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Sisters raped repeatedly at gunpoint

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Two sisters were repeatedly raped at gunpoint during a two-hour ordeal while their elder sister was forced to watch.

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Cape Town - Two sisters from Dunoon were repeatedly raped at gunpoint during a two-hour ordeal on Sunday morning while their elder sister was forced to watch.

When the Cape Argus visited their one-roomed shack, the younger sisters - aged 25 and 29 - were too traumatised to talk.

The oldest of the three sisters told the Cape Argus that two men in hoodies had barged into the house when the youngest sister came home from her shift at a fast food restaurant around 1am.

She and the middle sister were watching TV and heard the youngest unlock the security gate. She then called to her sisters to unlock the front door.

“When we asked her why she wasn’t using her key she went quiet. I opened the door and two guys were standing behind her. One of them had a gun pressed against her back.”

Both men had guns and had partially covered their faces with scarves.

“They made us sit on the bed, next to each other, and told us to strip to our underwear. It was horrible, we sat there terrified and shaking. One pointed a gun to my face and told me to stand aside and they each grabbed one of my sisters,” she said.

The men then raped the younger siblings, one on the floor and the other on the couch. “I looked on crying. They kept shouting, ‘shut up’ and ‘don’t make noise’. They never put their weapons down, not even during the rape.”

Afterwards the two men sat on the couch and watched TV. They then raped the younger sisters again.

“When they were done they asked for towels and cleaned themselves. They told my sisters to do the same,” said the oldest sister.

“They wiped the door handles on their way out and told us not to tell anyone or they would come back to kill us.

“They locked us inside and left. They took the towels with them.

“Life will never be the same again. My young sister hasn’t slept in the house since the incident; she can’t bear to be in here… everything is a reminder of what happened.”

Police spokesman Lieutenant-Colonel Andre Traut said police are investigating a charge of rape and no arrests have been made yet.

A group of women, who asked not be named, told the Cape Argus they lived in fear and could not walk around the area freely by day or night.

“Not that it stops them; they will break down your door if they have to. A lot of people die here and, as woman, we are powerless, we get robbed and raped.”

Another young woman told the Cape Argus that on Saturday evening her neighbour was dragged out of her shack by a man.

“We were woken up by a loud bang of someone kicking down a door around 10.30 pm. We heard her screaming and we saw a man dragging her out the door and they disappeared between the shacks. We were all too scared to do anything. No one has seen her since.”

Ward councillor Lubabalo Makeleni said incidents like these were a regular occurrence in Dunoon.

“Every other day something similar happens. From men raping their children to women getting attacked in their homes, it’s terrible what is happening here.”

Makeleni said most people were scared to report the incidents because they did not trust the police.

“Police are visible in the area but people are scared because perpetrators walk free soon after they are arrested. So they stay quiet or take the law into their own hands.”

Cape Argus


Burger King is OK, says Muslim council

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The MJC has ruled that Burger King in the Cape can retain its halaal certificate despite its gambling link.

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Cape Town - The Muslim Judicial Council (MJC) has ruled that the new and only Burger King branch in Cape Town should retain its halaal certificate despite the owner’s business link to gambling.

A “fatwa committee” meeting was held by the organisation on Tuesday after members of People Against Gangsterism and Drugs (Pagad) called for one of the fast food outlet’s shareholders, Hassen Adams, to be investigated because of his involvement in the gambling industry.

Adams is the founder and owner of Burger King SA’s parent company Grand Parade Investments, which is also a stakeholder in GrandWest Casino.

Pagad spokesman Abdullah Salie said gambling was a devastating problem that destroyed lives and crippled families.

“We don’t have a real issue with the restaurant; the question is if it was bought with money from a business that is detrimental to society.”

He said profits from gambling were haraam (forbidden according to Islamic law).

 

According to the MJC’s website, there are just over one million Muslim people in Cape Town.

Salie said a halaal certificate was important to attract Muslims to an outlet, but he argued that Cape Town’s Muslim community had to evaluate the sort of establishment from which they were buying their food and who they were supporting.

“We are not calling for a boycott, we are just offering our opinion.”

The MJC said on Tuesday that it would not take action against Burger King SA.

“As reprehensible as it may be for a Muslim to be in such activities (gambling and casinos), if there is no proof of any contravention of Islamic dietary rules in the preparation of any foodstuffs, the activities of the shareholder of such businesses do not render his products haraam.

“Where Muslims are annoyed, upset and angered by the owner’s un-Islamic activities, they are at liberty to avoid dealing with him or to boycott his business.”

The Islamic Council of South Africa’s operations manager and food technologist Aabied Akhewari said they had certified Burger King’s Cape Town branch, not Adams’s other businesses.

“From our point of view, if a Muslim walks into Burger King they can be 100 percent certain the food they are buying is halaal.”

He said Adams’s personal life had no bearing on the certification process, pointing out that many halaal-certified franchises were not even owned by Muslims.

Salie said Pagad would meet the Islamic Council of SA tomorrow to discuss the certification of the branch.

kieran.legg@inl.co.za

Cape Argus

Delft’s death toll rising fast

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Police were called to Roosendal in Delft after two men were found with gunshot wounds to their heads.

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Cape Town - Flaring gang violence in Delft is stretching police resources.

In the most recent incident police were called to Sterretjie Crescent in Roosendal early on Tuesday when two murdered men were found with gunshot wounds to their heads.

By late on Tuesday afternoon, police could only confirm that two men aged 23 and 28 had been shot and killed. Provincial police spokesman Lieutenant-Colonel André Traut said the shootings were being investigated.

Relatives were too distraught to talk to the media on Tuesday.

The double murder follows the death of two men on Saturday and a taxi shooting on Friday.

Some residents in Delft South said an internal dispute between two 28s gang leaders appeared to be behind the violence.

