Innehållsförteckning för 2022-06-24 från Cape Argus

Cabinet approves repeal of restrictions More than two years after the first Covid-19 case and 750 days of a National State of Disaster, five waves, over 100 000 deaths, a stay-at-home order, closure of businesses, increased job losses and immense strain on the health sector, South Africans have embraced the repeal of all Covid-19 restrictions with a sense of optimism and relief. Minister in the Presidency Mondli Gungubele, with Health Minister Dr Joe Phaahla, held a media briefing yesterday, following Phaahla’s decision to repeal Covid-19 restrictions related to mask wearing, public gatherings and travel, including vaccination proof at ports of entry. The Cabinet approved the repeal on Wednesday, with unanimous approval by the President’s Co-ordinating Council consisting of premiers and mayors. As at mid-June, there was a decline in reported…

mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis has called on the SAPS crime intelligence unit and the State Security Agency to join efforts with the City to tackle the growing metal theft trade. Hill-Lewis made the call after accompanying the City’s Metal Theft Unit (MTU) on on-site visits to various scrapyards across Bellville. He said while the City was working hard to rein-in rampant cable theft and safeguard essential infrastructure, bringing burgeoning cable theft to an end required a more conjoined approach. “Metal theft is now organised crime. We need our intelligence services to help us break down these criminal networks and take down the operations thoroughly. That’s why we need all parties to come to the table to ensure that we not only make arrests but that the justice system executes tougher…

Sekunjalo Investment Holdings (SIH) and associated companies (Sekunjalo) have welcomed the recommendation that was made in Chief Justice Raymond Zondo’s final reports into state capture that were released on Wednesday, for banks to follow due process before closing accounts. Justice Zondo made the recommendation when handing over his final reports of the Judicial Commission of Inquiry into Allegations of State Capture, Corruption and Fraud in the Public Sector including Organs of State to President Cyril Ramaphosa. He said: “It is therefore recommended that relevant existing legislation governing banks be amended to introduce this requirement of fairness or, if warranted, a new piece of legislation to be enacted which will make this a requirement.” The chief justice said that banks would need to afford their clients a proper opportunity to be…

Tech billionaire Elon Musk’s Boring Company has applied to dig a tunnel under Tesla Gigafactory Texas in Austin, however, it is unclear what they plan to do with it. The Boring Company has been in discussions with the state and municipal governments for several projects since moving to Texas, but to date, they have not moved forward with any of them until now, according to the auto-tech website Electrek. Now, the company has applied with the city of Austin to build a tunnel on the Tesla Gigafactory Texas property for the project “Colorado River Connector Tunnel”. The applicant has proposed a private access tunnel along with associated improvements, the report said. The Boring Company’s main project is its “loop” in Las Vegas. A Boring Company loop is a system…

Freedom Front MPL Peter Marais has accused the Western Cape government of being held hostage by land invaders, after the start of the legal process of the withdrawal of the declaration of the Driftsands Nature Reserve. Speaking at the end of a briefing to the Environmental Affairs and Development Planning standing committee by CapeNature about the process, Marais said: “I must admit I am shocked by the admission by the Western Cape government that the province is now run by land invaders.” Marais said that the Province had put its hands up in the matter and land invaders were now in charge of the Province and were destroying biodiversity even if the land was unsuitable for housing. During the briefing the management of CapeNature acknowledged that the scale and nature…

SANParks ecologists want to shift the agency to reduce its carbon footprint, and achieve net-zero GHG (GHG) emissions by 2050. In a webinar hosted by SANParks and SANParks Honorary Rangers on Wednesday evening, SANParks’ ecologists elaborated on the organisation’s climate change insights. This came while the spotlight remained on South Africa’s recent floods, torrential rain and droughts exacerbated by climate change over the years. SANParks landscape ecologists Mmoto Masubelele and Avhavhudzani Phophe led the discussion, which focused on reducing SANPark’s carbon footprint and mitigating the impact of climate change within the parks. “As SANParks, we started developing our own strategy to deal with climate change, the ‘climate change preparedness strategy’, which has four main objectives. The first is to understand the implications of climate change across the organisation. The second…

The decision taken by the city following the damage inflicted to the infrastructure of Umgeni Water Board by the recent floods was a difficult one. It was expected most of our customers were going to be concerned about it. Water is life, and accessing it is an inalienable right guaranteed in our Constitution. From the onset, as a caring city, it would be remiss of me not to apologise to all our customers bearing the brunt of this water rationing. eThekwini has an agreement with the water utility to be provided with 540 megalitres of water daily. Unfortunately, in the meanwhile, Umgeni is only able to produce 500 megalitres of water from the Durban Height Water Treatment Works. To feed this facility, Umgeni depends on four water aqueducts that convey…

The South African Revenue Service (Sars) has won its long-running legal war against Capitec Bank, with the Supreme Court of Appeal (SCA) validating its appeal against a judgment handed down by Acting Judge Frederick Sievers of the Cape Town Tax Court. The ruling by the SCA means that Sars can now prevent Capitec Bank from claiming back a R71.5 million VAT return from November 2017. On February 15, 2018, Sars issued a VAT assessment disallowing the R71.5 million claimed by Capitec as a tax deduction in its November 2017 VAT return on the basis that it did not qualify for a deduction in terms of the VAT Act. Additionally, Sars also levied a 10% late payment penalty for the resultant understatement of Capitec’s VAT liability. The Tax Court judgment…

