Indholdsfortegnelse for 2023-06-15 i Mercury

From herbs and spices to fresh seafood, rum cocktails, and more, South Africa is home to many fantastic food markets. And soon-to-be-launched Time Out Market, expected to open later this year at the V&A Waterfront in Cape Town, is set to add another beautiful experience to the city’s culinary scene. The market will feature 13 local chefs and restaurateurs, four bars, and one stage. Guests will experience some of the city’s best food from a variety of concepts while coming with family and friends to enjoy their meals – on china with flatware – at communal tables. Earlier this week, the first five award-winning, celebrated, and much-loved culinary talents to join the market’s all-star line-up were revealed. They will be serving a diverse range of cuisines, reflecting the city’s vibrant…

EThekwini Municipality speaker Thabani Nyawose has denied that city manager Musa Mbhele is facing a criminal investigation over tender irregularities. Nyawose and Malusi Mhlongo, head of the City’s legal services, spoke to the media yesterday. Nyawose is set to face a council motion for apparently misleading the council over a 2019 City Integrity and Investigations Unit (CIIU) investigation into Mbhele. This after a notice of motion was lodged by Adec leader Visvin Reddy, who said the motion was directed at the speaker for misleading action. In response to the notice of motion, Nyawose said it was in line with the rules of order and would be tabled at a council meeting to be held at the end of the month. “Council will debate the notice of motion and vote on…

The article “BRICS summit will be a turning point for South Africa” (The Mercury, June 13) advocates defying the International Criminal Court (ICC) arrest warrant for Russian President Vladimir Putin and deepening relations with BRICS countries. It complains that the ICC is biased. There is no mention that South Africa voluntarily signed up to the ICC and the commitments that go with membership, or that laws are designed to be obeyed whether they are convenient or not. Nor is there mention that Russia poisons and imprisons opposition leaders, nor that it invaded Ukraine, a sovereign neighbouring state. Why should South Africa want to deepen relations with countries with such poor human rights records, when South Africa’s main saving grace internationally is its respect for human rights following the fall of…

LOVE on the airwaves? A male American radio show host was taken aback when a White House correspondent, left him an awkward “I love you” message at the end of a contribution. Philip Wegmann, signing off from Chris Stigall’s show on the Washington station, WMAL, uttered the phrase, according to The Huffington Post, after the host addressed his report on Mike Pence’s presidential campaign launch. “Thank you, Phil, very much. Great to catch up,” Stigall said. “I love you. Thank you,” Wegmann responded. “Did I just hear Philip say he loved me? Did he think he was talking to his wife for a minute?” Stigall asked. “I’ve never had a guest actually say that in closing: ‘I love you.’ Sorry, Phil. I’m married. This is very uncomfortable.” Wegmann had been…

President Cyril Ramaphosa wants Eastern Cape Premier Oscar Mabuyane’s court challenge of his proclamation for a Special Investigating Unit (SIU) investigation into an alleged bogus degree scandal, to be struck off the roll. Mabuyane approached the Bhisho High Court in an effort to stop the SIU investigation against him and, authorised by Ramaphosa, into allegations of maladministration and impropriety related to his Master’s research proposal at the University of Fort Hare (UFH). The proclamation stated that the SIU was to investigate maladministration in the affairs of UFH, including related to the awarding of Honours degrees and the sourcing of public servants for study in various faculty programmes by an individual for personal gain. According to an SIU report, Mabuyane allegedly solicited the assistance of former University of Fort Hare (UFH)…

KwaZulu-Natal police have made a breakthrough in the mass murder of 13 people last month in the Taylor’s Halt area of Pietermaritzburg. Provincial police spokesperson Colonel Robert Netshiunda said yesterday that investigations, spearheaded by the Provincial Serious Violent Crimes Murder and Robbery Unit, have resulted in the arrests of four suspects who are linked to the killings of 13 people on May 14. “Eight people were burnt to death inside an RDP house, while others succumbed to their injuries in hospital. “Another dead body was found with burn wounds in the bushes, a short distance from the scene of crime,” said Netshiunda. He said the suspects were arrested on Tuesday. Netshiunda said investigations were continuing. “The investigating team are not ruling out possibilities of more arrests. The four suspects, whose…

