bloated Cabinet of the Government of National Unity (GNU) should be blamed on the electorate is nothing short of insulting South Africans whose tax will fund the lavish lifestyle of this increased Cabinet. “The size of the national executive is a result of our electoral outcome, with the need to be inclusive. In addition, the constitution of the national executive had to be cognisant of other national interests such as demographics, geographic spread, youth and gender representation,” Ntshavheni stated. It’s an excuse that attempts to shield his boss President Cyril Ramaphosa from being asked questions about his failure to live up to his promise of reducing the size of the executive in line with the prevailing fiscus challenges. Just as…

Britain’s Keir Starmer could hardly have asked for a better first week as prime minister, from hobnobbing with fellow world leaders to England’s run to the final of the European football championships. But a rebellion brewing within his ruling Labour Party over child welfare payments and a prisons overcrowding crisis forcing the early release of offenders means the honeymoon is unlikely to last. Starmer hit the ground running on entering Downing Street on Friday as Labour returned to power after 14 years following a landslide general election victory over Rishi Sunak’s Conservatives. In his first few days, he made bold ministerial appointments, held a press conference at his official residence and delivered his first speech in parliament as premier. Starmer then jetted off to Washington for a fortuitously timed Nato…

Seoul: The powerful sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un slammed South Korean “scum” yesterday for launching anti-regime propaganda leaflets across the border via balloon, warning they would pay “a very high price”. The Korean peninsula has seen tit-for-tat balloon campaigns recently, with Pyongyang floating trash-filled balloons southward in protest at ones carrying propaganda leaflets sent northward by South Korean activists. Kim Yo Jong said North Korean military personnel were investigating the matter. Pyongyang has sent more than 1 000 balloons carrying rubbish southward in retaliation for balloons carrying propaganda against Kim Jong Un. | AFP…

MOSCOW: The southern Russian city of Novorossiisk on the Black Sea declared a state of emergency yesterday as forest fires spread across an area of 22ha, its mayor said. Intense heat, strong winds and dry thunderstorms have caused forest fires across Russia in recent weeks, from the remote Siberian region of Tuva to the Republic of Sakha, also known as Yakutia, in the Far East. Firefighters battled blazes and vast expanses of scorched earth and trees.Buses had been prepared to evacuate around 200 people from risk areas and helicopters were extinguishing the blazes. Fires have spread across the region where many Russians holiday in the summer. | Reuters…

The best Springbok on show at the Shark Tank at the weekend, Ox Nche, has put into words the feelings of most Bok supporters after Ireland prevailed 25-24 to square the series 1-1. Nche was the Player of the Match and if his teammates had collectively scaled his level of performance, it would not be a blue Monday for South Africans. Nche said the Boks kicked too much. “I think we should have backed ourselves more with the ball instead of kicking a lot of possession away. I think that’s where we lost it,” the roly-poly prop said. “It is disappointing. “The boys gave it their all, but a few small things cost us the game. We still have a long way to go and plenty to work on. “We…

Wimbledon champion Barbora Krejcikova admitted Saturday she misses her late mentor and former All England Club champion Jana Novotna so much that she talks to her in her dreams. Krejcikova broke down in tears when she saw her name etched on the same Centre Court honours board that also recognises Novotna’s 1998 final victory. “The only thing that was going through my head was that I miss Jana a lot. “It was just very, very emotional,” said Krejcikova, after defeating Jasmine Paolini 6-2 2-6 6-4 in Saturday’s final. “Very emotional moment to see me on a board right next to her. I think she would be proud. “I think she would be really excited that I’m on the same board as she is because Wimbledon was super-special for her.” Novotna…

Key to growing the economy is for South Africa to tackle our stubborn levels of inequality and poverty. The most effective way is to create decent jobs and pay workers a living wage. While many condemned the slave wages the apartheid regime paid black workers, these same voices fall silent when these patterns continue in the democratic dispensation by the private sector. Today we are told by the private sector and some political parties that employers cannot afford to pay a living wage, that we must benchmark what we pay workers with far poorer countries in Asia and Africa. Yet this same economic logic mysteriously disappears when it comes to the exorbitant pay packages of executives, where CEOs of mining companies can make R300 million a year, but quibble with…

ZULU King Misuzulu kaZwelithini will today meet newly appointed Minister of Land Reform and Rural Development Mzwanele Nyhontso at KwaKhangelamankengane Royal Palace in Nongoma. The two will discuss the future of the Ingonyama Trust’s board (ITB). According to the statement issued by the office of the king through the king’s traditional prime minister and KZN Cogta MEC, Reverend Thulasizwe Buthelezi, the meeting will cover various topics, including the monarch’s dissatisfaction with the current board of the Ingonyama Trust appointed by former land reform minister Thoko Didiza. The king has previously expressed concerns that the Land Reform Department was undermining the powers of traditional leadership when it stripped the powers of signing Permission To Occupy (PTO). A PTO provides confirmation in writing that the land being occupied was lawfully allocated to…

