Five things you need to know about SA today

1. The Dispatch has quite a tale today. One of East London’s former mayors (the town has had quite a few in the past few years) chased after and karate-chopped a man, who allegedly stabbed a petrol attendant.  The suspect was arrested but the petrol attendant died as a friend of the former mayor was unable to get a call through to the emergency services. He flagged down a passing ambulance but they could not stop to help immediately as they were taking a woman to an old age home and returned too late. Lots of strands to this story that say a lot about our society. Read the story here.

2.  Trevor Manuel  is consulting lawyers over claims made by Allan Boesak in a book to be published soon, reports IOL and News24.  Boesak names Manuel’s family among other sturggle activists as benefiting from donor funds channelled through his Foundation for Justice and Peace. Read the IOL story here.

3.  There’s a moerse row brewing as Nelson Mandela’s grandson is denying that he has sold the funeral rights for Madiba’s funeral to the SABC for R3-million. He made his denial to both The Times and the Dispatch after  Sunday World broke the story. The Sunday World story says Mandla ignored repeated requests for comment. Read it here and read today’s story at The Times here.

4. And while we’re on the Sunday papers, I do feel the need to point out that the Sunday Times splash this week about young girls in rural Eastern cape being forced into marraige  is a story that appeared in the Daily Dispatch a few months back. Honestly, guys. Did you not think the Dispatch readers would notice?  Here’s the Sunday Times story and click here to read the Dispatch one from March.

5. News24 has a new look. Check it out but I must mention their perculiar practise of the past few weeks of leading with international stories. There’s a lot of exciting stuff happening right in SA, guys — web users can get international news from a host of foreign sites at the click of a button.

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There’s only one story today: the election results and how the online media is responding. Everybody’s got the story that by 8.30am this morning, the ANC had 63.7% (2 078 352 votes) – with the largest total of votes coming from the Eastern Cape (503 730) — the DA 19.5% (636,637 votes) and Cope only 7.7% (251 200 votes).

Most of the parties’ Facebook pages are silent and the IEC’s website is not loading, possibly because of the the number of hits on it.

It’s hard to beat the immediacy of TV and radio on this one but News24 seems to have the best online package of the big online media houses, with a cool little map of SA showing the results as they come in (the Western Cape is going to the DA, the rest are sticking with the ANC). Click here to go there.

My favourite story of the past two days, however, goes to the Daily Dispatch, which ran a reader competition of people’s memories of the 1994 election. I actually got a lump in my thoat when I read this one, about a reader’s memory of his grandfather voting for the first time.

The Dispatch’s election page is also much more lively than most, with an video interviews of young people talking about the election. Each video is embedded into a Google interactive map. Nice! Click here to interract.

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So what’s your website or blog worth? What the suckers with the money are prepared to pay, you might think. Well, maybe not. I’ve found a fascinating real time estimator of website values based on mathematical algorhythms called Stimator that chomps info from your websites (i.e. referrals from various sources)  and mixes it up with other economic stuff  I don’t pretend to understand. What’s so much fun about it is that in under a minute it  gives you a_ value — in US dollars nog al.

A half  hour of noodling around with South african URLs on Stimator’s calculator produced these results — and some  are mighty surprising. Of the big four news websites — IOL, News24, the Mail & Guardian and The Times — IOL came tops and the M&G second but News24 and The Times were beaten by the Daily Dispatch’s website (in East London). Here are the estimations done on 24 March:

Read the full story

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1. The Times reports that government sources say that Intelligence Minister Siyabonga Cwele was to meet President Kgalema Motlanthe last night to ‘‘provide him with an explanation” of what’s potting following the Sunday Times story saying that the minister’s wife is being investigated for trafficking cocaine between South America and South Africa. Read the full story here.

2. Schabir Shaik, Jacob Zuma’s former financial adviser who was jailed in 2005 for fraud and corruption, made an offer of R10-million for a swanky plek in Morningside in Durban one week before he was paroled. It also happens to be a stone’s throw away from the official Durban resident of the state president. Looks like Shaik was pretty sure (10 million bucks worth!) that he had a “get out of jail free” card. You have to subscribe to the M&G to see the story online. Click here to do that and you get one week free.

3. Meanwhile, back at the ranch Zuma says South Africans are being big meanies about Shaik’s health, waiting for him to die now that we’ve been told by Correctional Services that he’s in the final stages of terminal illness.

“You can’t say so many officials, all the way up to the minister, were all corrupt and dishonest and wanted to smuggle a prisoner out, it can’t be,” Zuma said.

Famous last words? Read the story on News24 here.

4. There has been a 56% rise in the number of missing police dockets over the past year, it emerged in Parliament. In 2005/6, 382 were lost or stolen; 427 in 2007/8 and in 2008/9 668 dockets went up in a puff of smoke. Ever wondered how easy it is get to a police docket vanished but you’re persecuted by traffic and library fines? You’re not working the system properly, people.

5. And maybe , just maybe, there’s light at the end of the tunnel for hacks (and readers) as there is a change of guard at the Evil Empire. Tony O’Reilly is handing over the reins of the Independent newspaper group to his son. They’re denying this will means a sell-off papers but we can only hope. In South Africa the Irishman owns both Cape Town daily broadsheets, both Durban daily broadhseets, The Star in Joburg and the Pretoria News. Most South African hacks have watched in dismay as these papers have fallen in quality in the past 15 years as cost cutting rules the day. Read Business Report’s story here.