Despite an investment of R65 million on upgrades, pupils and teachers at a rural school in Kokstad have been left without access to running water, among numerous other defects. These findings were made during a recent oversight conducted by the KwaZulu-Natal public works portfolio committee at Xoloxolo Primary School in Bhongweni, Kokstad. The inspection was initiated as part of a close-out report based on the auditor- general’s recommendation. Almost a year after the project’s completion, critical upgrades remain incomplete. The absence of grey water left the school reliant on collected water to flush toilets. Furthermore, the school’s taps ran dry, leaving pupils and teachers without drinking water. Additional concerns presented to the committee included substandard workmanship, evidenced by broken stairs, railings and downpipes, and expensive imported locks that are costly…

The Passenger Rail Agency of SA (Prasa) will have to pay damages in a matter where a commuter fell from a moving train, the doors of which weren’t closed, while travelling between Heideveld and Nyanga in 2019, the Western Cape High Court has ruled. Commuter Siyamthanda Maphela made a claim of R3.5 million from Prasa for negligence after he described in his claim that he was struck by something possibly thrown through the open doors of the train carriage. Maphela, who said he was a fare-paying passenger, said the incident caused him to fall from the moving train. He suffered a right frontal decompressed fracture of the skull and blunt trauma injuries to his upper and lower body. Prasa, however, denied the particulars of the claim and liability…

On JUNE 18, the nation will pause to celebrate fathers. Some will take time to remember great men who shaped their being, while many will not care less what day it is. The result of the latter can be captioned in a term that emerged in the 60s and 70s, and tightened its grip in the 90s and the new millennium – absent fathers. The damage caused by absent fathers is evident in the lives of many today. The damage has been examined to affect child development intellectually, psychologically and psychosexually. This continues to raise its head even in adulthood in the form of aggression, unstable relationships, identity, social stand and so forth. My generation of fathers are present in the lives of their children, succeeding where their progenitors failed.…

At least 78 migrants died after their fishing boat sank off the Peloponnese, Greece’s coastguard said yesterday, as fears mounted that the death toll could rise much higher. Some 100 people were rescued after the boat capsized in international waters in the Ionian Sea in an operation complicated by strong winds, the coastguard said. A migration ministry source said there could have been “hundreds” of people on the fishing boat. Greece’s head of state, President Katerina Sakellaropoulou, said she would visit the port of Kalamata to confer with senior officials on the rescue and accommodation response. The International Organization for Migration (IOM) until yesterday had listed 48 migrants missing in the eastern Mediterranean so far this year, compared to 378 a year earlier. Nearly 30 people had been taken to…

The powerful Hezbollah group and its allies thwarted a bid by their rivals to elect a top IMF official as Lebanon’s president yesterday, sharpening sectarian tensions and further dimming prospects for preventing a collapse of the state. Four years since Lebanon went into a financial meltdown that marks its worst crisis since the 1975-90 civil war, parliament failed for a 12th time to elect someone to fill the post reserved for a Maronite Christian under the country’s sectarian system. The stand-off has opened a fresh sectarian fault line, pitting the Iran-backed, heavily armed Shia Muslim Hezbollah against Christian factions including its own ally, Gebran Bassil, who endorsed IMF official Jihad Azour for president. Neither Azour nor Hezbollah-backed candidate Suleiman Frangieh came close to winning the 86 votes needed to win…

WAYDE van Niekerk has seldom entered a 400m race where he is not the favourite, but that might be the case in tonight’s Diamond League event in Oslo. And guess what? It’s a fellow southern African athlete who is challenging him for victory. A 20-year-old Zambian, Muzala Samukonga, is standing in the way of Van Niekerk taking the honours at the Bislett Games meeting in Norway. While many in the sporting world may not have heard of Samukonga, the youngster has already made his mark in athletics by emerging victorious in last year’s Commonwealth Games in Birmingham, with a time of 44.66 seconds. He also claimed the 400m gold medal at the 2022 African championships, but it is in 2023 that Samukonga made his big breakthrough time-wise, clocking a sensational…

Starting at the tender age of eight years old selling vegetables on the side of the road, Mike Tlhoaele was always destined for greatness in the business world. Tlhoaele is the owner of start-up IT solutions company, Impeco IT. Impeco is a technology business focused on networking, support services and application development, which started trading in 2014 when Tlhoaele was 25 years old. While racking and cabling may have been the beginning, Tlhoaele has made sure that his business is agile enough to keep up with the disruptive nature of working within the tech space. Professionalism, integrity and quality delivery are what drives his success, attributes that caught the attention of the Altron Group, who have collaborated with this successful startup and helped it grow. Tlhoaele has been working with…

