Johannesburg – Two teenage girls were found dead in Dobsonville, Soweto, on Wednesday morning, Gauteng police said.
“The girls were dressed in their school uniforms. They had cuts on their hands and necks,” spokesperson Warrant Officer Kay Makhubela said.
“Razors, candles and their school bags were found next them.”
eNCA reported that the girls were found dead in a field off Braam Fischer Drive.
Neither of the girls, aged 15 and 16, had been reported missing.
No arrests had been made.
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Pretoria – Media houses will use technologically advanced equipment to record Oscar Pistorius’s murder trial, the North Gauteng High Court in Pretoria heard on Wednesday.
Frank Snyckers SC, for MultiChoice and Eyewitness News, submitted that the equipment was not obtrusive and was controlled remotely.
He said the media houses had secured the National Prosecuting Authority’s (NPA) support.
“The world’s eye will be on the criminal justice system, as it has been. Principles of open justice and right to freedom of expression are part of the right to a fair trial,” he said.
“In fact, the trial judge can be given the means to deactivate the recording.”
Pistorius is accused of killing his model girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp in February last year. His trial is expected to be heard in the North Gauteng High Court from 3 to 20 March.
‘Unconsenting witnesses’
Snyckers told the court that if granted permission to film the proceedings, MultiChoice would broadcast the full trial unedited. He said however “unconsenting witnesses” would not be filmed.
The application to film the proceedings was brought by news channel eNCA. It was joined in the application by MultiChoice and Eyewitness News. A 24-hour TV channel dedicated to the upcoming trial would be launched on DSTV on 2 March, a day before the former star athlete goes on trial.
MultiChoice and EWN said they were proposing to use unmanned, remote-controlled high-definition cameras which would provide feed to all broadcasters.
The NPA on Tuesday said it would not oppose the application. However, NPA spokesperson Nathi Mncube said it did have a number of conditions. He would not say at the time what these were.
Pistorius’s legal team is expected to oppose the media’s application.
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Johannesburg-Kaizer Chiefs midfielder, Reneilwe Yeye Letsholonyane has vowed that he and his teammates will continue to work hard to defend their league title.
Yeye insisted that even though Celtic will be a hard nut to crack they will beat them when the two Teams meet on Wednesday night.
“The game will be tough. As you know Celtic has been doing well since the arrival of Coach Ernst Middendorp. We have to work hard as a Team to win the game on Wednesday. Even though we know what they can do, we will always focus on our game plan” Yeye told Chiefs official website.
“We are happy with the rotation of the players and that has been evident with the results. We are coping with the rotation system that the Technical Team have implemented. We are all working hard to get a chance to play and so far the system is working for us” continued Yeye.
Yeye said they have been encouraged by the attendance at games.
The supporters have been attending our games in large numbers. We hope they will come to FNB Stadium in their numbers once again. We are focusing on our plans at the moment. We are not looking at the other teams and their performances or whether they are closing the gap at the top of the table or not, says Yeye.
“What the other Clubs are doing is not of our concern, ours is to work hard and continue to win our games” said Yeye.
Tickets are sold at Computicket and Shoprite/Checkers outlets nationwide at a cost of R40 for adults and R10 for the juveniles accompanied by adults.
Kickoff is at 19:30 and the gates open at 16:30.-TDN
Follow us on Twitter@Taung_DailyNews or @IceT_
By Obakeng Maje
Matlosana-MEC for Human Settlements Public Safety and Liaison Nono Maloyi will hand over about 260 houses to Jouberton families near Klerksdorp on Thursday.
The Houses are part of the 8000 houses that are expected to be handed over between February and March 2014. The benefiting families are said to be from the nearby farming communities and have never owned houses before.
“The handover is part of celebrating twenty years (20yrs) of freedom, and also in line with the Outcome 8 of the National Development Plan vision 2030 which is intended to improve the quality of people’s lives and bring back dignity to the marginalized communities across the province” departmental spokesperson Ben Bole said.
According to Maloyi the gesture is part of the department’s service delivery initiative and reduction of housing backlog in the province. He said that the move is also critically important because it restores the dignity of those benefiting communities.
