First Take SA

Organisations representing farm dwellers and workers around Mkhondo are calling on the Piet Retief Magistrate's court in Mpumalanga not to grant bail to the four men accused of killing two farm dweller. This is after the four suspects aged between 31 and 58 appeared in court facing two counts of murder. Daniel Malan, Cornelius Greyling, Othard Klingberg and Michael Sternberg are accused of shootin...

The Basic Education Department has gazatted a new set of rules that may see teachers found guilty of sexual misconduct banned indefinitely from teaching in any South African school. The new batch of terms and conditions of employment was gazatted last week Friday by Education Minister Angie Motshekga. Some of the conduct which will qualify teachers for indefinite bans include having a sexual relat...

KwaZulu-Natal premier, Sihle Zikalala says there's a lack of trust between farm dwellers and government in Newcastle, north of the province. Zikalala was speaking during a visit to the Normandien farming community in Newcastle. The area has been in the spotlight, following an escalation of tension between farmers and farm dwellers.

Covid-19 has ravaged the Eastern Cape, claiming more than 11-thousand lives in the province. At the same time, tuberculosis remains a huge problem. The TB survey conducted in 2018 found the disease present in 737 out of every 100-thousand people. Statistics from 2015 showed the Eastern Cape to be the province with the highest prevalence of TB. Currently, there's concern about the sharp increase in...

Nature conservationist in the Eastern Cape have raised an alarm on the amount of birds which continue to drop dead from the sky. More than a 150 birds have been reported to have died without any explanation in parts of the Nelson Mandela Bay and King William's Town, also known as Qonce. A well-known snake handler and owner of Sandula Conservation, Mark Marshall, together with the provincial state...

A Judicial Conduct Tribunal has unanimously found that Western Cape judge president John Hlophe improperly attempted to influence two judges of the Constitutional Court. The report has now been submitted to the chairperson of the Judicial Services Commission which will determine his fate. The complaint against Hlophe was lodged by eleven Constitutional Court judges thirteen years ago, after judges...

South Africa has secured more than fifty-million doses of COVID-19 vaccines and delivery is expected to start later this month. Health Minister Zweli Mkhize made the announcement at the Soweto Home for the Aged in Gauteng. Mkhize conducted a visit of the facility as well as the Charlotte Maxeke Academic Hospital in Parktown, Johannesburg, to access the readiness for the roll out of phase two of th...

Free State artists have joined other provinces and embarked on a month-long sit-in protest at the offices of the Performing Arts Centre of the Free State, PACOFS, in Bloemfontein. They demand action against officials who have been implicated in a forensic report into allegations of corruption. Meanwhile Arts organisation ASSITEJ SA has launched legal action against the National Arts Council (NAC)...

Immediate technical deployment will be directed to Mozambique to aid it's fight against the insurgency in it's northern region of Cabo Delgado. This is a resolution for the SADC's Double Troika Summit held in Maputo, Mozambique, YESTERDAY. The meeting which was convened to discuss the ongoing security challenges also expressed concern on the impact the terrorism is having on the people of that reg...

The Southern African Development Community - SADC, will TODAY hold an extraordinary Troika Summit meeting in Maputo, Mozambique, to deliberate on measures to address terrorism in the host country. The meeting comes after insurgents attacked the strategic town of Palma late last month. The country has seen continued terrorist attacks in Cabo Delgado Province over the past few weeks, leaving many pe...

The Competition Commission says there is a lack of integration in the country's public transport system and this is worsened by the inequality between transport modes. The commission released its public transport market inquiry report YESTERDAY (Wednesday 7 April). Commissioner Tembinkosi Bonakele says they also received many complaints from the public about the sector

Former SABC Parliamentary journalist, Manelisi Dubase, says one of the stories he covered before he was retrenched was the very touching candlelight ceremony to commemorate the coronavirus victims that President Cyril Ramaphosa attended on New Year's eve last year. Dubase and another Parliamentary Journalist Mkhokeli Tanda are among the 621 employees who were affected by the SABC's Section 189 ret...