OPPOSITION parties the DA, IFP and EFF have all rejected the National Health Insurance (NHI) Bill in its current format, saying corruption, inadequate facilities and staff shortages were among the problems in the public health-care sector that the government had failed to address. The bill moved one step closer to being signed into law after it was passed by the National Assembly on Tuesday. Michéle Clarke, the DA spokesperson on health, said the party did not support the bill. “We believe the NHI will never reach its outcomes because of the environment we are operating in. We can’t just take private medical aids out of the situation, we need to form partnerships with private medical aids so that they can assist the capacity within the state. If you take the…

SOUTH Africans have become all too familiar with headlines detailing government departments that have crumbled, simply because ministers interfere in the management of their departments. The result is that these departments suffer from confused mandates, financial mismanagement, and often a lack of political will to see them succeed. It is time we demand that ministers’ wings be clipped and more power be vested in the legislature. A classic case of this is when ministers instruct officials to challenge court decisions, even against the advice of legal experts. The ministers do this because they have carte blanche use of taxpayers’ funds. They do not understand the enormity of the decisions they make, and as such, they plunge their departments into court battles, which lead to the unnecessary spending of taxpayers’ money.…

It amazes me how our leaders have this fixation on appointing and re- appointing boards whenever there is a problem at a state-owned entity (SOE). The members are often political appointees or friendly with the ANC. In the bad old days of apartheid, when at least the economy worked, and there was much more employment, there was never this phobia about appointing the boards of directors at SOEs, and neither is this the case in most free economies. That is partly why they are called free economies. They operate in accordance with market forces and without undue political interference. I generalise, obviously, to make my point. When are these overpaid, self-important megalomaniacs ever going to realise that for any business or government entity to function effectively, it needs to attract…

Politicians are human beings who intend to change the world or communities. Vulnerable communities are looking for the next big thing that can lift them out of their misery. Many in the communities belong to a political affiliation for self-gain to ease their poverty pain. The pain of poverty can make you look older than your years. Perhaps it was the betrayal of politicians who promised a better life that many are still waiting for. The pain of a son or daughter who becomes a parent. The pain of losing a child to gangsterism or drugs. At school, seeing this pain in the eyes of children from a failing community that needs help hurts to the core. Many adults at schools forget why they became teachers, especially in impoverished communities.…

A woman who, according to her now ex-husband, loved nice cars and fashionable clothing, forfeited her half of their matrimonial home, as well as her share of his pension money, all because she left him and their three children 11 years ago. The youngest child was 2 at the time and her husband told the Gauteng High Court, Pretoria, that until recently, she never bothered to check up on the children. He turned to court asking for a divorce, coupled with an order that she forfeit her marital benefits. The wife, in turn, launched a counter application, saying she was entitled to half of the house and pension, as she was a good wife during the time she had lived with her husband. The wife pointed out that she gave…

Out of the country’s 257 municipalities, 123 were being investigated for 325 corruption cases, according to the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA). Eighty of the cases were in courts, 44 cases were pending a decision to prosecute by the NPA and 155 cases were still under investigation. Other matters were at the inquiry stage, with 36 inquiries under investigation and 10 inquiries before the NPA. A breakdown of the corruption- related cases showed that North West led the pack with 64, followed by the Free State with 60, Eastern Cape, 46, Gauteng 39, Mpumalanga 35, Limpopo 30, the Western Cape 21, KwaZulu-Natal 19 and Northern Cape 11. Hawks head Godfrey Lebeya disclosed these details when he, the NPA, Special Investigating Unit (SIU) and SAPS detectives briefed the local government portfolio committee…

Two suspects who have been linked to the murder of Free State Warrant Officer Johannes du Randt have appeared in the Frankfort Magistrate’s Court. Fikile Du Preez Ramotsoenyane, 42, and Nkululeko Antonio, 47, were arrested at the weekend after they were found in possession of a police vehicle and other SAPS attire. Directorate for Priority Crime Investigation (Hawks) spokesperson Colonel Katlego Mogale said one of the accused made a brief appearance in the Vanderbiljpark Magistrate’s Court for the possession of stolen property, possession of police uniforms and possession of unlicensed ammunition. He later appeared in a different court for the murder of Du Randt, who was shot dead last week as he was tailing a hijacked truck. The duo are expected in the Frankfort Magistrate’s Court on June 20.…

