Indholdsfortegnelse for 2025-01-23 i Mercury

The DA categorically rejects the allegations being made against Dean Macpherson, Minister of Public Works and Infrastructure, primarily by political consultant JJ Thabane, who moonlights as a media personality. It is not just suspicious, but in fact entirely transparent, that these allegations come just as Macpherson is exposing, investigating and stopping serious corruption – including an R800-million scandal involving an oxygen tender awarded irregularly by the entity known as the Independent Development Trust (IDT) within his department. IDT is an entity that has been unable to submit audited financials since August last year, and has now run out of money under shambolic leadership. Minister Macpherson is doing the right thing by unearthing and investigating serious corruption, and by stopping the IDT deal. It is a new culture of corruption-busting, which…

UNDER President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s leadership, Zimbabwe finds itself in a devastating health crisis that exposes a profound failure of governance and the loss of human compassion at the highest level of leadership. The country’s collapsing healthcare system, marked by the deaths of pregnant women, shortages of basic medicines, and the rise of unaffordable private hospitals, points to a tragic betrayal of the people’s trust. In a country where the healthcare system should be a cornerstone of human dignity, the most vulnerable are paying the ultimate price. Pregnant women are dying due to inadequate prenatal care, lack of essential equipment, and deplorable conditions in state hospitals. Maternal mortality rates have skyrocketed, as many women cannot access timely medical attention. The death of a mother, often preventable, represents a profound societal failure…

As one passes year by year into the senior categories of society, the need grows for increasing vigilance against lapses in concentration and control. The other day I accompanied my niece and her hubby to a picnic under the trees of Michaelhouse to watch their son playing cricket. The couple picked me up from my digs in Howick for a drive through the Midlands to the school, where we set up a picnic lunch in those tranquil and beautiful surroundings, admiring the magnificent old buildings. On our return later to Howick, we stopped off at a delightful place called Piggly Wiggly for tea and scones. What a wonderful and enjoyable day. They dropped me off at my pad and I went inside with warm sensations of a wonderful day in…

THE sponsorship of the Royal AM football club by the Msunduzi Municipality hangs in the balance after a motion was put forward calling for the partnership to be scrapped. The motion, tabled by the DA, comes in the wake of concerns that the club is increasingly becoming an embarrassment for the city. As a result of the legal challenges faced by the club owner, the club is no longer delivering on its part of the agreement. In the motion, the party states that “Royal AM has been put under curatorship by Sars (SA Revenue Service), with Royal AM matches consistently being cancelled. Thus, no tourism benefit is being extracted for the city or ratepayers. Additionally, the Royal AM brand is attracting negative scrutiny, and this council association via the sponsorship…

THE Labour Court has turned down an application by an employee who was dismissed from his job at Overberg AgriBedrywe for using his cellphone while operating heavy machinery, which breached the company’s safety policies. The man, who argued that he was unfairly dismissed, was an experienced fitter and turner. He was dismissed in February 2021 after working at the business for about 20 months. His dismissal came after he was placed on light duty due to an injury sustained at work, during which he allegedly used his personal cellphone for private purposes while operating running machinery. The employer fired him for failing to comply with standards, rules and regulations related to safety, and a breach of trust. In a similar case last year, a quality controller at Eskom’s Kusile Power…

A Cape Town woman is expected to appear in the Kempton Magistrate’s Court after being nabbed by Border Patrol for fraud relating to card-cloning crimes. Hawks spokesperson, Zinzi Hani, said the woman was arrested on Tuesday. “The border police have arrested a 34-year-old suspect at OR Tambo International Airport on charges of contravening the Electronic Communications Act and Cybercrimes Act while returning on a Qatar flight.” Hani said from 2017 to 2018, the suspect was allegedly involved in compromising clients’ card information while she was employed at a car rental service at the Cape Town International Airport. “Through a preliminary investigation, it was discovered that the suspect gave the clients’ banking information to a syndicate who in turn manufactured cloned cards. The clients suffered financial loss of R400 000,” said…

