Innehållsförteckning för 2022-10-04 från Cape Argus

When Lady X, real name Xolisa Mvula, stepped onto the red carpet at the 28th South African Music Awards, she turned heads. Her outfit showed off her natural curves and her hairdo was even more of an attention grabber. She may have not gone home with the award for Sama28 Artist of the Year but one can’t blame the musician for going all-out for the big music night. The name “Lady X” may be new to some people, as she took a break from the industry after it became a dark place for her. Lady X has been in the Mzansi music industry for years now – this isn’t even her first Sama nomination. She is now clearly in a better place and her focus is on her music and…

Vrygrond remains tense following a spate of murders over the weekend and yesterday. Gang-related violence in the area has left residents afraid to leave their homes. Shootings erupted at the taxi rank yesterday, with one person confirmed dead. Police spokesperson Captain Frederick van Wyk confirmed the deaths of two known gang members after they succumbed to multiple gunshot wounds on Friday. On Saturday, three people were killed, including a taxi driver, and a known gang member. Gunfire continued to ring out on Sunday, with many taxis unwilling to enter the area, leaving commuters stranded over the weekend. Van Wyk said a 72-hour activation plan was ordered for the arrest of the suspects. Ward councillor Mandy Marr said it was the death of an individual close to a gang leader that…

It took (International Relations and Co-operation Minister) Naledi Pandor only two days to publicly condemn Israel for its action in Gaza following a wave of terror attacks on Israeli civilians in early August. Her vicious aggression speaks for the importance that this subject holds for her and her ANC government. Mahsa Amini, a young Iranian woman, was arrested on September 16 for not wearing her hijab properly, and suspiciously died while in the custody of the brutal Iranian “morality police”. This precipitated countrywide demonstrations which to date have claimed more than 75 protesters killed and seen 20 journalists beaten and arrested by security forces. Not only the Iranian people, but the international community have squarely condemned the violent response of that theocratic regime with calls for freedom from the oppression…

THE scourge of absent fathers in South Africa has been studied, academically explored and discussed in many a forum. This issue has been seen as the major contribution to the disintegration of society and its values. Volumes of academic studies the world over always come to the same conclusion about absent fathers and societal fragmentation. I hate to disappoint you, but this piece is not a psychological commentary on the overly explored subject. However, I would like to explore the Republic of South Africa, as represented by its government and its actions, as the absent father who has been a subject of many study years. With so much pain and unhappiness, I have been an observer and commentator on our government’s policies and actions (read service delivery) towards South African…

Mogadishu: Nine people, including senior regional officials, were killed in twin car bomb attacks claimed by the Islamist group al-Shabaab in Beledweyne in central Somalia yesterday, police said. “The initial information we have received confirms the death of nine people” including state ministers and commissioners, said Mohamed Moalim Ali, a local police commander. At least 10 others were injured in “suicide attacks” when two cars loaded with explosives were detonated about five minutes apart outside district headquarters in Beledweyne. Among the dead was the state’s health minister and a deputy district commissioner.…

MOSCOW: The pressure in the damaged lines of the Nord Stream and the Nord Stream 2 gas pipelines has stabilised and there are no more gas leaks, Russian energy giant Gazprom said yesterday. “The pressure in both lines of the Nord Stream gas pipeline has stabilised after the ruptures, gas leaks have stopped,” Gazprom said on Telegram. The company said it will restart deliveries via the Nord Stream 2 pipeline by pumping the natural gas back into the pipeline after all necessary inspections of the integrity of the line have been made.…

Rassie van der Dussen believes that the playing conditions for the T20 World Cup in Australia later this month should be much more batter-friendly than what the Proteas are currently experiencing in India, especially up front in the powerplay. Van der Dussen, who is currently not in India with the Proteas and is “gutted” to be missing the T20 World Cup with a finger injury, has been an interested spectator back home. Van der Dussen could only look on in frustration as the Proteas slumped to 9/5 in the first T20 international before again being reduced to 2/2 in the second match on Sunday. On both occasions, it was rookie left-arm bowler Arshdeep Singh who caused the damage. New-ball partner Deepak Chahar has also played a significant part in maintaining…

President Cyril Ramaphosa has announced that his Presidential Employment Stimulus has achieved a milestone of 1 million participants, with more than 600 000 jobs created and small businesses given a boost. He said the stimulus, launched two years ago as a response to Covid-19 devastating the economy, had contributed to job creation as the economy went on the mend. “This achievement is the result of a collaborative effort across government and the wider society, including the private sector, community-based organisations and many others,” he said in his weekly newsletter. He said the government would continue building on the success of the stimulus to expand its reach. “It is still very much needed to complement recovery of the job market. It also supports that economic recovery in important ways. In a…

