The Weekend View

THIS WEEK South Africa triumphantly returned to the world's greatest floral exhibition, the Royal Horticultural Society Chelsea Flower Show in London. The country not only secured a Gold medal from the judges but also won the "Best Exhibit in the Pavilion" and the "Best New Design" awards -  a first for South Africa. The last time the country competed at the Chelsea Flower Show, described as the O...

Some political parties are holding their final weekend campaign rallies TODAY in a last push to woo voters ahead of the national and provincial elections on Wednesday. Among them is the ANC which holds it's SIYAQOBA rally at the 95 thousand seater FNB stadium in Johannesburg. The Red Berets will have their TSHELA THUPA campaign rally at the 46 thousand seater Peter Mokaba Stadium in Polokwane. The...

INTRO: It's Africa Month and today is Africa day. This is a time when the continent commemorates the founding of the Organisation of African Unity. While we reflect on what it means to be African as well, let's speak about another part of us that is often under scrutiny. This is monarchs. Is there still a place for them and given modernisation, how do they fit into modern democracy. Lets speak to...

Sudan has been engulfed in civil war since fighting erupted on last year in April.  Fighting between the Sudanese army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces has seen more than 15,000 killed and many more displaced. According to humanitarian aid groups , the violence has worsened an already precarious humanitarian situation.  Last week the the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Human...

Sixty-one years ago TODAY, 32 African nations came together in Ethiopia to establish the Organisation of African Unity (OAU), which is now known as the African Union. Since 1963, Africa Day has been celebrated annually, on May 25, as a commemoration of this historical unification of African countries. But as we celebrate Africa Day, there is a loud crack of discord and disharmony across the contin...

With over 3500 registered voters, Canberra in Australia was the third largest overseas voting station after the UK and Netherlands. Udo Carelse spoke to who was among the thousands who cast their ballots there  YESTERDAY  

The election support organisation, Ground Work Collective, this weekend dispatched their independent election observers to voting stations in the United Kingdom, the United States, Canada and Switzerland. The election observation as part of its X_Change campaign and has seen thousands of South Africans volunteer to observe elections both at home and abroad. Udo Carelse spoke to Ground Work Collect...

Over 1200 South Africans cast ballots at three polling stations in the United States, well below the more than 4200 eligible to cast ballots in the national poll in that country. 635 ballots were cast in New York, far less than the 1700 expected in the Big Apple. Only 226 votes were cast ballots in Los Angeles while Washington D.C. issued more than 400 ballots. Voters traveled from all over the re...

Search and rescue efforts are still continuing for 11 fishermen who went missing after their fishing trawler sank off the coast of Cape Town n Friday afternoon. The National Sea Rescue Institute, the NSRI, says it is still hopeful that the missing 11- fishermen will be found as a debris field where the fishing trawler went down has been located . For the latest Udo Carelse spoke to  The National S...

This week President Cyril Ramaphosa signed the country's biggest health policy overhaul into law. Civil society organisations and political parties are threatening legal action , saying Ramaphosa must return to the drawing board and work with various industry experts to design a workable, universal health care model. Last week he signed the  Electoral Matters Amendment Bill which sees a change in...

Better the lives of the black majority. This was the message that came from the Umkhonto Wesizwe party during its manifesto launch at the Orlando Stadium in Soweto YESTERDAY. The party aimed to woo voters just 11 days before the country heads to the hotly contested May polls. It has made inroads in provinces like KwaZulu-Natal since its formation last year. However, it has not had the same effect...

Voting in the 2024 national elections at international voting stations started YESTERDAY and will continue this weekend. Registered voters in mainly Middle Eastern countries cast their ballots yesterday and the rest of the world - some 102 countries - will vote TODAY. London, which has the largest number of eligible voters of any voting station with over 24 thousand registered voters, will also op...

The Special Investigative Unit conducted a search and seizure operation at the Desmond Tutu Refugee Centre in Marabastad in Pretoria YESTERDAY (FRIDAY). This after a whistleblower tipped off the Department of Home Affairs to unlawful activities occurring at the centre where officials are allegedly being bribed to issue fraudulent documents to unregistered foreign nationals. The department in partn...