The event will take place as follows:
Date: 20 February 2014
Time: 10H00
Venue: Jouberton Ext 20 (Open space)
-TDN
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Kimberley – A government official treated a request from Northern Cape ANC leader John Block to help a business friend as an order, the Northern Cape High Court heard on Tuesday.
“I saw it as an order to help… with office accommodation in the province. We listen to our leaders,” State witness John Crouch said.
Judge Mathebe Phatshoane was hearing evidence in the fraud and corruption case against Block, Alvin Botes, ANC MP Yolanda Botha, and Trifecta director Christo Scholtz.
The National Prosecuting Authority alleges the Trifecta Group entered into a number of lease agreements with the Northern Cape social development department in which rentals, or rental space, were grossly inflated. The accused have all pleaded not guilty to all the charges against them or their companies.
Leading Crouch in his evidence-in-chief, prosecutor Peter Serunye asked whether he knew if Block was a government employee at the time the crimes were committed. Crouch was the head of a unit in the former Northern Cape transport, roads, and public works department responsible for providing accommodation for state departments in the province.
“No, he was the deputy chair of the ANC. I am a member of the ANC for many years, still am,” replied Crouch.
Serunye asked: “What was your reaction?” Crouch said Block was a leader of the ANC.
“It’s a fact in the Northern Cape when Block speaks we listen. We have that habit in the Northern Cape,” he said.
The court heard Block allegedly told Crouch a Sarel Breda would come to visit him.
“I must see how I could help him [Breda],” Crouch told the court.
Big chief
Crouch said before he could phone Breda, a Trifecta director, he apparently arrived at his office announcing he was sent by the “big chief”.
The court heard Breda visited Crouch’s office so often he and the staff became uncomfortable. Crouch testified he phoned Block to complain about Breda’s constant presence.
“His response was that I must see that the office accommodation of arts and culture, and agriculture must be completed,” said Crouch.
Breda died in a aircraft accident in the Northern Cape on 9 March 2009.
Earlier, Phatshoane warned Crouch he should answer all questions put to him by the State and defence teams honestly.
Crouch had faced corruption charges in the Trifecta case but turned State witness.
The trial continues.
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Orlando Pirates caretaker coach Eric Tinkler’s explanation for dropping Fatau Dauda to the bench against Ajax Cape Town is simple: Senzo Meyiwa is the number one.
It had long been wondered when the Ghana international would play for Pirates after sitting most of the season on the bench, but he finally made his debut 10 days ago against Mamelodi Sundowns when Meyiwa went off injured.
For more http://www.kickoff.com
Johannesburg – Three people were wounded in a shooting incident at an intersection in Westdene, Johannesburg on Tuesday, paramedics said.
Paramedics found two men had sustained critical injuries and one was seriously injured at the intersection of Main Road and Tobie Street on Tuesday evening, Netcare 911 Santi Steinmann said.
The men were transported to a nearby hospital.
Details of the shooting were still unclear.
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Johannesburg – A protest in the Zandspruit informal settlement near Honeydew continued on Wednesday, Johannesburg metro police said.
“Protest action continued the entire night,” said Senior Superintendent Wayne Minnaar.
He said that Beyers Naude Drive, between Johan and Peter roads, was still blocked off due to the protest, and advised motorists to use alternative routes.
On Tuesday, residents barricaded roads with burning tyres and stones in a protest against the removal of their shacks.
Captain Doniah Mothutsane said residents had illegally erected shacks along Beyers Naude Drive, making it difficult for vehicles to pass.
She said metro police had removed their structures earlier in the day, which caused the residents to protest. Police had met residents about the matter last week.
A bakkie and an old vehicle which was parked at a petrol station in the area had been torched.
No arrests had been made yet and no injuries were reported.
Police were monitoring the area, said Mothutsane.
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Johannesburg – The National Prosecuting Authority had a number of conditions should media houses broadcast Oscar Pistorius’s murder trial.
However, the NPA would not say what these conditions were.