Fake med certificates ALLEGATIONS of attempting to solicit a bribe from Busisiwe Mkhwebane’s husband should be enough to convince even the most biased person that Richard Dyantyi should recuse himself from this committee. Dyantyi should allow the allegations to be thoroughly investigated instead of rushing to conclude the inquiry under these controversial circumstances. This is similar to the blatant refusal of Chief Justice Raymond Zondo to recuse himself in the state capture inquiry against former president Jacob Zuma. Mkhwebane alleges that they even have WhatsApp messages, recordings that prove the direct involvement of Dyantyi in these brazen attempts to solicit a bribe. THE issue of fake doctors has been with us for many years. I, as a practising labour lawyer, often receive complaints from employers about fake medical certificates. We’ve…

THE youth unemployment rate, which now stands at an alarming 63.9% for those aged 15 to 24, should be enough reason for young people to go out and vote in their numbers for a party or an individual that will form a caring government they can hold accountable. By not taking part in next year’s elections, the very same people that have presided over the challenges and to a large extent worsened the situation, will stand a good chance of being re-elected. The country’s youth can no longer afford to leave the problems they are confronted with to politicians who are only interested in appointing their cronies in positions of power. That more than 700 000 graduates had in February applied for the R350 social distress relief grant since the…

Donald Trump was accompanied by two of his attorneys this week when he appeared in a Miami courtroom and pleaded not guilty to federal criminal charges that he unlawfully kept national security documents when he left office and lied to officials who sought to recover them. He was charged last week. But his defence team is still evolving after at least three key members left in recent weeks. Attorneys Todd Blanche and Chris Kise appeared with the former president during his arraignment, days after two other lawyers who had been helping Trump’s defence, Jim Trusty and John Rowley, resigned in the wake of his indictment. Trump has accused prosecutors of seeking to damage his political prospects. Trump has struggled to bolster his defence team as the documents investigation intensified. Two…

London: King Charles III yesterday received the sons of Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay Sherpa to mark the 70th anniversary of the first confirmed ascent of Mount Everest, the world’s highest mountain. The New Zealander and his Nepalese guide reached the summit of the 8 849m peak on May 29, 1953, as part of a British expedition led by John Hunt, paving the way for others to make the daring attempt to reach the peak. Charles received Peter Hillary and Jamling Norgay, the sons of the two mountaineers who themselves have successfully scaled Everest, as well as Hunt’s daughter, Sue Leyden. Charles hailed the historic climb as “one of the greatest examples of endurance”. He said his mother, the late Queen Elizabeth II, had received news of the expedition’s success…

One of the Miss SA 2023 top 12 finalists, Levern José, has been accused by former schoolmates of being a bully in high school. The 23-year-old from Kimberley in the Northern Cape had more than one person accusing her of bullying. “I was shocked to learn you made it to the top 12 in the Miss South competition, one of the girls you used to bully at school spoke out on what you and your gang of mean girls did to her on her WhatsApp status,” said @AnelisaJu. Twitter user @nsalemane also came forward with the bullying allegations against José. She said: “When I saw that girl make it to Miss SA’s top 30, I was asking myself how cause she was a bully. I wanted to comment on my…

Deputy President Paul Mashatile has reiterated in Parliament that South Africa will not face a power grid collapse. Mashatile said the issue of the grid collapse was used as a “scarecrow”. He said even now there has been a reduction in the stages of load shedding after interventions by the government. Mashatile said they would continue to ensure they address the issue of load shedding and improve the performance of the power plants. Electricity Minister Kgosientsho Ramokgopa has said the energy availability factor in some of the power stations has increased. The government has decided to go station by station to improve their performance. Mashatile, who was answering oral questions in the National Council of Provinces yesterday, said the grid collapse would not happen because of the safeguards that are…

DEMOCRACY is not just about elections. It is also about everyday practices, and democratic governments engage their people democratically, especially when they are organised in large democratic formations. A progressive government would see popular democracy as something to be supported and engaged. However, the ANC has repeatedly met popular democracy with contempt, as well as violent repression. On April 26, our movement held the strongest march of any organisation in the country over the so-called Freedom Day and Workers’ Day holidays, which are known in the Struggle as UnFreedom Day and May Day. More than 7 000 people from impoverished and marginalised communities took to the streets of Durban to defy the celebration of fake freedom by the ANC. We handed over our memorandum of demands, wrote many letters and…