A FEW gifts you can give to the people you love without spending a penny. Don’t rehash old and already resolved arguments. Let them go. Don’t say you will not bring up old arguments. Let them go, right now, turn the page, never to be mentioned again. Not only will you be giving a gift to others, you will benefit from the giving. Clean up your language by getting rid of swearing and blasphemy and sarcasm. Good humour has no victims. Cheap humour needs victims. If you clean up what comes out of your mouth, you will be amazed at how the process purges your thinking, and, again, you benefit from the gifts you give to others. Don’t talk so much, especially if it is stuff you’ve said over and…

MINISTER Aaron Motsoaledi’s longing to introduce the National Health Insurance (NHI) plan as a tool to correct inequalities is testimony of his distorted idea of the reality about health care. Solidarity would rather see Cabinet members in the newly formed Government of National Unity walking away from the NHI ideas which, according to all indications, will result in disaster for all South Africans. Yet Motsoaledi began his return as Health Minister on another false note with his statements that NHI is an “equaliser”. It is precisely because South Africa is the most unequal country in the world that the NHI won’t function here. It will mean that the middle class and the rich – a shrinking group of people – will be further used as the state’s cash cow, without…

THE West continues its hypocritical attitude in its approach to world affairs, and it appears globally it is taboo to tell this truth, especially in international forums – that this hypocrisy is based on racist thinking. Take the example of its attitude to wars which are being fought around the world. In Ukraine, they are very animated because they consider the inhabitants of that country “Europeans/Caucasians” like them. They are prepared to spend billions on armaments in support of that country. Sharply contrast this with the Middle East situation: here where genocide on a wide scale is being perpetrated against Palestinians, the West either turns a blind or is cynical about the situation. For example, Americans who provide “aid” to Palestinians and yet they are arming the very Israelis that…

Employment and Labour Minister Nomakhosazana Meth said on Thursday the sustainable solution to the unemployment crisis could not come from her department and the government alone, but a societal challenge that required a collective approach. Meth said Statistics SA continued to share disturbing data with the first quarter report of 2024 pushing the national unemployment rate to 32.9%. “We plan to lead the department in upping the ante pertaining to coordination work of all job creation initiatives, interventions and innovation that are found in various departments, spheres of government and public agencies. “It is also in our plans to raise the stakes when it comes to collaboration, partnerships, networks within the state, traditional leadership and the private sector,” she said. Meth made the statement when she tabled the department’s R3.8…

ACSA group executive for operations management Terence Delomoney said that data released by the International Air Transport Association (IATA) for April 2024 showed that global air cargo markets was projecting strong annual growth in demand into the second quarter of the year. “At the same time, African airlines saw 10.6% year-on-year demand growth for air cargo in April, demand in the Africa-Asia market increased by 25.8% compared to April 2023.” Delomoney said that aviation, and specifically air cargo, had the potential to be a significant driver of socio-economic growth and development across the African continent. “Air freight creates huge economic value for an airport’s region or country, enabling local trade and attracting new high-value industries.” Air cargo allows the transport of goods quickly, is a big trade enabler and could…

Thanks to a healthy dose of public vigilance, we have something to celebrate FOR some time, members of the National Assembly knew there was an issue with their uMkhonto weSizwe Party (MKP) colleague, Dr John Hlophe. But, most hesitated to publicly criticise or oppose a nomination of one of their own to represent Parliament in the Judicial Service Commission (JSC). This person is a legend in national politics, after all, someone with a storied legacy as a seasoned judge and legal scholar who, despite his impeachment as a judge for previous conduct involving a questionable conversation with other judges about his corruption-accused party leader, reappeared in service of his party leader as the MKP’s public face in Parliament. He is determined not to go anywhere voluntarily, not ever, even as…

A senior Hamas official said yesterday that the Islamist group had not withdrawn from ceasefire talks with Israel after this weekend’s deadly attacks in Gaza that Israel said had targeted the group’s military leader Mohammed Deif. But Izzat El-Reshiq, a member of the political office of Hamas, accused Israel of trying to derail efforts by Arab mediators and the US to reach a ceasefire deal by stepping up its attacks in the enclave. Saturday’s strike in the Khan Younis area of Gaza, in which at least 90 Palestinians were killed according to local health authorities, has put the ceasefire talks in doubt. There had been hopeful signs recently that a deal could be reached to halt fighting and return hostages held in Gaza. Two Egyptian security sources at ceasefire talks…