Delft Community Policing Forum chairman Reggie Maart said that often when police were trying to focus attention on an area, the problem would shift to a different part of Delft. “We can’t be everywhere at the same time,” Maart said. He commended the police for using their limited resources as best they could. “We have tried our utmost to be visible.”

MEC for Community Safety Dan Plato said gang violence had been flaring across the province - particularly in Atlantis, Kraaifontein and Mitchells Plain. He had discussed his concerns with provincial police commissioner General Arno Lamoer.

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Two weeks ago, a young couple, Jarryd Manuel, 18, and his girlfriend, Megan Hendricks, 19, were shot outside Manuel’s mother’s home in Delft. At the time residents marched from the Manuel home to the Hendricks residence with placards calling for an “end to the violence”.

* On Friday, a taxi shooting resulted in five people being wounded, one of whom died in hospital, Maart said.

* On Saturday, while Maart had been entering the church at Hendricks’s funeral, he had heard news of another double murder in Delft South, where two men were shot dead in separate shootings.

Police found the body of an unidentified 25-year-old man who had been shot in the head and back in Wallace Street.

A short while later 21-year-old Lesley Saul was found shot in the head in Block Street.

Following the shootings in Delft South a task team was set up and 16 people were arrested.

Maart said he was shocked at the number of young people taken into custody, including four teenagers. “While police were busy on the scene a young boy of 15 came to the scene with a firearm,” he said.

natasha.prince@inl.co.za

Cape Argus

Foreigners, tourist held in document blitz

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About 80 foreigners, including a tourist, were detained in Cape Town for not having their documents on them.

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Cape Town - Long gone are the days when many South Africans had to carry pass books, but on Tuesday about 80 foreigners, including an Australian tourist, were detained for not having their documents on them.

About 20 people from Mozambique, Zimbabwe and the Congo stood outside the Cape Town police station waiting for friends and relatives to be released.

They said police conducted a raid and arrested those who didn’t have asylum-seeker papers on them.

Australian tourist Michael Camacho was arrested while curio shopping in Hout Bay. His brother-in-law, Oliver Potgieter, was shocked to receive a call from Camacho saying he had been arrested. “I was really flabbergasted, I didn’t know that carrying your passport was a requirement,” he told John Maytham on Cape Talk.

He said Camacho was held at Caledon Square for about two hours but was not upset about the incident.

Gesel Mpeta waited with her two-month-old child for almost four hours, in the hope of seeing her husband emerge. Mpeta, who was herself detained for two hours, said they weren’t aware they had to have their papers with them at all times.

A sick Gamu Chipuriro, from Zimbabwe, said her cousin was granted permission to look after her and he was arrested while shopping in the city.

“I was at the hospital when my cousin phoned to say he had been arrested. I had to go home to get his papers and come here to wait for him.”

Her cousin had been granted an eight-day access document and they were in the process of extending it but couldn’t raise the R2 000 the department required.

Police spokesman Lieutenant-Colonel Andre Traut said the raid was a joint operation between Home Affairs, law enforcement and the police. “Some of the people are still there, there were about 80 arrests. It was carried out throughout the city and we have these operations on a regular basis.”

yolisa.tswanya@inl.co.za

Cape Argus

Court told how Claremont mom was killed

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Anzunette du Plessis’s throat was slashed thrice and she had 10 stab wounds to her upper body, the Western Cape High Court heard.

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Cape Town - Claremont mother Anzunette du Plessis’s throat was slashed three times and she had 10 stab wounds to her upper body, the Western Cape High Court has heard.

This was the gruesome testimony of forensic pathologist Estevao Afonso who was giving evidence against Moegamat Armien Salie.

At the start of the trial on Monday, Salie, 31, admitted that he had killed Du Plessis, 33, but claimed the attack on her was not premeditated. The State did not accept this and proceeded to call witnesses to prove that he had planned the October 4 murder and robbery.

Afonso, who performed the autopsy, told the court on Tuesday that the cause of death was “sharp force trauma and the consequences thereof”.

He said there was a 250mm wound to De Plessis’s neck.

“There was at least three incised wounds. Three injuries to that area that show at least three draws of the knife across the neck.”

Afonso testified one of the cuts had penetrated her airway making it difficult to breathe. In addition, an artery was severed, causing severe bleeding.

“Bleeding from the facial artery would have been profuse and as well as that of the other stab wounds. Therefore the blood in the office (inside the house) is consistent with the injuries,” Afonso said.

He described other stab wounds to Du Plessis’s back that had penetrated her lungs. She also had a number of bruises on her body and wounds on her hands which indicated that she may have tried to fight off her attacker, Afonso said.

On Monday, Salie admitted in court that he had stabbed Du Plessis during an argument over money. He and his father had fixed a leak on the roof of her rented house about two weeks before the murder.

That day, he returned to the house saying he wanted to check on the work that was done.

Du Plessis let him in and an argument started over money he claimed she owed him for odd jobs he had done around the house. He told her that he would take some of her possessions and return them once she had paid him.

But the State contends that Salie came to the house intending to rob and kill Du Plessis. He faces a minimum sentence of life in prison for murder and 15 years in jail for aggravated robbery.

The court heard on Tuesday there was no sign of sexual assault.

The trial continues on Wednesday.

jade.otto@inl.co.za

Cape Argus

Hit-and-run driver held for cyclist’s death

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The driver who allegedly killed Cape Town cycling champ Dr Koos Roux 10 days ago has been arrested.

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Cape Town - The hit-and-run driver who allegedly killed Cape Town cycling champ Dr Koos Roux 10 days ago has been arrested.

Roux was killed in a hit-and-run on Bottelary Road in Brackenfell on May 12, while on an early-morning ride with his son, Kobus, a student at Stellenbosch University.

Police this morning said a 51-year-old Brackenfell man had turned himself in to police shortly before 10am - after police had tracked him down.

“He was on the run, lying low, but the detective work continued,” police spokes-man Andre Traut said.

“The vehicle involved in the incident, a VW Polo Classic, was confiscated and will be examined. The circumstances surrounding the matter are still under investigation.”The suspect will appear in court once he has been charged, Traut said.

