By Obakeng Maje

Taung-South African Democratic Teachers Union (SADTU) in the province are calling for resignation of Department of Education MEC Louisa Mabe.

The Sadtu in the province accuse the MEC of ignoring their needs and claim the way MEC is running the department leaves more questions than answers.

Sadtu general secretary in the province Thabo Sematle vows that they will try all their level best to push the premier Thandi Modise and ANC in the province to heed to their call.

“We are sick and tired of the way MEC runs the department. There are lack of teachers and some teachers are not yet paid” he said.

Last month president Jacob Zuma announced that education will be trated as essential.

On wednesday the South African Democratic Teachers Union (SADTU) called on teachers, parents, learners and communities to unite behind quality public education as a basic human right. 

“As South Africa commemorates Human Rights Day on the 21st March 2013(yesterday), SADTU fully acknowledges that the key to quality public education lies on all key stakeholders working together” Sadtu said. 

“Education cannot be the responsibility of the teacher alone, we need to get the whole nation involved,” said SADTU’s General Secretary Mugwena Maluleke. “Education is indeed a human right because education reduces inequality in the society. It gives knowledge which makes one to be critical and therefore becomes an informed decision maker. It even improves one’s life expectancy.”  

Sematle said they haven’t approached premier and ANC yet about their call and will do so soon.

“We haven’t send a formal inquries to ANC North West and premier,but we will launch our grievances soon” Sematle said.

SADTU recently launched a campaign to promote quality public education. 

The Promotion of Quality Public Education Campaign calls on the learners to cooperate with the teachers in class, do their homework and respect. 

Parents are urged to support the learners with their school work and show general interest in their children’s education. Communities are called to look well after the school premises and to treat them as community property.

Business, churches and the youth are also targeted in this campaign. “We believe these sectors, more especially business, have skills and resources that they can share with education in bring about quality education,” Maluleke said. 

The decision to come up with such a campaign is in line with SADTU’s 2030 Vision’s strategic pillar of Creating a Learning Nation.

The national leadership of SADTU will soon embark on a nationwide information drive and the idea is to inform members, parents and communities about the initiative.  

*Our attempt to get Department of Education response proved futile before going to press.

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Banyana Banyana have climbed three places to 53rd position in latest FIFA Coca Cola Women’s World Rankings released on Friday, 22 March 2013.

The Sasol sponsored senior women’s national team has made similar strides on the continent moving into fourth position, one place above the 2012 African Women’s Championship winners, Equatorial Guinea.

Nigeria retains their position as the number one team on the continent followed by Cameroon and Ghana in second and third place respectively.

Banyana Banyana head coach, Joseph Mkhonza said he was excited about the recent developments.

“I am very happy; this is good news for me and the whole country. We want to see ourselves amongst the top 10 in the world and be consistently in the top three in Africa.”

“I thought we did well in the Cyprus Women’s Cup despite finishing in the 11th place. We must continue building on what we learnt during the tournament. We will continue to introduce new players to the squad as a means of having more players and creating healthy competition.”

Mkhonza, who is South Africa’s 2012 Coach of the Year, applauded the controlling soccer body, SAFA and sponsors Sasol for giving women soccer great exposure, something he said raised the profile of women football.

The next FIFA Women’s World Rankings will be released on Friday, 21 June 2013.

BY Obakeng Maje

Rustenburg-The Police arrested three suspects at Mfidikoe Village on Friday at about 08:00 after they allegedly robbed and assaulted the SAB truck crew while they were offloading beers at a local tavern. 

According to the witnesses, it appeared that four suspects at the time tried to rob the truck and two of them entered the truck police said.

“One of the suspects pointed the truck’s crew with a firearm and a scuffle ensued. The firearm fell off from the suspect’s hand and all three suspects fled on foot and managed to catch a taxi” Warrant Officer Sam Tselanyane said.

“At that time the Police sector vehicle that was on patrol was informed and reacted immediately to the complaint. The Police managed to stop the taxi and three suspects aged 28, 28 and 35 were arrested and SAB invoice machine and knives were recovered from them” he said.

Police are investigating a case of armed robbery and the suspects will appear at Rustenburg Magistrate’s  Court on Monday .

BY Obakeng Maje

Rustenburg-Police are investigating a case of murder after a body of a 51-year-old man was found in a bedroom at his rented farm house. 

The incident happened 23 Kilometres outside Rustenburg at Olifantshoek farm near the R24 (Rustenburg –Johannesburg) road. 

Police said that on Thursday at about 14:00 the farm owner went to visit the  deceased and his 78-year-old mother. On his arrival at the farm, the owner alleged that he was met by deafening silent. 

“He allegedly knocked on the door and there was no respond.  The farm owner then became suspicious and called the police” colonel Emelda Setlhako said. 

“Upon arrival of the police at the scene, the house door was forced open and members were met by the strong smell coming out of the house” she said.

Police then searched the house and the decomposed body of a 51-year-old man was found in one of the bedrooms .

Police could notice that there was some serious scuffling inside the house as blood spots were seen on some of the walls. 

Further search and investigation was conducted at the scene. 

“During the search police were shown to the other secluded bathroom that is accessed through the wardrobes and found a 78-year-old woman sitting inside a bath still in a state of shock and dehydrated” police said. 

Emergency Medical Services were summoned and the old woman was transported to a local Hospital. 