THE report headlined “Government fails to pay 952 businesses” (Cape Argus, Friday, September 30) refers. The government keeps on and on about how they support small businesses, and how they do things to enhance the profitability of small businesses. An article of this nature shows that non-payments by the government to suppliers are getting worse every year. This non-payment destroys small businesses and shows the true intention of this government. They don’t care about small businesses at all! The reality is that everyone within the various state departments who has his or her hands in the till would rather help themselves than pay honest business people who are trying to earn a living. We cannot even boast about a National Development Plan when this is taking place. We see departments…

SOMETIMES events that take a few weeks to happen unfold in a matter of days. The last few days of last week were such days. It started with newly elected City of Joburg Speaker, Colleen Makhubele, agreeing to a vote of no-confidence in the mayor Mpho Phalatse. Then on Friday morning, Phalatse brought an urgent court application to declare the council meeting where such voting would take place unlawful. This was followed by behind-the-scenes, frantic horse-trading culminating in the vote of no-confidence in the mayor and the swift election of a replacement, Dada Morero. Since this sudden turn of events, reactions have ranged from dismay at the DA-coalition partners’ lack of principle to social media analysts pointing out the contradiction that the very same politicians elected on their opposition-to-the-ANC ticket…

Washington: At least 80 people were killed in the US states of Florida and North Carolina by Hurricane Ian which made landfall in southwestern Florida last week. At least 76 of the deaths were in Florida. More than 1 600 rescues had been made in Florida since Ian made landfall there on Wednesday, according to officials. The storm brought catastrophic storm surges, heavy rains, destructive winds and flooding to Florida’s coast and inland areas, causing damage that will cost an estimated $28 billion to $47bn to repair. US President Joe Biden said Hurricane Ian “is likely to rank among the worst in the nation’s history”.…

World Rugby’s move to “aid the flow of the game” with water breaks has had the exact opposite effect and needs to be scrapped. In May, the governing body announced that it had approved a global trial limiting the opportunity for non-playing personnel to enter the field of play during a match with the aim of “improving the flow of matches by reducing unnecessary stoppages without compromising welfare”. Firstly, it’s not hard to figure out why such a law was suddenly implemented following the ridiculous outrage at SA Rugby’s director of rugby Rassie Erasmus’s ‘water boy’ role. We all know the real reason it was implemented in the first place ... it was a poorly masked attempt at restricting the comings and goings of Erasmus. “The aim of the trial…

Sekhukhune United coach Kaitano Tembo believes that his side will go all out for a win and have had enough time to prepare ahead of their home clash against Orlando Pirates at the Peter Mokaba Stadium tonight. The pressure is currently on Tembo and Babina Noko. The side has shown little improvement from last season. Instead, they have won just one league game so far and are second last with seven points after eight games. Should Sekhukhune lose to the Sea Robbers and Marumo Gallants pick up points against TS Galaxy, Tembo’s side could move to last place. “Preparations have been going well,” said Tembo. “We have had enough time to rest and to look at areas that we need to improve. We also looked at areas in which we…

Mantashe backs project to save power plant Mineral Resources and Energy Minister Gwede Mantashe has backed the much-delayedand “most complex” steam generator replacement (SGR) project at the Koeberg nuclear power plant. The unprecedented project, worth billions, has been marred by workers’ suspensions emanating from the hostile NUM-Eskom relationship and operational delays of the project. The project – which was estimated to cost R20 billion in 2010 – is a key factor in whether the plant’s life span is extended for a further 20 years, beyond July 2024. Built by the French between 1978 and 1984, the plant’s 40-year operational licence is coming to an end. Earlier this year, Eskom announced a planned outage for unit 1 in Koeberg as part of the SGR project, and the outage was supposed to…

The trial of farmworker Jeremy Sias – accused of killing 30-year-old bakery manager Meghan Cremer – was cut short after Sias told the court he had severe toothache that required medical attention. Sias, 29, faces four counts of murder, robbery with aggravating circumstances, theft, and defeating the administration of justice for his alleged involvement in Cremer’s murder and attempts at discarding the evidence. Yesterday, Judge Elizabeth Baartman directed the police detective assigned to the case to ensure Sias received treatment from the district surgeon, after he complained of severe tooth ache. This came after police officer Winston Pickard returned to the stand to give testimony on the ancillary notes he recorded during an interview with Sias, before the accused led police to where he had dumped Cremer’s body. Pickard said…