Roux’s son said at the time: “We were hit from behind. I was in the air… then on the ground. I got up and looked at my dad, he was not moving.” They had been riding within the yellow line.

Roux senior was well-known in cycling circles and sources told the Cape Argus on Wednesday that a number of people had, in the past 10 days, ensured that various leads were passed on to police investigators.

Roux was a national cycling champion - having won a gold in his age-group at the SA national track champs in 2011.

* The identity of the 31-year-old cyclist killed in Durbanville on Tuesday, in a collision involving a Golden Arrow Bus, was being withheld until his next-of-kin had been located, police said this on Tuesday morning.

Cape Argus

Dunoon xenophobic attacks remembered

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Five years ago, a Somali shopkeeper was faced with a choice - stay in Du Noon and try to save his livelihood or flee for his life.

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Cape Town - Five years ago today, Somali shopkeeper Abdul Aziz Husein was faced with a choice - stay in Dunoon in an attempt to save his livelihood or flee for his life.

He left everything behind. A neighbour with a car helped him escape the township unnoticed.

“In five minutes, my shop was empty. They even took the fridges,” said Husein.

He vividly recalls that night on May 22, 2008.

A meeting was scheduled for 6pm at which then ANC MP Lumka Yengeni was due to address the community - both foreigners and locals - at a hall in Dunoon near Milnerton in a bid to quell any possible xenophobic flare-ups.

Xenophobic-linked violence was already raging elsewhere.

Hundreds had gathered for the meeting, but it never took place. A mob went on the rampage, killing a Somali man, injuring many others, looting shops and leaving hundreds displaced. One of the shops that was looted was Husein’s.

He had also attended the aborted meeting but, by the time he returned to his shop, the tension had descended into chaos.

“People were angry,” he said. “They threw stones at my gate.” Some of them had been his neighbours.

He tried to talk to them, he said, but they were not prepared to listen. “I called the police. They came but they said they can’t save my stuff, only my life,” said Husein.

He took refuge with thousands of other foreigners at a temporary safety site - or “camp” - in Blue Waters in Strandfontein.

Husein said the conditions were tough. It had been winter, the camp was near the sea and all he’d had to keep warm at night was one thin blanket.

“It was a troubled life there,” he said. He hadn’t returned to Dunoon until two months later.

Local residents had been apologetic, he said, pleading with him and other foreign business owners to reopen their shops. This was because, with so many shops having closed down, many people had to travel far and spend money on taxis to buy groceries.

He agreed to return, but still fears another outbreak of xenophobic violence.

Husein is not the only one - another Somali shopkeeper in Dunoon, Mohamed Mohamud Osman, said the locals did not like Somalis but still supported their businesses because of their competitive prices.

“Every day’s a fight,” said Osman. “Sometimes they say we have no stability. They say we must go home, but I can’t because there’s problems there.”

A number of non-profit organisations have agreed that not much has changed in the last five years.

While there have not been the widespread attacks of 2008, there have been isolated incidents in the Western Cape.

According to the Consortium for Refugees and Migrants in SA, attacks on foreigners have continued, with national statistics showing that, in 2011, one person a week, on average, was killed, while 100 were seriously injured and over 1 000 were displaced.

Foreigners tended to be targeted during service delivery protests.

Scalabrini Centre outreach manager Sergio Carciotto said that, in 2012, about 200 foreigners had been killed. He said, however, that he suspected some of these incidents might be related to common crime, not only to xenophobia.

Carciotto said civil society organisations had implemented programmes, in an attempt to shift mindsets, but this only made for “a drop in the ocean”.

He said that the perception still existed, particularly among those living in poor communities, that immigrants and refugees were “out to take local jobs” and that there was “a threat of an invasion”.

“If you ask people, they give the same answers as five years ago,” he said. “And, of course, this is not the case.”

Fred Bidani, advocacy manager for the Agency for Refugee Education, Skills Training and Advocacy, said that while there had been a reduction in xenophobic attacks over the last few years this did not mean they had stopped.

He said that while organisations were trying to educate people about diversity, there was “no political will” on the part of the government.

Passop (People Against Suffering, Oppression and Poverty) founder Braam Hanekom blamed xenophobic violence on three factors - that the “mass deportation” of foreigners had recently resumed, trade unions and civil society organisations had not done enough to prevent looting of foreign-owned shops during protests, and there was a “growing narrative of anti-immigrant rhetoric among politicians”.

In February Husein himself experienced a housing protest that teetered on the edge of a violent outbreak.

Dunoon residents had been toyi-toying, threatening to attack foreigners should they not get houses.

Husein had packed up his family and goods, locked up his shop and lived with his brother in Joe Slovo for two weeks while things calmed down.

However, local shopkeeper Vuyani Vantjie said that while locals and foreign shop owners still had their differences, they were trying to understand one another. Both had been subject to robberies and crimes.

Their main contention, however, was prices. Vantjie said he suspected Somali shopkeepers banded together to get goods at lower prices, enabling them to sell them for cheaper.

“We are trying to accommodate the situation,” he said. “We can’t stick to xenophobia and fighting because they also really need the money. It’s how competition works.”

Dunoon ward councillor Lubabalo Makeleni said that while they needed government funding to hold regular meetings and workshops, they had held a few public meetings to iron out issues between local and foreign residents.

A committee had been established to represent foreigners; however, there was “no trust among themselves”, said Makeleni, and it was, therefore, “difficult to get the foreigners to speak with one voice”.

But community meetings have provided little comfort for Husein, who has been robbed at least five times.

During an incident last year, he was shot in the leg.

When he went to the police to report the incident, he said, they had told him to come back the next day. He didn’t bother.

leila.samodien@inl.co.za

Cape Times

Police open case after cyclist killed by bus

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A Durbanville man cycling to work was run over and killed when he apparently swerved to avoid traffic and fell under a bus.