The defence team in the trial of the former police officer charged with the murder of George Floyd is facing an uphill battle after a growing body of damning testimony against their client. This follows testimony from the emergency room doctor that sought to revive Floyd who had lost consciousness with Derek Chauvin's knee on his neck for over 9 minutes. This was followed by the Police Chief of th...

There continues to be uncertainty as to when the local government elections will be held. This, after the EFF intensified its bid to have the polls pushed back -- lobbying other political parties and approaching the Electoral Commission to put the matter on the agenda. However, there are a number of hurdles it must still overcome, including a rejection of the proposal by some other parties.

The South African National Taxi Council has hinted that a possible increase in taxi fares may be on the cards as the price of fuel soared higher by one rand from THIS MORNING*. Motorists from inland provinces will now have to fork out over seventeen rands for a litre of 95 unleaded fuel while diesel has soared by a total of 65 cents. These latest price hikes are inclusive of the 27 cents that Fina...

More than 165 million Americans have received at least one dose of the Coronavirus vaccine as the country ramps up its daily doses to close on 3 million shots per day. While officials are lauding the fact the country with the highest death toll and accumulative caseload is outpacing much of the world in immunizing their population, they continue to raise alarm at rising case numbers while pointing...

Limpopo Police and the SANDF have heightened their visibility in and around the Beitbridge Border Post. There's been a spike in robberies and attacks at the Musina crossing recently. A truck driver was airlifted to the Pietersburg Provincial Hospital in Polokwane last week. He was robbed while queuing at the port of entry.

Over 600 SABC employees said their final goodbyes as they re-lived some of their most vivid moments at the public broadcaster. Yesterday marked the end of the road for 621 permanent staff members after the SABC concluded it's section 189 retrenchment process. The SABC will transition to its new structure today.

Auditor General Tsakani Maluleke says irregular expenditure among national and provincial government departments decreased to R54 billion from the R66 billion in the previous year. The AG says despite the decrease the number is nothing to celebrate as 31-percent of the auditees failed to disclose irregular expenditure. Maluleke says her office could not audit R2 billion worth of contracts due to m...

Trade union BEMAWU has expressed fears that the quality of work being rendered by the SABC will be compromised following the departure of over six hundred workers during the just concluded section 189 retrenchment process. The public broadcaster yesterday (Tuesday) met with both BEMAWU and the Communication Workers Union to discuss the completion of the retrenchment process. The public broadcaster...

Health minister, Zweli Mkhize, says the delivery of the country's vaccines is on track. Mkhize appeared before Parliament's Health committee, to give a two weekly briefing on the progress of the country's Covid-19 vaccination programme. MPs criticized the department for its inability to roll out the vaccination programme with the necessary urgency.

Former Lily Mine employees embarked on a peaceful march and handed over a memorandum of grievances to the Mpumalanga High Court in Mbombela. They are calling on the court to set aside or fast-track the court case between owners of the mine- Vantage Goldfields, Business Rescue Practitioners and the potential investor, Arqomanzi. Last Month, the High court granted Arqomanzi an interim order preventi...

Despite fears that the Easter weekend activities could become spreader events for the Coronavirus pandemic, President Cyril Ramaphosa has kept the country under Alert Level One. He has also announced that religious gatherings over this period will be restricted to 250 people indoors from 100 and 500 people outdoors from 200. But the president has put some restriction on the sale of alcohol for the...

SANCO in the Free State says it has noted with concern the alleged interference by Businessman, Johan Rupert in ANC internal affairs. This comes at the backdrop of leaked audio clips circulating on social media platforms, depicting a chaotic ANC NEC meeting marred by an exchange of insults and swear words. Speculation had been rife throughout the day YESTERDAY as reports indicated that the NEC mee...

ANC Secretary General Ace Magashule will have to step down within 30 days or run the risk of being suspended from the party. This came out at the end of the governing party's National Executive Committee held at the weekend. President Cyril Ramaphosa read out the long-awaited outcomes of the meeting last night. The delivery of his closing remarks was delayed when members failed to agree on the fin...