Nepali search teams retrieved more bodies yesterday of 50 people missing after a landslide triggered by torrential rains swept two buses into a fast-flowing river. Over 300 officers, including divers, were scouring the river for passengers and the two buses themselves, said Kumar Neupane, spokesperson for Nepal’s armed police unit.Other teams on boats were using sensor equipment to search the murky water. The force of Friday’s landslide in central Chitwan district pushed the vehicles over concrete crash barriers and down a steep embankment, at least 30m from the road. “One body has been found about 5km from the accident site,” police said. In total, five bodies had been retrieved. District official Khimananda Bhusal said that about 50 people were swept away on the buses, revising down the number from…

BAGHDAD: Iraqi authorities have removed the remains of 139 people from a large pit believed to contain victims of the Islamic State group (IS), an official said yesterday. The Alo Antar hole, a natural desert feature turned into a mass grave by IS jihadists, is in Tal Afar, 70km west of Mosul in northern Iraq. It is not known how many bodies were dumped there, and a search is ongoing for other victims. “They include women and men,” said Dia Karim, director of the mass graves department at the Foundation of Martyrs. Karim added that “according to testimonies, the victims date back to IS rule” or before, when al-Qaeda was present in the area. | AFP…

CAIRO: Kuwait Petroleum Corporation (KPC) said yesterday that it had made a “giant” oil discovery in the Al-Nokhatha field east of the Kuwaiti island of Failaka, with oil reserves estimated at 3.2 billion barrels. KPC’s chief executive Sheikh Nawaf Saud Nasir Al-Sabah said the new discovery’s reserves were equivalent to the country’s entire production in three years. The initial estimated area of the newly discovered oil well is around 96 square km.Preliminary estimates of the hydrocarbon reserves present were at 2.1 billion barrels of light oil, and 5.1 trillion standard cubic feet of gas, which correspond to 3.2 billion barrels of oil equivalent. | Reuters…

Proteas seamer Ottniel Baartman is set for another overseas adventure when he joins the Texas Super Kings for the remainder of the Major League Cricket (MLC) tournament. Baartman, who had never travelled internationally before this year, will head back to the US, where he had recently featured in the T20 World Cup, after his Proteas teammate Gerald Coetzee was ruled out of the remainder of the competition due to injury. Coetzee sustained a low-grade left abdominal strain that has put his participation in the coming Test series against the West Indies in the Caribbean in doubt. For Sunrisers Eastern Cape paceman Baartman it is an opportunity to erase the disappointment of losing out on a maiden stint with English County Championship side Hampshire Hawks for the T20 Blast due to…

WHAT COMES to mind when towns such as oThongathi in KwaZulu-Natal and Malelane in Mpumalanga are mentioned? The common denominator/factor is the sugar industry. These towns were developed mainly as the result of the cane-growing and milling activities in these regions. Over the years, the industry has proven beyond doubt that it is a catalyst for socio-economic development in some of the deeply rural and job-starved areas of KwaZulu-Natal. The industry is the beacon of hope for many rural communities, especially for thousands of black small-scale growers spread across the two provinces. It is an industry that creates 65 000 direct and 270 000 indirect jobs, with at least one million people dependent on the sugar cane-growing and milling sectors. KwaZulu-Natal is synonymous with sugar cane farming. Anyone who grew…

Debt Rescue and other experts are warning members of the public to be cautious about dipping into the two-pot pension fund retirement system as this could lead to them having less money for their retirement years. The two-pot retirement system will open for applications on September 1 and will allow for members to withdraw up to 10% of their retirement savings with a maximum of R30 000 at the marginal tax rate. Neil Roets, CEO of debt counselling company Debt Rescue, said the two-pot retirement plan poses a significant risk to the financial security of citizens. “This system may ultimately leave many people without enough money to support themselves in their later years. The ability to withdraw money from one pot may seem appealing in the short term. However, the…

’TWAS a game of two halves. In the first, the Paddies hammered at us, rattling up points, the Boks defending desperately yet mainly ineffectively. The points against rattled up embarrassingly. Rassie no doubt had things to say in the change-room at half-time. The second half was entirely different, our fellows taking the initiative and eventually overtaking the Irish. Splendid stuff. With only minutes to go, the Boks were narrowly ahead and the damsels of the Pub With No Name, in Morningside, were starting to strum at their knickers in the expectation of supplying elastic for the time-honoured celebratory feu de joie in which the street lights are shot out. But that second half also had its blemishes. The Boks persisted in endlessly and pointlessly kicking away possession, soaring kicks down…

