South African media darling and business mogul Khanyi Dhlomo has again found herself in the spotlight. But this time her latest venture has been tinged with the unwelcome whiff of scandal. 

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Johannesburg – Bafana Bafana will host their Soccer World Cup qualifier against Botswana in Durban on September 7, FIFA has confirmed.

According to the Sowetanlive website, the match at the Moses Mabhida Stadium will kick off at 15:30.

But the venue for the key match in Group A between leaders Ethiopia and the Central African Republic [CAR] has yet to be designated, suggesting it is likely to be played at a neutral venue rather than in Bangui. 

That will come as much relief to Ethiopia but a blow to South African hopes.

Ethiopia have a two-point advantage over Bafana in the standings after being stripped of three points by FIFA for using an ineligible player. 

The respite for Gordon Igesund’s team gives them a chance to still salvage prospects of going to Brazil, but SA must beat Botswana and Ethiopia fail at the same time if Bafana are to finish top of the standings and advance to the final phase of qualification.

Sport24

Harare – Zimbabweans began casting ballots on Wednesday in a fiercely contested election dominated by Robert Mugabe’s bid to extend his 33-year rule and overshadowed by suspicions of vote rigging.

The 89-year-old president, Africa’s oldest leader, is running for election for the seventh and perhaps final time, after a series of violent crackdowns, economic crises and suspect elections.

This time Mugabe vowed to step down if he lost and claimed the army – long the bulwark of his rule – would also respect any victory for Morgan Tsvangirai, his perennial rival.

But few are taking him at his word.

Even Tsvangirai, who was forced out of the race in 2008 after 200 of his supporters were killed, told CNN he took Mugabe’s promise “with a pinch of salt”.

Determined to cast their ballots, voters, some wrapped in blankets on a cold winter morning, started queuing up at least four hours before polling stations opened.

Voting appeared to be brisk in many urban areas, which have traditionally recorded strong support for Tsvangirai.

At polling stations set up in green tents on an open field in Mbare, the capital’s oldest township, several hundreds were standing in line.

At Epworth, a Harare township, 66-year-old Ellen Zhakata held back her tears after voting.

“I am happy to have cast my vote. I just want an end to the problems in our country,” she said. “All my children are outside the country because of the economic troubles here. I am so lonely. How I wish they could be working here.”

Economic crisis

Millions of Zimbabwean were forced to migrate to find work elsewhere after an economic crisis which was exacerbated by the violence-marred 2008 elections.

Some 6.4 million people, around half of the population of 12.9 million Zimbabweans, are eligible to vote at 9,670 polling stations across the country.

A candidate needs 50% of the vote to avoid a run-off and both Mugabe and Tsvangirai appear confident they can manage that feat.

Mugabe has focused his campaign on bashing homosexuals and on promises to widen the redistribution of wealth to poor black Zimbabweans.

Amid recovery from an economic crisis that saw mass unemployment and galloping inflation, Mugabe loyalists insist their hero is “tried and tested”.

Credible opinion polls are rare, but according to one survey by the US-based Williams firm in March-April, Mugabe could be in for a rough ride.

In a survey of 800 Zimbabweans, 61% said they had a favourable view of the MDC compared with 27% for Mugabe’s ZANU-PF.

The poll showed Tsvangirai leading in seven of 10 provinces and that only 34% of those who voted for Mugabe in 2008 back him for president this time around.

Tsvangirai hopes his plans to lure back foreign investors, create a million jobs in five years and improve public services will deliver a long-awaited victory.

Polling stations will close at 19:00. Final results are expected with five days.

The elections will also chose lawmakers and local government councillors.

In June, the Research and Advocacy Unit – an NGO – reported the existing roll included one million dead voters or people who have emigrated, as well as over 100 000 people aged over 100 years old.

AFP

Chairperson of Moral Regeneration Father Mkhatshwa has joined Minister of Arts and Culture Paul Mashatile in congratulating the North West for being the first province to host a Social Cohesion and Moral Regeneration Summit and a trendsetter in implementing resolutions of the National Summit held at Kliptown in July last year. . 

“You are a great province and the Moral Regeneration Movement is very very proud to be associated with you,” said Father Mkhatshwa who was speaking during the closing of the two-day Provincial Moral Regeneration and Social Cohesion Summit that commenced in Mahikeng on Tuesday.

Mkhatshwa said the North West province has always been a trendsetter  in activism within the Moral Regeneration Movement. “Once again you are becoming a leader in this area of work. With you we can only become a winning team, a winning country, a winning nation and we can all be very proud of your work,” said Father Mkhatshwa.

In his address at the summit on Monday, Minister of Arts and Culture Paul Mashatile also commended the North West Province for being the first province to host a summit on Social Cohesion following the resolutions of the National Summit on Social Cohesion. 

Minister Mashatile said it was appropriate that the North West was hosting the Provincial Social Cohesion and Moral Regeneration Summit during Moral Regeneration Month.-TDN

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Cape Town – A Ukrainian mother who duped an elderly man into investing R4m with a Ukrainian bank, but kept the money for herself, was on Tuesday given seven months to repay the money, or face prison.

Kateryna Karpovska appeared in the Bellville Specialised Commercial Crime Court, before Magistrate Amrith Chabilall.

Chabilall said she had been in a romantic relationship with the man and the method she had used to cheat him was a disgrace.