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Cape Town - A Durbanville man cycling to work was run over and killed when he apparently swerved to avoid traffic and fell under a bus early yesterday - the second city cycling fatality in eight days.

The latest death has re-ignited the argument about whether vehicles should give cyclists a 1.5m berth.

EMS spokeswoman Keri Davids said paramedics declared the cyclist dead shortly before 7am in Durbanville Avenue in Durbanville.

The Golden Arrow bus was en route to Durbanville.

Police spokesman Andre Traut did not want to release the 31-year-old cyclist’s name, as requested by the family.

“We have opened a case of culpable homicide but have not charged the bus driver. We will investigate all leads,” Traut said. Traut could not confirm whether the cyclist was wearing protective or reflective gear.

Last week cyclist Koos Roux of Bloemendal was killed on Bottelary Road in Kuils River when he was hit by a bakkie. In April a cyclist was killed and another injured when they were struck by a vehicle in Prince George Drive near Muizenberg.

Golden Arrow Bus Service spokeswoman Bronwen Dyke said the bus driver was unaware of any cyclist at the time of the incident.

“According to the bus driver she pulled away and heard a loud bang. She stopped and got out of the bus to find the cyclist under the bus,” Dyke said.

She said their preliminary investigations indicated: “The cyclist swerved out for other vehicles into the bus and landed beneath it.”

Dyke said a pupil waiting at the bus stop was too traumatised to provide reliable information. They were still investigating the tragedy. The driver had been suspended until the investigation was complete.

Pedal Power Association chairman Steve Hayward renewed their call for a 1.5m distance between cyclists and motorists on all public roads. “We believe that the accidents are due to disrespect most motorists have for cyclists. When there is a horse cart or slow-moving truck, you have to wait to overtake. Why can’t the same be done for cyclists?”

MEC for Transport and Public Works Robin Carlisle said:

“By law the distance between motorists and cyclists on all roads is one metre. Adding another 0.5 metres would not be a good move. If there is a cyclist, that car should wait to overtake.”

Carlisle also conveyed his condolences to the family.

jason.felix@inl.co.za

Cape Times


Knife wielding gangs invade school

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The provincial Education Department sent officials to investigate gangsterism at Bulumko Secondary School in Khayelitsha.

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Cape Town - The Western Cape Education Department sent officials to investigate gangsterism at Bulumko Secondary School in Khayelitsha this morning after a group of former pupils carrying knives jumped the fence and threatened schoolchildren and staff.

No one was harmed in the incident yesterday and the gang fled after spending some time at the school.

Last week a resident of F-Section, who lives near the school, contacted the Cape Argus to report the murder of Ayanda Ngetu, 25, in a street fight in the early hours of the previous Monday morning.

A senior teacher at the school, who asked not to be named for safety reasons, confirmed that the school has been at the centre of a gang war between teenage pupils from surrounding areas for months. The department has since described Monday’s incident as “gang-related”.

Hours after Ngetu was buried on Saturday, a fight broke out in Tanga Street. Zimvo Kanyiso Jaxa, 18, died at the scene and two boys were taken to hospital with stab wounds.

Police have opened a murder docket, but no arrests have yet been made, spokesman Lieutenant-Colonel Andrè Traut said.

Cape Argus

Catholic Church says defy e-tolls

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The Roman Catholic Church has added its powerful voice to the swelling opposition against e-tolling.

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Durban - The Roman Catholic Church has added its powerful voice to the swelling opposition against charging motorists for using South Africa’s freeways, calling the proposed e-tolling “morally unjust”.

It urged people into open rebellion by calling on them not to buy e-tags or pay the toll fees.

As Parliament pushes through the e-toll bill, the co-ordinator of the Justice and Peace Department of the Southern African Catholic Bishops Conference, Father Michael Deeb, said e-tolling would be a further burden on the poor who were battling to find jobs and live with steep electricity and food prices.

“We believe, after the research we have done, that at best the whole e-tolling is gross misappropriation of public funds and at worst is total corruption,” he said. “We as the church have been concerned.”

A select parliamentary committee on public services met earlier this month to discuss the Transport and Related Matters Amendment Bill and unanimously approved a word change amendment before sending it back to the portfolio committee.

The amendment, proposed by ANC MP Raseriti Tau, changed a section to say that when the minister of transport makes a regulation in terms of the law, this must be submitted to Parliament for “consideration” instead of the original term “comment”.

The bill amends the law to allow for the electronic collection of tolls and the prosecution of those who fail to pay.

The government insists that tolling roads is the only viable way to pay for the upgrades and maintenance of freeways.

Deeb said the government had not been honest with South Africans and there were other ways they could pay for the improvement of the freeways.

“We believe there is an alternative, such as raising the fuel levy, which is being ignored. If there was just a slight increase to the fuel levy this whole thing would be paid off in one go.

“But with the tolls we are going to pay for it for ever. Because of this, we are demanding answers and that the consultation process should listen to the people, which we don’t believe they have done,” he said.

“We are urging all people, not just people from the church but all people of goodwill to not collaborate with the e-toll system. They should not buy e-tags and they should not participate in it at all. We should force the government to listen to the alternatives.”

Vusi Mona, general manager for communications at national roads agency Sanral, said an inter-ministerial committee led by Deputy President Kgalema Motlanthe met reli-gious organisations last year to discuss this matter and the Catholic church’s representative was not there.

“That was an opportunity for consultation and discussion which the church missed,” he said.

“We are saddened that they have gone outside the view of other religious leaders and even more so, that they decided to make their view heard only to the public and not to Sanral or its shareholder,” he said.

Mona rejected the church’s call for a fuel levy increase, explaining that e-tolling was more efficient and cost-effective.

“Tolling is a mechanism where only those people who use that particular road, fund its construction and maintenance. The model makes it possible to mobilise substantial capital resources upfront, usually through debt or equity,” he said.