The eThekwini Municipality Revenue Management Unit (RMU) intends to go on an aggressive campaign to register more customers to its e-Services platform. The collapse of the postal service has led to delays in the delivery of monthly utility bills. Some resident’s accounts were in arrears because they had not been receiving their bills. The RMU is in the process of doing away with posting of bills by the end of June, subject to council approval. With the introduction of the online e-Services platform where customers register to view, download, and pay their customer bills, the RMU has seen a reduction in the number of manually posted bills. In a report presented to eThekwini Full Council, the municipality said it had 924 585 active customer accounts as at October 31, 2024.…

DHAKA: A Bangladeshi education ministry order demanding officers report institutions and pupils involved in anti-government “provocative activities” has been condemned by lawyers for challenging the spirit of last year’s student-led revolution. The mass uprising spearheaded by students toppled long-time autocrat Sheikh Hasina in August 2024, with an interim government led by Nobel Peace Prize winner Muhammad Yunus taking charge. The order, signed by the ministry’s director of its “monitoring and evaluation” for secondary education, Abed Nomani, was issued on January 2 – but shot to attention after it circulated on social media and in newspapers. It ordered officials to “remain vigilant and proactive in preventing students from engaging in provocative actions, driven by propaganda, misinformation or disinformation against the government or the country”. | AFP…

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt confirmed that US federal employees working in diversity offices must be put on paid leave by yesterday, as the new administration of Donald Trump had ordered the programmes shut. “Send a notification to all employees of DEIA (Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Accessibility) offices that they are being placed on paid administrative leave effective immediately as the agency takes steps to close/end all DEIA initiatives, offices and program,” said The US Office of Personnel Management (OPM) memo posted on social media platform X by a CBS correspondent While campaigning, Trump had vilified diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) policies in the federal government and corporate world, saying they discriminated against white people – men in particular. He also demonised any recognition of gender diversity, attacking transgender…

Amanzimtoti Bowling Club was buzzing with excitement on Sunday, January 19, as it hosted the much-anticipated PNB Pro10 pairs playoffs through to the final. Thirty determined teams battled it out in the heat, each aiming to outplay their opponents and secure a spot in the final showdown. Spectators and players alike caught up in the drama of this thrilling tournament. The semi-finals delivered riveting contests with Stella Park’s Chris Strover and Travis Finestone narrowly defeating Westville CC’s Antoon Classen and Lindsay North in a nail-biting 51–49 finish. Meanwhile, Westville BC’s Rodney Ward and Matthew Mayo outperformed their club mates Roger Boulle and Keegan Bauristhene with a 55–45 victory, setting the stage for an exciting final. The final was a showcase of drawing skills, strategy and sheer determination. Ward and…

BUILD One SA (BOSA) leader Musi Maimane sparked a thought-provoking conversation about the social standing of teachers. Maimane calls for the valorisation of teachers and equalisation of their pay grade to that of medical practitioners. However, it’s anomalous to set graduates of teaching and medicine on the same level. Let’s rather explore other avenues on the teaching front for the occupa tion to be valued the same way. Teachers are important for the country. This goes for nursing, where scarcity can be disastrous in the event of a pandemic on the scale of Covid-19. It’s therefore vital to put more emphasis on giving these professions some priority. The starting point is to impose 65 years as an age limit for public representatives and extend the retirement age for teachers to…

DONALD Trump’s inauguration speech was the best in the history of all American presidents. He wants to make America great again and will achieve it as he is a strong and reliable president who puts the country first. I salute him and hope he puts an end to all wars all over the world. Our president should take a leaf out of his book and also start putting our country first and not himself and his party whose motto is corruption. South Africa will never be a democracy while the ANC rule. If only the DA could take control of the country, we would all be great again. An example being Cape Town, run by DA, winning the number one city in the world. That just shows you that they…

The future of Mango Airlines remains unclear after the Air Licensing Services Council cancelled Mango’s licences in November. Mango’s business rescue practitioner (BRP) Sipho Sono said he could not say whether the troubled state-owned low-cost airline would challenge the decision to cancel its licences. “Unfortunately I don’t have answers to those questions. We report progress to creditors on a monthly basis,” said Sono in response to questions on whether a decision has been taken to review or appeal the council’s cancellation of the licences. In his latest monthly update, Sono wrote: “The BRP regrets to inform creditors and affected parties that on November 15, 2024, the Air Services Licensing Council issued a letter notifying its decision to cancel Mango’s air services licences.” He added that upon review, he was advised…

