JOHANNESBURG – South Africa’s former finance minister Malusi Gigaba said on Sunday a private video was leaked after his phone was hacked, and he had faced blackmail threats over it when he headed the Treasury. Gigaba, now Home Affairs minister (again), was thrust into the finance post in March last year after former President Jacob […]

Namibia’s desert landscape got a makeover this week as magical water poured down from the heavens. In some parts over 100mm fell according to the Namibia Meteorological Service, flooding rivers (see video below) and finishing with radiant rainbows. Well known Gauteng-based publicist Georg Knoke, who grew up in Namibia, said on Facebook: “Magic in Sossusvlei – […]

CapeNature and SANCCOB Saves Seabirds successfully released 13 rescued and rehabilitated African penguins on Saturday at Stony Point penguin colony in Betty’s Bay, on the Overberg coast of South Africa’s Western Cape province. While the first bunch raced (or waddled) for freedom, watch below as a few stragglers needed to be coaxed into the water… […]

Several fires have raged in the Western Cape, South Africa, this week, claiming the life of one firefighter pilot and destroying at least 10 homes in the Southern Cape, and leaving thousands homeless in Cape Town informal settlements, as the region has been gripped by a heatwave… and tonight flames continue to burn in the […]

JOHANNESBURG – Former South African president and Nobel Peace Prize winner FW de Klerk has been hospitalised for a lung condition, but is recovering and is expected to be discharged next week, his foundation said on Saturday. De Klerk, 82, South Africa’s most recent white president, became Nobel laureate jointly with his successor, Nelson Mandela, […]

The future of Mapoyi Mthetho, the ‘unknown’ opera singer filmed singing outside a Bloubergstrand restaurant on Thursday, is looking a LOT brighter… thanks to Capetonian diner Nicolene Smith capturing the moment on film (see below), and to South Africans who made the video go global (and thanks to Mapoyi’s incredible talent of course!). At midday […]

Chinese business tycoon Jack Ma has three main pieces of advice for South Africa: improve the education system, invest in entrepreneurs and ensure clean governance. Speaking at the inaugural South Africa Investment Conference business dinner on Friday night, Ma said for any country to develop it has to pay attention to those three elements. Ma […]

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) – South African President Cyril Ramaphosa used an investment summit on Friday to reassure investors that his government was committed to protecting property rights as it pursues plans to accelerate the pace of land redistribution. “We are committed as government to pursuing a comprehensive approach to land and agrarian reform which ensures transformation, […]

ADDIS ABABA (Reuters) – Ethiopia’s parliament has approved senior diplomat Sahle-Work Zewde as the country’s first female president, proceedings on state television showed, cementing another shift in the country’s political system from Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed. Sahle-Work is at present U.N. under-secretary-general and special representative of the secretary general to the African Union. She replaces […]

It’s been a fantastic day for South Africa as local and international businesses have come to the inaugural South African Investment Conference bearing gifts in the form of investment commitments to the tune of R290 billion ($20 billion). “This R290 billion is what we have now in our hands and these are in addition to […]

South African businessman Andre Hanekom is still missing in Mozambique under mysterious circumstances. On Thursday his wife of 36 years, Francis, took to Facebook to urge people to sign a petition to the Government and Mozambique police to free him. The petition claims Hanekom, who had been living in Mozambique for 25 years, has been […]

CAPE TOWN – South African Finance Minister Tito Mboweni said on Thursday that the country had to act swiftly on its debt levels to avoid turning to the International Monetary Fund for help. “Whether or not you like the IMF, ideologically or practically, it doesn’t matter. When you get into a debt trap that’s where […]

Amongst the more depressing aspects of Finance Minister Tito Mboweni’s maiden budget speech to the South African parliament on Wednesday (details here), there were some highlights… Sanitary pads are to be added to VAT free items which will come as welcome news to over half the population! Sanitary pads – along with bread flour and […]

Tributes have poured in for South African firefighting pilot, Nico Heyns (65), who lost his life in the line of duty on Tuesday in Vermaaklikheid, in the southern Cape. Early on Thursday evening, Working on Fire posted the following moving video tribute to a man who was loved and respected by all who knew and worked […]

Europe made a step forward in the fight against plastic on Wednesday with a move to ban popular throw-away plastic items like straws and cotton buds… and a greater burden to be placed on manufacturers to recycle; all in a bid to help clear up ocean pollution. Under the proposal by European Union (EU) lawmakers […]

Hip-Hop legend, Jabulani “HHP” Tsambo has sadly passed away on Wednesday afternoon. Details surrounding the veteran’s death are still sketchy at this stage, although he was known to have been suffering from depression for some time. ‘Jabba’ had spoken honestly in interviews about his battle, and had told The Sowetan in 2016 that he had attempted suicide […]

JOHANNESBURG – South Africa’s rand weakened more than 1 percent on Wednesday after new Finance Minister Tito Mboweni forecast wider deficits and slower growth in his maiden budget speech. At 1247 GMT, the rand traded at 14.4200 versus the dollar, 1.1 percent weaker on the day. Mboweni delivered the medium term budget to parliament as […]

JOHANNESBURG – South Africa’s state pension fund and a local black investment firm have bought a majority stake in Africa’s biggest cattle company for R5.2 billion. The Public Investment Corp. (PIC), Africa’s largest investment fund and the biggest investor in South Africa’s economy, said on Tuesday it had bought a majority share in Karan Beef […]

JOHANNESBURG  – South Africa’s biggest supermarket chain, Shoprite, said on Tuesday it would pay customers for reusing its newly introduced recyclable bag… as it joined domestic rivals in efforts to curb plastic pollution. Supermarkets have come under increased pressure to cut their use of plastic as images of littered oceans and beaches become commonplace, shocking […]

Police in South Africa have shot and killed two men in KwaZulu-Natal in a ‘blaze of bullets’ who were allegedly responsible for the murder of two security guards in a stationary vehicle in Soweto two weeks ago. This was confirmed by South African Police Service (SAPS) spokesperson Vishnu Naidoo in a statement on Tuesday. Chilling […]

Local South African film-maker – Joshua Bradley – is thrilled at having his movie screened in the United States next month. The movie – Nommer 37 – is set to premier in cinemas in Los Angeles and New York on 2 November 2018. The crime thriller, set in the Cape Flats, was funded by the Department of […]

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) – South Africa’s new finance minister will target spending on agriculture, infrastructure and job creation projects in his inaugural budget speech on Wednesday in a bid to haul the economy out of a recession. With the government facing a ballooning debt, stubbornly high unemployment, struggling state companies, and dwindling coffers, Tito Mboweni, a […]

N’DJAMENA – Two of six critically endangered black rhinos – relocated to Chad in May – have tragically died, Zakouma National Park’s management said, undermining efforts to restore their population in Chad after a nearly 50-year absence. Before the transfer of the six rhinos from Addo Elephant National Park in South Africa in May, the […]

Americans are clamouring to buy a $2 lottery ticket that could make them one of the richest people in the world… with a fortune GREATER than South Africa’s gross domestic product! Tuesday night’s Mega Millions lottery jackpot stands at a whopping $1.6 billion!! Wouldn’t it be great if a South African expat, living in the […]

LUSAKA – Zambia has revived plans it suspended two years ago, after protests by animal rights activists, for the controlled slaughter of up to 2,000 hippos over the next five years, its tourism minister said on Monday. Charles Banda said the hippo population could not be supported by the water levels in the Luangwa river […]