“Road users must, in real terms, receive a net positive economic benefit when they use the improved road - time and vehicle operating cost savings that are greater than the cost of the toll.”

Said Mona: “Suggestions that the fuel levy must be increased to fund this particular project may very well mean that every time a new road has to be built or an existing one refurbished, the fuel levy would provide the solution. “Such an approach is unsustainable.”

Last week, provincial Transport MEC, Willies Mchunu, announced that Sanral had agreed to scrap the proposed toll gate at Isipingo, south of Durban, and that no toll gates would be built anywhere else on the South Coast to pay for a new highway along the Wild Coast region of the Eastern Cape.

However, Sanral has denied that the toll plan has been scrapped. Mona said yesterday that the N2 Wild Coast toll project would continue on the Eastern Cape side while discussions are under way with the KwaZulu-Natal government.

He said the funding model would be determined by the Presidential Infrastructure Co-ordinating Commission.

lee.rondganger@inl.co.za

Daily News

Cape Town seeks toilet interdict

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The City of Cape Town intends seeking an interdict against the people disrupting the servicing of toilets in informal settlements.

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Cape Town - The City of Cape Town intends seeking an interdict against the people disrupting the servicing of toilets in informal settlements, an official said on Wednesday.

Utility services mayoral committee member Ernest Sonnenberg said services had been affected in Kanana, Barcelona, and Boystown, in Gugulethu.

“We have met with our attorneys and will be getting the interdict soon. We can't say exactly when,” he said.

Sannicare janitors responsible for cleaning communal toilets blocked the N2 highway with burning tyres on Monday and dumped faeces in the road, in protest against being dismissed.

At the weekend, residents escorted city officials to service toilets which had been left unattended because of the labour action.

“Last night (Tuesday), we received reports from community members in Europe (in Gugulethu) that they were being threatened by members of the ANC Youth League (ANCYL), who, it is alleged, threatened to burn their homes,” Sonnenberg said.

“The city will work with all relevant law enforcement agencies to investigate any such claims.”

ANCYL regional chairman Khaya Yozi denied that members had played any part in the toilet dispute.

“These are very extreme and unfounded allegations. It's just poor of the city, when they are caught with their pants down, to blame it on someone else,” he said.

“We are not involved in these threats or violence whatsoever.”

He said ANCYL leaders had played a mediating role between Sannicare and its former contract workers.

“The employees were told by their contractor that they were dismissed, but they protested because they were actually employed by a sub-contractor. There was also a discrepancy in salary being offered.”

Yozi, who is a councillor for the Nyanga areas of Vukuzenzele, Lusaka and Zimbabwe, said he and other councillors had convinced the janitors to keep on cleaning the toilets.

“The toilets are being cleaned on the basis of our intervention. We said to the cleaners: we pledge solidarity with your march, but look, we live here with yourselves. They need to be cleaned.”

Yozi asked the city to take a greater leadership role in the dispute.

Sonnenberg said six city employees had been attacked in the past few weeks. A city vehicle was set alight a month ago in Kanana.

On Friday, a city official was attacked while driving in a marked car through Boystown. He was hit on the head with a brick and glass was shattered on his arm. He was taken to hospital for treatment.

On Monday, city staff were apparently singled out and threatened.

“What is becoming increasingly clear is that the intimidation of city staff and disruption of major transport routes is part of a well co-ordinated strategy,” Sonnenberg said.

“The city will not stand idly by while our staff are being attacked, and while the rights of innocent citizens to sanitation and other services is threatened.” - Sapa

Lesbian pastor vs Church

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Ecclesia de Lange and the Methodist Church are at loggerheads after she was fired because she married another woman.

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Cape Town - Lesbian minister Ecclesia de Lange was fired by the Methodist Church because she married another woman before the church had taken a decision on gay marriage, the Western Cape High Court heard on Tuesday.

The church has been deliberating gay marriage for 13 years and has still not taken a decision.

Lawyers for the church said De Lange, 43, had broken a church rule which stipulated that “no positive steps toward same-sex unions… be taken pending further determination”. Her decision to wed was seen as “an attempt to impose her religious and doctrinal views on the church and its members”.

De Lange says she was unfairly dismissed from her ministry because of her sexual orientation, after she had told her congregation in December 2009 that she was going to marry her female partner.

She was ordained in 2006 and married her partner on December 15, 2009. She has since divorced the woman and is set to marry again.

 

The church’s lawyer, Isabel Goodman, argued before Judge Anton Veldhuizen that while same-sex marriages were not a “doctrinal taboo” for the church, De Lange’s announcement of her intention to marry had “forced” it to take a position while the church was still “grappling” with the issue of same-sex marriage.

For this reason, she had been suspended and later dismissed, said Goodman.

 

In January 2010 she was charged by the church’s internal disciplinary committee with breach of the laws governing the church and found guilty. She appealed but this was rejected.

She was eventually dismissed on February 20, 2010.

 

Goodman said the matter was likely to be a “messy, gritty fight” over church doctrine and should therefore be dealt with “within the family” of church arbitration and not in open court. An arbitrator experienced in church law would be able to hear more extensive evidence than a court, she added.

“It is not for the court to decide whether or not there was a rule (about same-sex marriages),” she added.

But Anna-Marie de Vos, De Lange’s lawyer, said a court should decide on the matter, as De Lange’s case was one of discrimination based on sexual orientation, Such discrimination was unconstitutional.

She said as there was no “explicit” prohibition of same-sex marriages, De Lange had not broken church rules.

It had not been made clear that church members who “pre-empted” a church decision by getting married would be dismissed.

 

“It is a jump of enormous proportions to say… there will be a disciplinary hearing and you will get fired,” she said.

She was not asking the court to take a stance on the doctrinal issue of whether gay marriages should be allowed by churches. Rather, she was asking the court to help enforce the church’s own laws.

And the law on same-sex marriages at the times was one of “no policy”, she added. Until the church had a policy, it was bound by the constitution, said De Vos.

