“Look at that car outside. Look at the laptops and the iPads when we go to Parliament, and look at what we are wearing. Check where we are staying. And then look at the conditions of the working class South African of today. Look at the taxis they ride in … how they stand eight hours in a queue at a hospital for a Panado.”

- Cosatu secretary general Zwelinzima Vavi, who questioned his own lifestyle at the Numsa national political commission yesterday.

Source: Times Live

Had it not been for the media and whistle-blowers, many instances of corruption would not have been exposed, the National Press Club (NPC) said on Tuesday.

The Protection of State Information Bill in its present form would lead to wide classification of information, NPC chairman Yusuf Abramjee told a public hearing on the draft legislation in Mamelodi, outside Pretoria.

“The bill in its current form is clearly open to abuse. It provides for wide-ranging powers, relating to the classification [of information],” said Abramjee.

“Officials, including junior civil servants and members of security services, are authorised to classify documents with the head of departments.”

Read more here (via Times Live)

In defence of the protests: Women have seized the word ‘slut’ to reclaim their right to wear what they want, writes Gillian Schutte

In 2008, hundreds of South African women donned their miniskirts and protested at the taxi rank where a young girl was brutally accosted by taxi drivers and hawkers for wearing a short denim skirt.

Read the full article here (via Times Live)

China denounced a Pentagon report that warned its military modernization could destabilize the region

Beijing and Washington have sought to rein in their quarrels this year, and a recent visit to China by US Vice President Joe Biden brought vows of cooperation and goodwill.

Read the full story here. (via Times Live)

Poor white families have been warmly received by their black neighbours at a new RDP housing complex

For many years, Koekie Beukes and her late husband Carl dreamed of owning a house. Yesterday, 57-year-old Beukes’ dream came true as she moved into her new home at Chief Mogale Gardens amid opposition from the local people’s civic organisation.

Read the rest of this article here. (via Times Live)

Court ruling leads to 5000 lifers qualifying for speedy parole hearings

Half the criminals sentenced to life behind bars in South Africa for rape, murder and other violent crimes will be considered for parole after serving less than 14 years in jail.

Read the rest of this article here. (via Times Live)

Pollsmoor has traumatised the well-manicured Sandton widow of slain Judge Patrick Maqubela

Now Thandi Sheryl Maqubela – who has been charged with killing her husband at his Sea Point flat in 2009 – has been moved from the notorious prison, where she was held for 15 days.

Read the rest of this article here. (via Times Live)

Double amputee Oscar Pistorius produced the lone quality effort in a disappointing morning session for the South African athletics team at the IAAF World Championships in Daegu, South Korea, on Sunday.

Pistorius made history by finishing third in his 400m heat, clocking 45.39 — the second fastest time of his career — to progress to the semi-finals.

Read the full story here (via Times Live)

Somali Islamist rebels have beheaded at least 11 civilians in the capital in the past two weeks, a campaign of terror that residents said Friday is designed to show the insurgency can still act in Mogadishu after withdrawing from their bases there earlier this month.

“We wake up with beheaded bodies on the streets every day,” said Abdinur Marwan, who lives in a district of Mogadishu called Hewila. “They call themselves Muslims while doing what Allah banned! Everyone is trying to leave here because people are being killed like goats.”

Read the full story here (via Times Live)

Flooding that caused a dam to overflow in part of southwestern Nigeria and led to houses being submerged has killed 20 people, an emergency management agency spokesman said on Sunday.

“Twenty confirmed dead,” said Yushau Shuaib of the flooding in the city of Ibadan. “A dam overflowed its boundary … It’s a very serious situation.”

Read the full story here (via Times Live)

The rate of new HIV infections continues to outpace prevention efforts, Deputy President Kgalema Motlanthe says.

Replying to questions in the National Council of Provinces, he told members there were now an estimated 5.38 million people with HIV in South Africa.

Read the full story here (via Times Live)

Western powers are determined to bring about regime change in Libya regardless of the cost to that country, former president Thabo Mbeki said on Friday.

In a speech to students at Stellenbosch University, delivered in his capacity as patron of the Thabo Mbeki Foundation, he said the major Western powers had intervened in Libya to “advance their selfish interests”.

Read the full story here (via Times Live)

Much has been made of SlutWalk, the march taking place in a number of countries to promote women’s right to be safe.

Some women have taken exception to the name, refusing to be associated with the derogatory meaning of the term “slut”.

Read the full story here (via Times Live)

An old railway bridge along Smit and Solomon streets in Braamfontein has begun to crack and may collapse, says Johannesburg metro police.

Chief Superintendent Wayne Minnaar said that engineers had been called to inspect the structure, and the roads along it had been cordoned off. Minnaar said the old city bridge, used by thousands of motorists daily, started cracking on one side on Thursday morning.

Read the rest of this article here (via Times Live)

Reports that National Youth Development Agency (NYDA) chairman Andile Lungisa wants to make the country “ungovernable” are false, the agency said on Monday.

“The NYDA would like to place it on record that Lungisa has no intention of making the country ungovernable at any point,” spokesman Siyabonga Magadla said.

Read the rest of this article here. (via Times Live)

The former owner of the farmhouse in which retired army commander General Solomon Mujuru died in a fire has questioned how the celebrated liberation fighter could not have escaped from the property “that had more doors and windows than holes in a colander”.

Read the rest of this article here. (via Times Live)

By Jama Majola