The North Gauteng High Court will on Wednesday hear an application by media houses to broadcast the trial.
The application is being brought by news channel eNCA who is being joined in its bid by MultiChoice and Eyewitness News.
A 24-hour TV channel dedicated to the upcoming trial will reportedly be launched on DStv a day before the star athlete goes on trial.
MultiChoice and EWN said it was proposing permission to use unmanned, remote controlled high definition cameras which would feed to all broadcasters, if the application was successful.
The NPA said it would not oppose the application.
Pistorius is accused of killing his model girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp in February last year. His trial is expected to be heard in the North Gauteng High Court from 3 to 20 March.
It was not immediately clear if Pistorius’s legal team would oppose the application.
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Cape Town – Opposition MPs on Tuesday told President Jacob Zuma he had failed to match up to his predecessors, Thabo Mbeki and Nelson Mandela.
Democratic Alliance leader Lindiwe Mazibuko was the first opposition party leader to tell the National Assembly that Zuma’s “poor leadership” had reversed much of the progress South Africa had made up to 2009.
Mazibuko vowed to table a motion to impeach Zuma if the public protector’s report on Nkandla found him guilty of wrongdoing.
Speaking during the debate on Zuma’s State of the Nation address, Mazibuko told MPs she wanted to deliver a strong message on the Nkandla “scandal”, which involved spending over R206m of public money on Zuma’s private homestead in KwaZulu-Natal.
“I want to use this opportunity to send a very clear message to our honourable members, that should the honourable President be involved in any wrongdoing in the Public Protector’s report on the Nkandla scandal, I will not hesitate to table a motion to impeach him in this House.”
Mazibuko said she could not guarantee opposition parties would win such an impeachment vote, but said millions of South Africans would be calling on MPs to do the right thing.
“They know the real story – that our country cannot afford another five years of President Zuma’s administration.”
Public Protector Thuli Madonsela’s report on Nkandla is set to be released on 1 March.
Minutes later, Congress of the People leader Mosiuoa Lekota said the country was ruing the day former president Thabo Mbeki was forced out of office.
“South Africa today is less happy than when President Mbeki was driven out of office,” he said.
Lekota served as a minister under Mbeki and broke away from the ANC in 2008 after Mbeki was forced to step down as president. He said under Zuma the country had racked up trillions of rands in debt and wasted billions more every year.
“Is it any wonder that township after township in the province you govern are going up in flames?”
Govt failed SA
IFP leader Mangosuthu Buthelezi said Zuma and his government made promises but delivered very little.
“Considering this last quarter of our democratic era, one blatant truth demands to be spoken: Mr President, under your watch, this government has failed South Africa,” Buthelezi said.
“Twenty years ago, words like ‘rainbow nation’, ‘miracle transition’, ‘freedom’, and ‘reconciliation’ filled the public discourse. Under your leadership, Mr President, those words have become ‘Marikana’, ‘scandal’, ‘protest’, and ‘corruption’.”
Some MPs in ANC benches heckled Buthelezi, while Zuma and some of his Cabinet ministers sat chuckling in their seats.
Buthelezi quoted both Nelson Mandela and Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu on their warnings that people should criticise the “oppressed” if they became the “oppressors”.
“It is painful, but I cannot stand in this House in good conscience and say that today’s ANC is the ANC in which I cut my political teeth. It is not the same creature. It is hideously transformed,” Buthelezi said.
Acid test
Election day, he said, would be an acid test for the country.
“On the 7th of May, South Africa will visit the trauma unit. Whether we emerge healed, or dying, is up to the electorate.”
Cabinet ministers jumped to Zuma’s defence.
Home Affairs Minister Naledi Pandor said Zuma was correct to say the country had a good story to tell.
“In fact, it is an extraordinary story of a remarkable political and socio-economic transformation, one that is probably unparallelled in recent history both for the speed of its achievement and the wide-ranging diversity of areas that have seen fundamental change,” she said.
“The only cloud hanging over this good story, Mr Speaker, is the uninspiring negativity and poor grace of the opposition parties that have spoken here today.”
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The Guardian 