She asked the court to reinstate De Lange as a minister and set aside the findings of the disciplinary hearing.

Outside the court, De Lange said it had never been her intention to “disrupt” the church, but she had decided to take the matter to court as she felt her constitutional rights had been violated.

She has since got engaged to her fiancée, Melanie Case.

Judgment was reserved by Judge Veldhuizen.

jan.cronje@inl.co.za

Cape Times

Journalists accosted in Cape Town

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Sanef has condemned the alleged manhandling of Cape Argus journalists David Ritchie and Yolisa Tswanya.

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Johannesburg - Reports that a Home Affairs official allegedly manhandled reporters outside a Cape Town police station were met with outrage by the South African National Editors' Forum (Sanef) on Wednesday.

Sanef said in a statement that Cape Argus photojournalist David Ritchie and reporter Yolisa Tswanya were covering a story about the arrest and detention of immigrants at the police station when they were accosted by the official.

“According to Cape Argus executive editor Gasant Abarder, the officer pulled Ritchie from outside the police station, grabbed his camera and proceeded to delete the images - without identifying himself.”

A police officer, who witnessed the incident, apparently ordered Ritchie off the police premises.

The newspaper's legal representatives were investigating the matter, with a view to instituting civil and or criminal cases against the official.

Sanef said it supported this action.

“Sanef is also concerned that it appears that wayward officials have taken to deleting images.

“Why would government officials go through the trouble of manhandling journalists and deleting their pictures if they (officials) knew that they had not broken the law and thus had nothing to hide?”

Sanef said the deletion of images was illegal and should not be tolerated in a democracy. - Sapa

Guptagate: Zuma roasted

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Sugar daddies, cocaine, curry, rape and accusations of electioneering all featured at the lively Guptagate debate.

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Cape Town - Sugar daddies, cocaine, curry, rape and accusations of electioneering all featured at Wednesday’s lively Guptagate debate in Parliament, where MPs had a go at each other while some placed the blame squarely on President Jacob Zuma’s doorstep.

MPs from all parties were united in condemning the use of the Waterkloof Air Force base by the Gupta family, with opposition calls for ministers affected by the incident to step down.

DA chief whip Watty Watson was the first to take to the podium, saying he knew very well that the ANC “didn’t want this debate and delayed it”.

“By the cabinet using officials as scapegoats in this appalling incident, which has become known as Guptagate, this government has made a mockery of the concept of accountability,” said Watson.

He said Zuma was the commander-in-chief “yet he forgets that the buck stops with him”.

“What sort of leader is this?” asked Watson.

DA MP David Maynier said Zuma was the one responsible for creating the “culture of undue influence” referred to in the investigation report by the team of directors-general.

“That is why the president should have been here today, accounting to us in Parliament, rather than hiding away from us in the Union Buildings,” he said.

Maynier said the root cause of the problem which led to the Guptagate scandal was none other than Zuma.

“Years of frustration with President Zuma’s sugar daddies, including the Shaiks, the Reddys and the Guptas, who make up Zuma Inc, exploded,” said Maynier.

Azapo MP Jakes Dikobo also took to the stand during the debate, saying that if South Africa was a woman, “the Gupta incident would amount to rape”.

This led ANC deputy chief whip Mmamoloko Kubayi to raise a point of order over Dikobo’s use of rape to illustrate his point.

Cope leader Mosiuoa Lekota hit out at the ANC, saying the executive ran the country as if South Africans had a “chicken’s memory”.

PAC MP Letlapa Mphahlele said he had been told that some politicians were “receiving money stained with blood and cocaine”. He said if the chartered jet had not been cleared, it should have been impounded by the government.

But unlike most opposition parties, the Minority Front’s Roy Boola came to Zuma’s defence, while attacking the DA.

“(You) can’t say if it snows in Ethekwini it is Zuma’s fault,” said Boola.

United Democratic Movement leader Bantu Holomisa said the probe must have been the easiest investigation for the government considering the “close proximity of the Guptas to the cabinet and the directors-general”.

“This generally corrupt relationship between cabinet and the Guptas has allowed the Guptas to use state-owned enterprises as their cash cow in their controversial free-of-charge breakfast shows with the national broadcaster,” said Holomisa.

ANC MP Annelize van Wyk came to Zuma’s defence, saying the opposition was suffering from “a serious case of election fever and government envy”.

She asked whether the DA “enjoyed the curry”, referring to DA leader Helen Zille’s visit to the Guptas’ Saxonwold compound, where she was served a variety of vegetarian curry dishes.

Van Wyk added there had been no effort to “sweep the incident under the carpet”.

Justice and Constitutional Development Minister Jeff Radebe said they had become used to opposition parties “reaching verdicts without any of the facts”.

Politlcal Bureau

Argus may lay charges after ‘assault’

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Cape Argus lawyers may lay charges against a Home Affairs official who allegedly assaulted a photographer.

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Cape Town - Cape Argus lawyers are investigating the possibility of a civil claim and criminal charges against a Home Affairs official who allegedly assaulted a Cape Argus photographer and deleted pictures from his camera.

The incident occurred on Tuesday at about 3pm. Cape Argus photographer David Ritchie and reporter Yolisa Tswanya were on the pavement outside the Cape Town Central police station at Caledon Square speaking to the family and friends of 80 immigrants, who had earlier been arrested for not having their documents on them.

Ritchie said he took a photo of the Home Affairs official speaking to a group of the waiting people.

“He noticed me take the picture and he told me to delete it.” But when Ritchie refused, the official walked up to him and asked him to delete it again.

“I refused again, and I said I was on public property and he was a public official.” The man then grabbed Ritchie by the arm and pulled him into the police station courtyard.

“David was trying to shake the man off but couldn’t get away because the official, who was a big guy, had a tight grip on his arm,” said Tswanya.

Ritchie once again refused to delete the photo.

The official then grabbed the camera from him and started deleting the photographs stored on the memory card.