Allegedly the two had a gardener who was generally assisting at the farm as the deceased was also breeding dogs.

According to the information received, the gardener was last seen by the neighbouring farm’s gardeners on Wednesday. 

Among the things that are missing include a VW Caddy and two Cellular phones belonging to the deceased and his mother.  The motive for the murder is unknown and  the suspect/s are still at large.  

A case of murder was registered and investigation continues.

Durban – Using the latest cellphone and Apple iPad technology, a Durban North couple led police to where a gang of burglars was hiding out with their stolen goods.

Police also recovered bags of stolen clothing, shoes, credit and debit cards as well as flat screen television sets from other house break-ins and robberies, including the couple’s neighbour. One of the gang was arrested.

Shauna Wynne Cole said the men had broken into their Highdale Road home while they were asleep on Monday night.

“We never heard a thing. But when we woke up in the morning we realised that our cellphones, iPad, wallets, takkies and watch were missing,” she said.

Her husband, Richard, activated “find my iPhone” (a GPS satellite tracking application) on his home computer and within seconds found the GPS location of the stolen items.

The application can be downloaded free of charge from the internet (http://ipod.about.com/od/usingios4/ss/Set-Up-Find-My-Iphone.htm).

“It was amazing how fast the application worked. A satellite image came up and we could see the phone was at a house in Inanda,” Wynne Cole said.

“An hour later the phone location moved to a spaza shop in the area.”

She said they borrowed a neighbour’s iPad to activate the satellite image and go mobile, heading them for Greenwood Park police station.

For more details go to www.iol.co.za

Bloemfontein – The Supreme Court of Appeal has converted the 10 murder charges against Jacob Humphreys to 10 charges of culpable homicide, according to reports.

The SCA also reportedly replaced Humphreys’ 20 -year prison sentence with 8 years behind bars.

The Cape Town taxi driver was appealing both his conviction and sentence in the Supreme Court of Appeal in Bloemfontein.

For more details go to www.iol.co.za

By Obakeng Maje

Manokoane,Taung-North West Provincial government sent its representatives at Manokoane, in Taung to respond to the residents grievances.

The residents of Manokoane went on strike almost a year ago protesting against poor service delivery in their area.

They burnt two houses belong to their headmaster and councillor respectively.

A month ago they allegedly burnt a half-built house of the headmaster again during protest.

The residents wanted a tarred road between Manokoane and Taung Station.

The provincial government taday held a meeting with concerned residents in Manokoane.

Even though some of top guns were not available,the committe that were responding to the residents grievances promised that a road that link Magogong via Maphoitsile and Taung Hospital will be tarred soon.

The provincial government was led by Sam Sethubamagala and promised that the construction will commerce in two weeks time.

The residents had different views and mixed emotions as they say they will believe this when the preparations started.

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Johannesburg – She was allegedly raped, then thrown naked from the 10th floor of a building by her boyfriend or his friend.

But both are walking free as no criminal charges have been brought against them, despite the curious circumstances around her death.

The couple lived in a building on Market Street on the east side of the Joburg CBD and the alleged murder is said to have taken place in the early hours a day after Valentine’s Day.

According to a security report that The Star has seen, the couple were seen on CCTV footage entering the building just before 11pm on February 14 with another man. The woman was named only as Cynthia.

Johannesburg – The police watchdog is not revealing its findings into the events that led up to the supercar crash earlier this year, although they have finished their investigation.

A high-powered Audi R8 smashed into three pieces in January, killing the driver Areff Haffejee and policeman Goodman Lubisi, who was in the passenger seat. At the time, the police said Lubisi had been kidnapped by Haffejee after he found dagga in the car and a high-speed chase ensued.

However, this did not explain why Lubisi was in the passenger seat and did not use his service pistol to force Haffejee to stop the car.

CCTV footage seen by The Star showed the Audi travelling at normal speeds along Rivonia Road followed by a police van without its blue lights on.

The police watchdog, the Independent Police Investigative Directorate (Ipid), has refused to reveal its findings.

For more details go to www.iol.co.za

By Obakeng Maje

Taung-Taxi drivers in Taung on the rampage after the taxi rank that they were using went under construction.

Taung municipality put Taung taxi rank under construction early this year. This cause confusion within taxi industry as the makeshift taxi rank allocated to them is too far from CBD.

The municipality moved all taxis to a temporary taxi rank just behind Extention 6.

According to taxi drivers say since they were moved to that makeshift taxi rank, business has took a knock as they accuse other motorists of stealing commuters from different hiking spot.

However the municipality refutes their claims as hogwash and absurd.

According to municipality spokesperson Charity Modikwe says the agreement was reached between all stakeholders and Taxi Associations operating in the area.

“The old taxi rank is under construction and we expecting to reach its completion in January 2014” Charity Modikwe told local radio.

“We followed all procedure before we move all taxis to a makeshift taxi rank in Extention 6. The temporary taxi rank is user-friendly” said Modikwe.

Modikwe said the temporary taxi rank have electricity,water and sanitation.

According to municipality the new taxi rank will have bays for various destinations including bus bay.

“The new taxi rank will be more bigger than the old one and that will be more efficient” Charity Modikwe said.

Taxis are not using the allocated taxi rank and some of taxis are parked in the streets including others operating next to the railway station in the area which put commuters lives in jeopardy.

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