The entire world is in utter turmoil as events cascade out of control. The blowing up of the Nord Stream pipeline, religious chaos in Iran, carnage in Ukraine, the rise of deadly fascism and confrontation in the South China Sea are being choreographed by the demons of war who seek perpetual war as an instrument for global control. Peace efforts have been abandoned as brinkmanship and nuclear roulette become a deadly tool of superpower diplomacy. Eyeball-to-eyeball stand-offs will lead humanity to extinction. Three thousand powerful nuclear weapons are on the alert to turn planet Earth into a radioactive wasteland for at least 1 000 years. Every nuclear war exercise conducted over the past 75 years graphically reveals that human life on Earth ceases to exist even in a limited nuclear…

Allow me to be brutal, dirty honest with the dirty morsige state our country is in, but I want to stay on our stoep here in the Western Cape in my brutal, dirty opinion. First, we have heroes who need all classes of available South African medals. Here I am pointing to the so-called illiterate, the poorest of the poor, in communities who on every dirt collection day, without any safety equipment, dive into our bins to “mine” items for recycling. These items are then exchanged for financial gains at recycling plants. These dirt collections occur mostly in the well-to-do areas, where the rich throw away items that are a poor man’s treasure. Let us now hit the Dirt Road to the poor and the informal settlements where dumping waste…

A sober workforce is both a legislative and an operational requirement. Employers have a duty to ensure a safe working environment, which includes a duty to prevent intoxicated people from entering the workplace. This is especially important in industries such as construction, manufacturing, mining and transport, where operating heavy machinery under the influence of intoxicating substances can be extremely dangerous. Workplace testing of existing employees has been used successfully to identify and deter intoxication in the existing workforce. To extend this deterrent effect and communicate a zero tolerance to substance misuse, it is advisable for companies in safety-critical industries to conduct pre-employment substance testing so as to avoid hiring individuals who are likely to defy or ignore company policies that prohibit the consumption of intoxicating substances. A clearly communicated policy…

BIRMINGHAM: British Prime Minister Liz Truss was forced yesterday into a humiliating U-turn after less than a month in power, reversing a cut to the highest rate of income tax that helped spark turmoil in financial markets and a rebellion in her party. Finance minister Kwasi Kwarteng said the decision to scrap the top rate tax cut had been taken with “some humility and contrition”, after his party’s lawmakers reacted with alarm to a move that favoured the rich during an economic downturn. Elected by party members but not the broader public, Truss and Kwarteng had sought to jolt the economy out of its more than 10-year run of stagnant growth with a 1980s-style plan to cut taxes and regulation, all funded by vast government borrowing. Signalling a break with…

The Nobel prize in medicine was awarded yesterday to Svante Pääbo, a Swedish geneticist whose work on ancient DNA helped change our understanding of human origins. Pääbo, an evolutionary geneticist at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, did groundbreaking work to sequence the genome of long-extinct Neanderthals, showing they interbred with modern humans. Before Pääbo’s contributions, scientists studied bones and artefacts to understand human ancestors. His work has established a new field of science, paleogenomics, that uses DNA analysis.…

Liverpool are conceding too many similar goals in their matches this season and the players may need to get “back to basics” to tighten the defence and return to winning ways, manager Jurgen Klopp said yesterday. Famed for their counter-pressing style which helped Liverpool compete on all four fronts domestically and in Europe last season, Klopp’s side have leaked goals this season and kept only two clean sheets in all competitions. A 3-3 home draw with Brighton & Hove Albion on Saturday dropped Liverpool to ninth place in the Premier League standings and Klopp said they would have to come out of the crisis in a similar way to when they lost several defenders to injuries two seasons ago. “When you spot a problem and think you have the solution,…

When coach Arthur Zwane selects his team for tomorrow’s derby against Swallows FC, Kgaogelo Sekgota and Edmilson Dove will be the first names on his team sheet. This duo were the stand-out performers for Chiefs in Sunday’s MTN8 first leg semi-final 1-1 draw against AmaZulu. Dove marshalled Chiefs’ central defence well, and although he is a newcomer to the side, he made an immediate impact by dealing with Usuthu’s attacking threats. He reads the game excellently, and has an eye for space. He deals well with balls into central positions from out wide. Sekgota, meanwhile, deservedly won the Man of the Match award after an excellent performance playing in the right channel of midfield. He showed a fine turn of speed when he set off on attacking runs. He kept…