The South African Department of health forecasts supply challenges of insulin pen devices for diabetes management, and has advised health facilities to ration the distribution of insulin pens across the country. Reacting to this development, the global medical humanitarian organisation, Doctors Without Borders or MSF, is calling on Danish pharmaceutical corporation Novo Nordisk and other manufactu...

TODAY is International Nurses Day. This year's theme is, "Investing in Nurses and the Economic Power of Care", which emphasizes a global call to reshape perceptions about nursing. This as there are amplified calls for countries to move away from a General Practitioner or doctor-centric healthcare system towards one that is more nurse-led. This however will also require advanced training and educat...

A global TB vaccine trial was launched THIS WEEK in Gqeberha to address South Africa's number one killer disease. The Wits Health Consortium announced the start of the Bill & Melinda Gates Medical Research Institute's Phase 3 clinical trial to assess the efficacy of TB vaccine candidate, The trial is being held at the Isango Lethemba TB Research Unit located at the Jose Pearson Hospital in Gqe...

There was elation on site where a survivor was retrieved YESTERDAY after 118 hours of being trapped under the rubble of a collapsed building at George in the Western Cape. The multi apartment building was under construction when it collapsed on Monday. Eighty one people were on site when the building imploded. Forty-two have so far been recovered, of whom 13 were declared deceased. Another 39 are...

There was elation on site where a survivor was retrieved YESTERDAY after 118 hours of being trapped under the rubble of a collapsed building at George in the Western Cape. Meanwhile , in the early hours of the morning (SUNDAY) , a body was removed under the rubble. For the latest Bongiwe Zwane spoke to Western Cape Chief Director for Disaster Management, Colin Deiner .

President Cyril Ramaphosa has signed into law the Second Adjustments Appropriation Bill and the Electoral Matters Amendment Bill.  According to the Presidency, the two Bills will expand financial resources for South Africa's multiparty democracy, including support for independent candidates and representatives.  The Second Adjustments Appropriation Bill provides for a net movement of R290 million...

The Nelspruit Specialised  Commercial Crimes Court in Mbombela, Mpumalanga YESTERDAY acquitted former State Security Minister, Bongani Bongo, and seven other accused, of fraud and corruption. The charges emanate from an alleged corrupt land deal amounting to over 70-million rand of tax payer's money. The money was used to purchase land for the Department of Human Settlement in the Emalahleni and M...

Emergency workers continued their search overnight for people who remain unaccounted  for following the collapse of a building in Victoria Street in George THIS WEEK.  Shortly after midnight THIS MORNING, rescue workers managed to retrieve the body of yet another person from underneath the rubble.  The death toll now stands at 14 . For the latest Bongiwe Zwane spoke to Western Cape Chief Director...

President Cyril Ramaphosa THIS WEEK signed into law the Preventing and Combating of Hate Crimes and Hate Speech Bill. The new piece of legislation outlaws offences of hate crimes and the offence of hate speech and allows the prosecution of persons who commit such offences. The offence of hate speech applies to any person who intentionally publishes, propagates, advocates, shares or communicates an...

The Constitutional Court YESTERDAY dismissed former president Jacob Zuma's recusal application. The court did not give reasons for its dismissal, but they are expected to provide these in their written ruling on this case. Zuma had argued that six judges of the Constitutional Court that sent him to prison in the first place should not be involved in the current matter of his eligibility to partici...

Credit Bureau TPN  has just released its third national residential tenant survey which provides the property sector with insights into tenants' needs and wants. The survey has found that financial barriers are the primary reason people rent and more women than men are renting because they can't afford home ownership.  More than 170,000 tenants were surveyed, and 19,000 completed responses were re...

AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF) has issued a dire warning about the current draft of the World Health Organization Pandemic Agreement. With the final negotiations imminent, AHF is concerned about the document's glaring oversite of equity and transparency. AHF says the consequences of passing this agreement are unimaginable and that the African continent is at risk of entering the next global heal...