IT’S ONE thing to condemn and castigate government policies or policies that a certain association, official body or representatives of any community stand for. For instance one can complain about Zionist-Whites, yet not call all whites rogues or land occupiers. Not all Muslims are jihadists. Government-led expeditions to colonise countries abroad that were followed by some general populous as have occurred throughout history, deserve to be examined correctly as having been official leadership ventures. Not emerging from private individuals. The ploy of bringing in common settlers, thereafter, is in most cases to eventually take command of the new frontier. For this reason, Mr Peter Bachtis’s letter last Thursday (“French Culture is being destroyed”) can’t sneak past unchecked. In his disappointment that the Far Right did not obtain the majority in…

Nelson Mandela Day is perhaps best known for its slogan, “67 Minutes of Service”, but did you know where that came from and why it is no longer the slogan? In 2009, it was calculated that Mandela spent 67 years of his life in the service of social justice – in his years of activism and mobilisation, his years in prison, as well as his years as president of the Republic of South Africa. However, it seems that something went wrong with the calculation because, in 2009, Madiba had spent 65 years fighting for social justice since he joined the ANC in 1944. Even with this error, the 67 Minutes campaign went global and became the rallying call for Nelson Mandela International Day. There were many notable campaigns that were…

Julius Malema, the Commander- In-Chief of the EFF, must take the blame for the poor performance of his party. The party revolves around him, and he is a demagogue presented by his party as a demigod whose colleagues carry water and other stuff for him. When attacking President Cyril Ramaphosa for consulting his party for collective decision-making, he said he does not do collective decision-making, but makes a decision alone as a leader. Then, the question is, what is the meaning of leadership or a leadership collective? At times there is a difference between being the leader of a party and being the leader of the government. In government or state, you are not compelled to consult, but when it comes to the party, you have to. In fact, even…

Kenya’s under-fire police pledged yesterday a “transparent” investigation following the discovery of eight female bodies dumped in a Nairobi garbage site. Police chiefs said they were pursuing possible links to cults, serial killers or rogue medical practitioners in their investigation into the macabre saga, which has horrified and angered the nation. The mutilated and dismembered bodies, trussed up in plastic bags, were hauled out of a sea of floating rubbish in an abandoned quarry in Mukuru, a slum area in the south of the Kenyan capital. The discoveries have thrown another spotlight on Kenyan police and added more pressure on President William Ruto, who is struggling to contain a crisis over widespread anti-government protests that saw dozens of demonstrators killed. Acting national police chief Douglas Kanja said six corpses were…

An alliance of Myanmar ethnic minority armed groups said yesterday that it had agreed a four-day ceasefire with the junta in northern Shan state following clashes in which its fighters seized territory from the military along a strategic highway to China. The area has been rocked by fighting since last month, when the so-called Three Brotherhood Alliance renewed an offensive against junta troops along the road to China’s Yunnan province. The clashes shredded a previous Beijing-brokered truce that in January halted an earlier push by the alliance – made up of the Arakan Army, the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army and Ta’ang National Liberation Army. Dozens of civilians have been killed in the recent fighting. Myanmar’s borderlands are home to ethnic armed groups who have battled the military since independence…

NIAMEY: A large number of the prisoners who escaped yesterday from the high-security Koutoukale prison, about 50km northwest of the capital Niamey, have been captured and some “neutralised” by the Nigerian Defence and Security Forces (FDS), the army said on Saturday evening in its information bulletin. The army said this escape followed a mutiny that had broken out in the remand centre, and several dozen inmates managed to escape. But thanks to the “rapid and effective” intervention of alerted security units, a large number were apprehended, said the army. A unit on patrol in the Gorou sector managed to locate and “neutralise” three armed terrorists wanted after the escape, the army said. | Xinhua…

DUBAI: Dubai Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al-Maktoum yesterday announced that he appointed his son, the emirate’s crown prince, as defence minister of the United Arab Emirates in a cabinet reshuffle. Sheikh Hamdan, 41, is the second son of Sheikh Mohammed and has held the title of crown prince of Dubai since 2008. The royal graduated in 2001 from Britain’s elite Sandhurst military college and became chairperson of the Executive Council of Dubai, charged with strategic development plans. His father, Sheikh Mohammed, has been defence minister since the founding of the UAE in 1971. | AFP…

TEST captain Temba Bavuma will be alongside Wiaan Mulder, Matthew Breetzke, Tony de Zorzi, Lungi Ngidi, Kyle Verreynne, Dane Paterson and Tristan Stubbs at Kingsmead Stadium in Durban this week as the first day of the pre-Caribbean tour camp gets under way. While seven other squad members are in the US competing in the Major League Cricket tournament, Bavuma and Co will be getting together for the first time since the New Year’s Test at Newlands. Coming on the back of a lot of white-ball cricket recently, the objectives of the camp will be for the players to polish their red-ball skills, and remind themselves of the team’s philosophy. Despite the Proteas’ 2-0 Test series victory during their last visit to the Caribbean three years ago and the West Indies’…