ITHALA (SOC) Bank has revealed its financial details, insisting that it is solvent. The details are contained in the urgent interdict application which was filed by Ithala last week. In the application, it sought to challenge the decision of the Repayment Administrator (RA) to place a hold on the bank’s activities. When the matter was heard last week, the court did not grant the interdict and adjourned the case to a later date. This is because there is a pending provisional liquidation matter which has been brought by the SA Reserve Bank’s Prudential Authority that is set to be heard. The authority, which appointed the RA, said last week that he had found that Ithala was “technically and legally insolvent”. As a result of the hold on the accounts, Ithala…

The advocacy group, Women and Men Against Child Abuse (WMACA), has called on South Africans to engage in a critical discourse on abuse related to pornographic images of children. This comes after the arrest of Darren Wilken, 35, who is due for his second court appearance at the Randburg Magistrate’s Court on January 28. Wilken was arrested last Friday in Midrand following a raid that uncovered electronic devices containing child sexual abuse material, large sums of cash, and drugs, exposing his connection to a transnational sex crime syndicate. As a result, WMACA advocacy manager Luke Lamprecht launched a campaign called “Stop Calling it Child Pornography”. “We must stop calling this ‘child pornography’ – that term minimises the horror. This is not about children being sexualised; it is about them being…

THE University of Cape Town (UCT) is still the country’s leading university, according to world rankings, which have recently come under scrutiny from some academics. According to the 2025 Times Higher Education World University Rankings, UCT’s highest rankings are 81st for clinical and health, and 92nd for education in 2024. UCT was ranked 180 among more than 2 000 institutions from 115 countries and territories. However, only 14 of South Africa’s 26 public universities feature in the rankings. Stellenbosch University and Wits University are both ranked between 301 and 350 while the University of Johannesburg (UJ) is placed between 401 and 500. The University of KwaZulu-Natal is ranked between 501 and 600 while both the University of Pretoria and the University of the Western Cape are in the 601 to…

In a case of David taking on Goliath, a homeowner who lost his house after a default judgment was issued against him, based on wrong calculations by Nedbank, emerged victorious as the Gauteng High Court, Pretoria, overturned the sale in execution. Prenash Somlal, who appeared in person fighting his case against Nedbank, turned to the court to have a default judgment against him overturned. The default judgment was issued by the court as Somlal never pitched to defend the matter. But in his rescission application, he explained that he had sorted it out with Nedbank that he was exploring avenues of keeping his property, and he was assured that the bank would not ask at that stage for the property to be sold on execution. But the bank proceeded and…

BELGRADE: Student organisers in Serbia called for a general strike this week, according to an announcement yesterday, in the latest move to increase pressure on officials over the fatal collapse of a train station roof last year. The Balkan country has been hit by regular protests after a roof at a train station in the northern city of Novi Sad collapsed in November, killing 15 people, following restoration work at the facility. The announcement posted on social media by a leading student group called for Serbians to engage in “general civil disobedience” tomorrow and to avoid going to work, shopping and engaging in other normal daily life activities. “Let’s take freedom into our own hands! Your participation makes a difference,” said the statement. | AFP…

The top lawyer of late Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who died in a Russian prison in February last year, said she regretted not finding the right words to stop him returning to Moscow in 2021. Olga Mikhailova, who defended Navalny for 16 years, said his return to Russia sparked a “tragic” chain of events leading to his death – and to the jailing last week of three of his legal team on extremism charges. February 16 will mark the first anniversary of the charismatic politician’s death in an Arctic penal colony, which his supporters regard as murder sanctioned by the Kremlin. “I feel like I did not push hard enough,” Mikhailova said in an interview in Paris. Navalny barely survived a poisoning in 2020 with the Soviet-designed nerve agent…

Van Reenen’s Pass on the N3 is a notoriously dangerous section of road where many crashes and deaths as well as road blockages frequently occur. Road engineers have recognised this for a long time and some decades ago the predecessor of SANRAL (South African National Roads Agency) in the national Department of Transport sought a new crossing of the Drakensberg. This alternate route, which had high standards, was justified both from a safety and an economic point of view. It had an Internal Rate of Return (IRR) on investment of 18% compared to the general threshold level for infrastructure development of 8%. A route bypassing Harrismith was located and designed. However, this was when politics reared its head. Apart from funding difficulties, which could have been overcome, a great deal…