The WCED has won a case at the Western Cape High Court to invalidate a contract for the provision of catering services entered into between the school governing body (SGB) of the Western Cape Sports School in Kuils River and Star Catering from Khayelitsha. The WCED had gone to court seeking an order that an agreement entered into between the SGB in September 2019, with the caterer ZT Makhosikazi Trading (Pty) Ltd trading as Star Catering, was unlawful and void. The issue went back to August 2019 when Zukiswa Lali, a director of Star Catering, was told that the school wanted to appoint a new service provider. Lali was called, with other potential service providers, to make a presentation at the school, and on September 4, 2019, the SGB held…

The Cape of Good Hope SPCA says it has seen an increase in the illegal snaring that is threatening animal life in the urban areas of the southern peninsula. The organisation says its wildlife department responds to at least two call-outs a month to retrieve animals caught in active snares found across the Constantia Valley, Fish Hoek, and down to and including inside Cape Point Nature Reserve. SPCA spokesperson Jaco Pieterse said the type of snares found included self-locking, noose-type snares made either from binding wire, bicycle brake cable, construction string, or plastic packaging rope. Pieterse said a poacher typically would set many snares in an area and often won’t recall all the trap sites, resulting in the discovery of severely decomposed animals. “The misconception is that snares are being…

DO NOT panic, monkeypox is rarely fatal, not highly transmissible and very close physical contact is required for transmission, emphasised health experts as South Africa reported its first case. Health Minister Dr Joe Phaahla confirmed yesterday morning that he had received a report from the National Health Laboratory Services chief executive that they had confirmed through laboratory tests the first ever case of monkeypox in South Africa. “The patient is a 30-year-old male from Johannesburg who has no travel history, meaning that this cannot be attributed to having been acquired outside South Africa,” Phaahla said. The National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD) confirmed that contact tracing had commenced in an attempt to identify any additional linked cases of monkeypox in South Africa. “Because of the travel history for this particular…

Forty-three young Capetonians are undergoing an apprenticeship programme through the Department of Economic Development and Tourism (Dedat). Dedat runs an artisan development programme affording opportunities for experiential learning at the Golden Arrow Bus Services (Gabs). The initiative, awarded to unemployed youth, gives youngsters the opportunity to learn at the Gabs depot and workshop, providing them valuable work experience in jobs requiring artisanal and technical skills. Finance and Economic Opportunities MEC Mireille Wenger said the programme highlighted one of the department’s top priorities – to create economic opportunities for young people in the Province. “We are working hard through our skills development programme to create more opportunities for young people to get the right qualifications, skills and experience for jobs available now and in the future. One of my priorities is…

The world drug problem and response continue to present challenges to the health, safety, and well-being of people in South Africa. A drastic change in approach to drug policy recognises that the punitive approach has not been successful in tackling drug-related problems. Instead, the emphasis should be placed on evidence-based public health and social justice principles that focus on individuals, families, communities, society as a whole, and must underscore social protection and health care instead of conviction and punishment. While South Africans are using the same kinds of drugs as the rest of the world, alcohol is the most widely used psychoactive substance in the country, accounting for approximately 58% of deaths on South African roads. The per capita consumption of alcohol in South Africa is 11 litres, ranking in…

THE South African Weather Service’s Cape Town office expects this weekend to be clear but cold, with temperatures predicted to increase gradually next week, allowing Capetonians a reprieve from the recent grey skies and wet weather conditions. Other parts of the Western Cape will not be as lucky, as the weather service issued a warning for disruptive rain leading to localised flooding of susceptible informal settlements and roads expected over the Langeberg and Garden Route municipalities into tomorrow morning, as well as between Storms River and Port Alfred from the evening, then easing off. The weather reprieve was welcomed after last week’s bout of heavy rainfall over the Mother City resulted in destruction and despair for residents, particularly those residing in informal settlements. This was followed by another cold front…

Instagram might ask you to prove your age – but only in certain circumstances. The photo and video-sharing platform said beginning yesterday it will start testing new tools for age verification if accounts listed as younger than 18 try to change their age to over 18. But users could still misrepresent their birth dates when setting up an account. The change comes as Instagram’s parent company, Meta, faces increased scrutiny over the presence of children younger than 13 on its apps. A federal privacy law prohibits collecting data on people under 13 without parental permission, but only if the platforms know it’s happening, which lets companies look the other way, privacy advocates claim. State and federal legislators have proposed a variety of bills – including the Kids Online Safety Act…

There’s much excitement and pride at Al-Jam’iyyah Al-Khairiyyah Hafith Institute of Cape Town as twins Umar and Uthmaan Abrahams, 12, have been selected to join a South African U13 soccer team. The boys were selected for the school team that got invited to a tournament hosted by Sports Stepping Stones. The team made the finals and the boys were selected for the final squad of 30 to represent the Western Cape, and subsequently were selected for the national team. The boys were incredibly excited to be representing their school and South Africa. “I was very happy and proud that I made the squad. I am honoured to be able to represent my country,” Umar said. Uthmaan said: “I am truly grateful that my brother and I were both afforded this…

RETURNING to this Springboks side, it seems, is much like cuddling up on your couch; a warm security blanket tucked in around you; a mug of hot chocolate steaming in hand; while watching a YouTube video on 10 Greatest Tries by South Africa at a World Cup. It feels like home. That was certainly the sense the media scrum would have pondered for the briefest of moments yesterday in Pretoria when hooker Malcolm Marx and prop Trevor Nyakane expressed their delight regarding being back in SA and within coach Jacques Nienaber’s Bok set-up. “It is unbelievable,” said Marx, now back from Japan where he was playing for Kubota Spears. “It has always been special to be in the Springbok environment and seeing all of the guys that are playing in…