He sentenced her to eight years’ jail, suspended for five years, on condition that the money was repaid by 28 February.

He said she had the means to repay it, according to defence attorney Pieter du Toit.

In addition, she was sentenced to three years’ house arrest, and ordered to do community service as a cleaner at the Table View police station.

Chabilall said Karpovska had qualified for the minimum sentence of 15 years for a first-time offender, for fraud involving R500 000 or more.

All that had saved her was that her children were with her in South Africa, and to jail her would leave them in a foreign country without support.

“This is the one single factor that saved you from going to prison for 15 years,” he told her.

Karpovska was appointed by the Ukrainian Joint-Stock Commercial Bank, better known as the Imexbank, as the chief representative officer (CRO) with the SA Reserve Bank (Sarb).

In all, she was sentenced on four counts of fraud, one contravention of the Prevention of Organised Crime Act and one violation of the Financial Advisory and Intermediary Services Act.

According to the charge sheet, the bank eventually closed its South African representative office in March 2008.

Karpovska failed to inform the Sarb of this, and fraudulently continued as the Imexbank’s CRO with the Sarb.

In the R4m fraud, she falsely informed the man not only that she was Imexbank’s CRO, but also its chief wealth manager.

“It is disgraceful that a woman can do such a thing to a trusting man,” Chabilall said.

– SAPA

Pietermaritzburg – A doctor, who testified that three people died of heat stroke after taking part in a KwaZulu-Natal Road Traffic Inspectorate (RTI) fitness test, changed her evidence on Tuesday.

Dr Carolyn Lee said she was not certain of her conclusion, after the transport department presented the blood and pathology results of the three participants.

She was testifying in Pietermaritzburg in an inquiry into the deaths of eight people, who took part in a 4km run at the city’s Harry Gwala Stadium in December. It formed part of a fitness test for RTI job applicants.

More than 34 000 people qualified to apply.

A total of 15 600 applicants attended a fitness test on 27 December and a similar number on 28 December.

Lee was the head of the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) at Grey’s Hospital.

She assessed two of the participants who died, Lungile Wambi and Ntuthuko Sibisi.

Lee did not assess a third victim, Bongiwe Mbatha, but made her findings based on medical notes she received from Edendale Hospital.

Lee said Sibisi might have suffered severe dehydration and had the precondition of diarrhoea. Wambi had multiple cardiac arrests and low blood pressure, which explained the dehydration he had, she said.

In Wambi’s case heat stroke was lower down on the list of possibilities. Mbatha had features of heat stroke, but may have had an underlying, pre-existing condition.

Weather conditions

Advocate Ravenda Padayachee for the department, said an expert would testify that if weather conditions were not conducive for fit people to participate in a 3.8km run, a 20% fatality rate of people with no pre-existing condition was expected.

He said genetics played a large part in someone surviving a 3.8km run in hot weather.

Lee said it was possible some of the participants could have had pre-existing conditions.

Padayachee said he would call a witness who would testify that Sibisi died of fluid overload.

Lee said the fluid replacement given to Sibisi was not unusual in dealing with someone who was dehydrated.

She said a healthy person would not die from 8l of fluid as they would excrete it as urine.

Padayachee said Grey’s Hospital had failed to cool Sibisi down, even though it was suspected she had heat stroke.

– SAPA

Johannesburg – Two children, two men, and a woman were killed when a bakkie and a truck collided in KwaDukuza, KwaZulu-Natal, on Tuesday evening, paramedics said.

Two people, including a 10-year-old girl, were critically injured in the collision on the R102 shortly before 20:00, Netcare 911 spokesperson Chris Botha said.

Three others sustained serious injuries. The cause of the accident was unknown.

– SAPA

Johannesburg – Ousted Tlokwe ANC mayor Maphetle Maphetle will return to the North Gauteng High Court in Pretoria on Wednesday, in another bid to regain control of the municipality.

Maphetle was supposed to have vacated his office by 10:00 on Tuesday by order of Judge Neil Tuchten.

On Monday Tuchten dismissed an application to nullify the council meeting at which Maphetle was unseated on 2 July.

But, when newly-elected DA Mayor Annette Combrink arrived to take office on Tuesday, Maphetle would not leave, saying he was going to appeal.

“Maphetle Maphetle is occupying that office because the ANC has decided to appeal against that judgment,” ANC North West spokesperson Kenny Morolong said.

North West DA spokesperson Tiaan Kotze said: “The DA has not received any [legal] papers yet. What they are doing is absolutely illegal.”

Meanwhile, the DA sent for the sheriff of the court to enforce the order. But later on Tuesday, Morolong said an application for leave to appeal had been filed in the north Gauteng High Court in Pretoria.

“The ANC is ready to exercise its right to appeal,” Morolong said.

“We believe the convening of that council meeting was inconsistent with what we call rules of order at the Tlokwe local council.

The mayor is hard at work. His focal point is service delivery. He is unfazed by this development.”

DA Councillor Hans-Jurie Moolman said the party would oppose the application, set down for 10:00 on Wednesday. Maphetle and Tlokwe speaker Barei Segotso had sought to have the meeting at which Combrink was voted in nullified.

The ANC’s North West provincial disciplinary committee expelled 14 of its councillors during the controversy.

– SAPA