On a personal note… I’m in Cuba – it’s my second visit – and immersed in Cuban warmth and hospitality. I’m enjoying undistracted conversations where focus is made easier because cellphones are not consuming everyone’s attention. There’s no shortage of mobile phones; it appears rather that perhaps due to the expense, face-to-face conversations are still valued. I’m in dialogue with people whose imperfect English is vastly superior to the embarrassing collection of limited phrases I can say in Spanish. My experience is that this is a country of enormous beauty and goodwill. It’s a nation of resilience. It’s a nation where inconveniences are embraced as challenges and where inconveniences draw people into tighter neighbourhoods of mutual support. Yes, there are parts of the beautiful city of Havana that are more…

The financial troubles of the National Student Financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS) are continuing and it has allegedly failed to pay for accommodation for students for last year. The Private Student Housing Association (PSHA) has warned that students may not be able to return to rooms they provide if NSFAS fails to pay the outstanding debt within the next 14 days. The association, which provides accommodation to more than 80 000 students, said NSFAS owes R44 million to its members, from 2024. The association warned that this could disrupt the start of the academic year and create a nightmare scenario for students and their parents. The PSHA board said on Monday the non-payment compromised the sustainability of running private accommodation businesses. CEO Kagisho Mamabolo said the association had previously advocated for…

The Parliamentary Committee on Home Affairs has thrown its weight behind the Border Management Authority’s (BMA) bid to receive more resources to fund its operations. Committee chairperson Mosa Chabane said there was a significant shift in managing ports of entry since the BMA came into being. “There is a collective responsibility for all of us to make sure we assist the work of the BMA,” Chabane said. The Border Management Authority is grappling with a R4.5 billion budget shortfall that threatens its operations over the next three years. The repercussions are expected to affect critical areas such as human resources, technology investment, and essential equipment procurement. Home Affairs Minister Leon Schreiber has previously indicated that the shortfall for the BMA over the medium-term expenditure framework period was R4.353bn. This was…

The Consumer Goods Council of South Africa (CGCSA) has emphasised the need for enhanced collaboration between retailers, mall owners, and law enforcement to combat rising crime rates in shopping centres. This comes after three malls were robbed in four days in Durban last week. On Sunday, an armed robbery occurred at a jewellery store in Musgrave. One employee was reportedly injured. According to KwaZulu-Natal police spokesperson Colonel Robert Netshiunda, “four suspects, armed with firearms and their faces concealed with masks, stormed into a jewellery store and robbed the staff of money and jewellery. “Two more suspects were waiting outside in a white VW Polo. The vehicle was fitted with false registration plates.” A cellphone store at a mall north of Durban was also robbed on Sunday. According to reports, four…

YAOUNDE: Chad’s ruling party, the Patriotic Salvation Movement, won a sweeping victory in the legislative elections held last month, securing 124 seats out of 188, according to final results released by the country’s Constitutional Council on Tuesday. “We are on the verge of definitively turning the page of transition to move resolutely towards the development of our dear homeland. The future is before us. It’s up to us to build it with strength and faith,” Chadian President Mahamat Idriss Deby Itno said. He praised the peaceful manner in which the elections unfolded. Chad’s Minister of Women and Child Protection Amina Priscille Longoh said the results showed remarkable progress toward parity of men and women in parliament in the country. “Of the 188 parliamentarians, there are 64 women, or 34.04%,” in…

JAKARTA: Indonesia’s Business Competition Supervisory Commission (KPPU) has found US tech giant Google LLC guilty of monopolistic practices in the Google Play Store and ordered the company to pay a fine of $12 million (R222m). Google requires application developers distributing their apps through the Google Play Store to implement the Google Play Billing System (GPB System). If developers fail to comply, their apps are removed from the store as a sanction. Additionally, Google charges a service fee of 15-30% for transactions processed through the GPB System. The KPPU Board of Commissioners stated that Google’s policy of mandating the use of Google Play Billing for all transactions in the Play Store has harmed application developers. | Xinhua…