“When he gave it back, I asked him for his name, but he didn’t give it to me,” said Ritchie. Ritchie left after a policeman told him he was not permitted be in the courtyard.

Yusuf Simons, Home Affairs’ provincial manager for Western Cape, said they would investigate the incident.

Cape Argus executive editor Gasant Abarder said: “I have instructed our lawyers to investigate the possibility of instituting a civil claim against the Home Affairs official involved, and to take a statement from our photographer David Ritchie to prepare for the possibility of laying a criminal charge.”

Referring to the deletion of the images, Abarder said: “He thought he had deleted all the images but imagine our surprise when this picture of him was left on the card.”

The SA National Editors' Forum was “outraged” at the way Ritchie was manhandled and detained, and that his pictures were deleted.

It said it supported the Cape Argus plan to take legal action over the matter.

“Sanef is also concerned that it appears that wayward officials have taken to deleting images.

“Why would government officials go through the trouble of manhandling journalists and deleting their pictures if they knew that they had not broken the law and thus had nothing to hide?

“The deletion of images is illegal and should not be tolerated in a democracy.

“Sanef encourages the Cape Argus to pursue the matter to its logical end and to ensure the official faces the full wrath of the law.”

kieran.legg@inl.co.za

Cape Argus


NCOP passes e-toll bill

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The controversial e-tolls bill now goes back to the National Assembly after it was passed by the National Council of Provinces.

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Cape Town - The e-tolls bill was passed by the National Council of Provinces (NCOP) on Wednesday.

The Transport and Related Matters Amendment Bill was supported by the ANC and opposed by the DA and Cope.

The bill now goes back to the National Assembly.

Minister of Transport Dikobe Ben Martins said the bill was necessitated by the development of the Gauteng Freeway Improvement Project and was needed to implement the electronic tolling.

The bill aims to legalise the collecting of tolls, to allow the Cross Border Road Transport Agency to collect tolls as well as Sanral, and to allow different toll prices.

“Funding the Gauteng Freeway Improvement Project through a user charge has enabled the upgrading of some 201km of roads that would otherwise have taken in excess of 12 years to fund,” said Martins.

“Without this project, traffic in the province would have been in gridlock by now.

“Members may be interested to note that the traffic volumes on the Gauteng freeways increased with between 27 percent to 42 percent for different freeway sections since 2006. On the N1 between the Allandale interchange and Buccleuch interchange, morning peak hour traffic increased from 9 000 vehicles in 2008 to 13 000 vehicles in 2013.

“An independent survey carried out by a company providing navigation services showed that the improvements have led to a 50 percent reduction in travel times on the N1 between Johannesburg and Tshwane in peak hours.”

DA MP Herman Groenewald said the bill would make the poor poorer.

“The government cannot just ignore millions of South Africans. Taxpayers, road users, vehicle owners, political parties, unions in the labour market and ANC members against tolling deserve public participation in all provinces. Even the churches, it appears, have spoken out against e-tolling,” he said.

“The DA cannot support a bill which will make poor South Africans poorer.”

Cope MP Dennis Bloem said the bill had been widely campaigned against by the majority of political parties, by civil society, religious organisations, business and Cosatu.

“It is very clear that this bill does not have the support of the majority of South Africans,” he said.

“This bill has split the ANC into two. I know people will deny this here, but this is a fact.”

On Tuesday, the bill was returned to an NCOP committee which had previously agreed to it.

“The chairperson of the National Council of Provinces referred concerns regarding the manner in which the first meeting was handled to the chair of the committee.

“The chair of the committee consulted widely and decided that it was best to reconvene the committee to deal with the bill,” said the committee chairman, ANC MP Pat Sibande.

He said the committee had rescinded its earlier report on the bill and reconsidered it.

louise.flanagan@inl.co.za

The Star

Protesters loot hawkers’ stalls

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Delft residents who were making their way through the city centre after a day of protesting looted hawkers’ stalls.

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Cape Town - Delft residents who were making their way through the city centre after a day of protesting outside the Western Cape High Court looted hawkers’ stalls.

The residents from Delft’s TRA5 had come to town to support seven community leaders against whom an urgent application had been brought in the high court. As they reached the Grand Parade many grabbed goods from hawkers’s stalls before fleeing towards Cape Town Station.

The court application had been brought by the provincial Department of Human Settlements against the leaders for disrupting construction of new houses which are intended for TRA5 residents.

The case is back in court on Thursday.

The residents were due to receive houses built using alternative building materials, but the residents said that they wanted brick houses.

Bruce Oom, spokesman for MEC for Human Settlements Bonginkosi Madikizela, said they had applied for an interdict against the seven leaders so that the building work could be continued without disruption.

The community leaders have been accused of intimidating building workers on the site and preventing them from performing their duties.

“The department has a mandate to deliver houses to those people who need them most, and at stake are the housing needs of thousands of people due to the unhappiness of a few individuals.”

But residents argued in court that there were no grounds for an interdict since the last disruption had been on March 22 and work at the site had continued uninterrupted since the beginning of last month.

Outside the court, Zwelohlanga Ndiki, one of the respondents in the case, said residents had marched to the site after they heard that their new houses were to be built with material similar to asbestos slabs.

“There was no show house to show the people what kind of house they will be getting and the residents want an assurance that these houses will not collapse after eight years.”

Oom said the project was expected to be complete by March next year, “but due to various challenges with the project, the completion date may be extended by a few months”.

He said that houses built with alternative materials were in many ways superior to conventional brick and mortar houses.

“All houses have to meet the standards of the National Home Builders Registration Council, which independently guarantees the quality of the houses for five years after construction.”

Oom said a show house had been built by the contractor at another site and the community leaders had been invited to inspect it.

“Minister Madikizela has also communicated the process to the community, as well as the benefits of the new houses, and so the department is satisfied there has been sufficient communication.”

neo.maditla@inl.co.za

Cape Argus

Teen gangsters kill second victim in a week

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The soil had barely settled on the grave of Ayanda Ngetu when another victim was claimed by a gang of Khayelitsha teens.