Patrons at the Mdlalose Tavern in Nomzamo Park in Orlando East, Soweto, were enjoying themselves in July last year when armed gunmen burst in and opened fire. Sixteen people were gunned down and several were wounded in the mass shooting. Police rounded up six suspects, but despite months of investigation, they all walked free on Monday. The National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) decided to drop all charges against the accused as it believed it did not have a watertight case against them. As there was insufficient evidence against the accused, it felt there was little prospect of a successful conviction. Witnesses did not want to come forward as they feared for their lives. What was the NPA to do but shrug its shoulders, drop all charges against them and let…

A KwaZulu-Natal man who killed a 48-year-old taxi driver in February this year has been jailed for an effective 25 years. Siyanda Mfundo Mahlambi, 23, pleaded guilty to the murder of Sihle Ismael Malembe which took place on February 6, 2023. In his Section 105A plea handed to the Pietermaritzburg High Court by Legal Aid attorney Amanda Hulley, Mahlambi said he had met his friend at the Hlosukuhle Tuckshop in Dann- hauser. His friend had told him they could make money if they stole a car, because he had a buyer for a car. Mahlambi had agreed to steal a car because he needed the extra money to host a birthday party for his daughter. Mahlambi said that on the day of the murder they had gone to a tavern,…

THE board of defence arms manufacturer Denel has put the blame on the Department of Public Enterprises for allegedly failing to inform it about a meeting it missed with the public accounts watchdog last week. The board had been threatened with a subpoena and having to explain why the costs of the postponed meeting with Parliament’s standing committee on public accounts (Scopa) should not be carried by it. Yesterday, Scopa chairperson Mkhueko Hlengwa said it would have been pointless to proceed with last week’s meeting in the absence of the board. Denel was meant to brief the committee on its failure to table its audited 2021/22 annual report and its liquidity crisis, as well as to update the committee on irregular, fruitless, and wasteful expenditure. The Special Investigating Unit was…

Call for political will to find solutions and convince Treasury to provide more funds HERE is another public service announcement: if you are one of the millions of people who rely on the public health system, do not have a heart attack or stroke, and do not catch the flu or get involved in a vehicle crash. The chances are that no one will arrive in an ambulance to help you, and you will not receive proper and prompt medical attention in dysfunctional hospitals and clinics. The health service heads deep into winter. The flu is spreading. Shack fires are increasing, botched circumcision cases are looming, an exhausted and demoralised workforce is struggling to cope, severe staffing shortages persist and a broken social-care system needs reform. Unbelievable as it might…

EU MPs yesterday took a key step towards setting unprecedented restrictions on how companies use artificial intelligence (AI), putting Brussels on a collision course with American tech giants funnelling billions into the technology. The European Parliament adopted its position on legislation known as the EU AI Act, which would ban systems that present an “unacceptable level of risk”, such as predictive policing tools, or social scoring systems, like those used in China to classify people based on their behaviour and socio-economic status. The legislation also sets new limits on “high-risk AI”, like systems that could influence voters in elections or introduce harms to people’s health. The legislation would set new guardrails on generative AI, requiring content created by systems like ChatGPT to be labelled. The bill also requires models to…

Fighting rocked several vulnerable cities in western Sudan yesterday in an expansion of the country’s almost two-month-old war as the number of people who have fled their homes rose above two million. The war between the army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces has caused a humanitarian crisis in Khartoum, as well as cities including El Obeid, Nyala, El Fashir, and El Geneina, where more than 1 100 people have been killed. Speaking from El Geneina, Khamis Abbakar, the governor of West Darfur state, called for international intervention in what he described as a genocide. “Civilians are being killed randomly and in large numbers,” he said. While the RSF and allied militias had originally targeted areas of El Geneina where members of the Masalit tribe lived, these attacks had now…

SIYA Kolisi is on track to make a dramatic return ahead of the Rugby World Cup in France, Jacques Nienaber and Rassie Erasmus assured the South African rugby family yesterday. Speaking alongside head coach Nienaber at the Springboks base camp in Pretoria as they prepare for the Rugby Championship early next month, the director of rugby revealed that the Bok captain was recuperating swimmingly from a serious knee injury. Earlier this year, while playing against Munster, a fairly innocuous sidestep by Kolisi damaged both the ligaments in his knee, requiring serious corrective surgery and a prolonged period of recovery on the bleachers. But, according to Nienaber and the further elaborated by Erasmus, Kolisi will make the World Cup, and might return to action during the warm-up matches for the showpiece…