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Cape Town - The soil had barely settled on the grave of Ayanda Ngetu when another victim was killed by teenage Khayelitsha gangsters.

Residents, none of who wished to be named, told the Cape Argus how the second attack this month unfolded near Bulumko Secondary School.

Late on Saturday, two dozen teenage boys, reportedly affiliated to the Mavura gang of Town 2, Khayelitsha, strolled into F Section to the street where Ngetu was killed a week before. Without warning, they pulled out knives and descended on three F-Section boys standing on the corner of Tanga Street and Mvuzo Crescent.

In the ensuing scuffle, two of the F-Section boys were stabbed, but a third - 18-year-old Zimvo Kanyiso Jaxa - came off worst. He was stabbed in the chest several times and died later in Khayelitsha Hospital.

Police spokesman Lieutenant-Colonel Andre Traut said nine people had been questioned in relation to the murder, and arrests were imminent.

The Cape Argus reported on youth gangs, many of whom are pupils at Bulumko High School, holding the community hostage after Ngetu was killed under similar circumstances in the early hours of May 5.

At the time, Bulumko High principal Bernard Hlongwane admitted fighting between gangs had escalated dramatically since late last year. When the Cape Argus visited the school on Wednesday, he refused to comment.

The provincial Department of Education confirmed that a group of knife-wielding teenagers had breached the school’s perimeter on Monday afternoon, threatening teachers and pupils. No one was injured.

The department sent staff to monitor and “stabilise the school environment”.

Meanwhile, parents and community leaders are meeting nightly in a bid to find a solution to the violence.

Ward councillor Patrick Mngxunyeni explained the objectives of the meetings: “We need to acknowledge that the whole community needs to team with police in fighting this crime. Parents need to take the message back to their kids.

“They need to stop protecting the children who are involved in the gang fights, especially those who are the ringleaders.

“We must also guard against the community taking matters into their own hands by resorting to vigilante justice. That is why we invite police to attend the meetings.”

daneel.knoetze@inl.co.za

Cape Argus

She’s 73 and diving with Cango crocs

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Some septuagenarians spend their retirement relaxing. But Janet Martyn, 73, does things differently.

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Western Cape - Some septuagenarians spend their retirement relaxing. But Londoner Janet Martyn, 73, does things differently.

She has been hopping into a steel cage and diving into crocodile-infested waters at Cango Wildlife Ranch, spending some quality time nose-to-snout with a group of Nile crocodiles.

“They are just so beautiful,” Martyn said. “They’ve ceased to be a lot of reptiles to me, but individuals.”

Martyn is a dedicated volunteer at Cango, and has spent two or three weeks there every year for the past seven years. Cango’s Tammy Moult says that she is passionate about crocs, and a dedicated worker.

“She is an amazing woman. She works harder than a lot of the 20-year-olds. She really puts her back into it.”

Moult said crocodile cage divers were typically young adventure-seekers. Martyn is one of the oldest to confront the crocs.

Martyn said it had been a long process working up the courage to do the cage dive. After spending time at Cango with people who loved the crocodiles, she caught their enthusiasm.

“It infects you when you spend so much time with people who love something,” said Martyn.

The wildlife ranch, in Oudtshoorn, was the first to create a crocodile cage diving experience, during which a cylindrical cage is lowered by a crane into the water. Although they do not use bait to draw the crocodiles to the cage, the animals are trained to associate the cage with food, and are eager to approach it.

Nile crocodiles average between 4m and 5m in length and weigh about 410kg, though crocs up to 6.1m and weighing 900kg are not uncommon. They are opportunistic predators who take a variety of prey, including fish, reptiles, birds and mammals.

Cango has not had any safety incidents with the crocodile dives. The crane has a double chain system hooking on to the cage, there is a safety escape inside. The whole system is checked regularly.

In addition, said Moult, the crocodiles were well fed.

The ranch had recently replaced the three elderly and “sluggish” crocodiles with four inquisitive young males who were keen to get close to the cage.

“You know you’re safe because of the cage,” Martyn said, “though if you put your hand out you may have it removed.”

Speaking by phone from London, Martyn said she planned to do another cage dive when she visited South Africa later this year.

“It’s already booked,” she said.

alison.decker@inl.co.za

Cape Argus

SAPS hackers ‘did not access secret info’

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Hackers did not access any confidential info when the SAPS website was compromised during a cyber attack, police say.

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Cape Town - Hackers did not access any confidential information when the SAPS website was compromised during a concerted cyber attack last week, say police.

A hacker performed a data dump on Friday, uploading personal details of complainants on the police’s website’s e-mail server to another page.

Almost 16 000 e-mails were exposed, including details of incidents of crimes such as rape, murder and robbery and the names and contact details of the complainants.

The police website hosts a variety of services, including an anonymous crime tip-off page where users can report criminal activity.

But national police spokesman Brigadier Phuti Setati said on Wednesday it was only the general feedback portion of the website and the list of police contacts that had been compromised.

“This is not confidential, it is available to anyone… the SAPS has made a facility available on the website where a person may log a request to be addressed by a specific station or division or merely to give a compliment. This information is usually published.”

Anonymous tips and case information were stored on a different server in another building, and there was no electronic link between the two.

“Hacking (our website) will always be a matter that the hacker community will strive to achieve, and therefore the website and the police’s corporate systems are hosted on completely different networks.

“The confidential information cannot be hacked.”

Setati said police had launched a “major investigation” into those behind the attack.

“They will be brought to justice.”

DomainerAnon, a user on Twitter who claimed credit for the attack, tweeted: “The reason for (the attack) is to serve as a reminder to the government regarding murders of 34 protesting miners outside the Marikana platinum mine by police. To date, no officers have been brought to justice… this situation will NOT be tolerated.”

kieran.legg@inl.co.za

Cape Argus

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