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1. Security for ANC president Jacob Zuma is costing the taxpayer R1-million a month, it emerged in Parliament in response to questions from the DA. That means he’s cost the taxpayer a cool R50million since he was dismissed as deputy president in June 2005. Good grief! I think we’re all agreed on this: Mr Zuma, you’re simply not entitled to this if you’re not deputy president. Go hit The Friends of Zuma for some cash.

2. Manufacturing output, considered by economists as one of the key indicators of real economic performance fell a record 11% in January compared with the same period the year before. Mining output also fell 11%, which means South Africa’s trade deficit is up at a record R17.4-billion. It’s could well mean a drop in interest rates soon. For a quick little analysis of the situation read MoneyWeb’s Alec Hogg’s radio interview with Cees Bruggemans, chief economist of First National Bank on SAfm.

3. News24 says that about 220 South African towns are now withholding their municipal taxes due to poor service delivery, according to the National Taxpayers Union. Read the story here. Good on yer, people. I have oft wondered where the R1200 a month I pay in rates goes in the Buffalo City area and have concluded a large amount is being frittered away or simply not being spent as the parties — and factions within parties — wage war against each other in an endless power battle.

4. The Constitutional Court has ruled that South Africans living overseas can vote in the next election. If you are one, go to this story at The Times to find out how.

5.

A renegade stripper on a seduction spree, a Ducati motorcycle seized by crack detective Piet Byleveld and a spy game between two strip-club kings on Facebook.

Yislaaik. Now, that’s an intro and it’s not even a complete sentence (from Alex Eliseev at The Star. He’s a very smart young hack so I bet he wrote it rather than the news editor). Eliseev has been covering the Teazers court case in the South Gauteng High Court. Need I say more — read it here.

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1. East London has the highest percentage of people in South Africa who believe there is life on other planets while Johannesburg’s West Rand has the lowest, says a survey of 2000 people. I can’t speak for the West Rand but, as an East Londoner, I must say this is curious considering it’s also the Bible Belt, populated by many God-fearing charismatic Christians. If God made man in his own image, what do they think aliens look like? Read the story here.

2. A Wits University researcher says last year’s xenophobic riots were not spontaneous mob events but planned by South Africans wishing to set themselves up as community leaders in the townships and involving businessman wishing to route out competitions from foreign owners of businesses such as spazas. Speaking at a Joburg conference about the findings of a report on the xenophobic attacks, the researcher even indentified a specific hostel in Alexandria where the attacks were planned but said that police did not — and still do not — wish to “interfere”. Read this very interesting story here on News24.

3. Still on xenophobia, the Daily Dispatch has a good follow-up on its recent investigation into the lives of Somalis in East London. In the Transkei town of Port St Johns, the locals have in fact welcomed and integrated with Ethiopians refugees. Check out this except from the story. How shocking is it that this is the exception to the rule:

Take Sunday night in Mthumbane Location as an example. Yalew Tessema’s spaza shop buzzed with customers and children playing outside as the full moon shone over them.

He was not bothered about the time as he continued to serve customers behind his open counter, often striking up small talk in broken IsiXhosa.

“There is nothing to be scared of in this place,” he said. “I can close at whatever time of the night if it is really busy. The people here are friendly. We can even sleep without locking our doors.”

Refugee saga: a story of hope

4. Shooting for a Hollywood film based on a book by two South African photographers (they can write?) will start in Joburg soon. Ryan Phillippe, the former husband of actress Reese Witherspoon, heads the cast of the film based on the book, The Bang Bang Club, by Greg Marinovich and Joao Silva on their experiences covering political violence in South Africa in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Read The Times story here.

5. And gloomier than gloom, business confidence is at its lowest in 10 years in South Africa. The index is calculated from an average of confidence levels in five sectors — manufacturing, retail, wholesale, the motor trade and construction. Read the Business Day story here.

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1. SA Airways boss Khaya Ngqula has been sacked by the board a few weeks after a report on allegations of corruption was handed to it and the public enterprises minister. The main allegation is that a R1.5 billion catering deal SAA is doing with a consortium is a conflict of interest. One of the consortium partners, Vusi Sithole, is also a business partner of Nqcula’s wife.

2. President Kgalema Motlanthe said in a question to him at the Johannesburg Stock Exchange that he will consider an investigation into the medical parole from prison of Schabir Shaik, the former financial adviser of ANC president Jacob Zuma.

3. Still on Mr Shaik, a cardiologist at one of the country’s academic hospitals told The Times that Shaik’s condition was “nothing exceptional” after analysing a report about his health signed by the state cardiologist, Professor DP Naidoo. Naidoo told the Sunday Times he had discharged Shaik from hospital four months before he got parole. The doctor later said he was misquoted. Read the full story here, which also gives an account of the interview Sunday times journalist Megan Power did with Naidoo.

4. News24 says that an affidavit by a dead policeman that implicates the presidency, National Intelligence Agency and the National Police Commissioner’s Office in an alleged conspiracy was handed in to the Bloemfontein High Court by the defence for IT consultant Mzwendoda Kunene at his murder trial. Kunene, who is accused of murdering Ballito estate agent Lynne Hume in 2007, was one of three accused in the hoax e-mail case that implicated ANC members in a conspiracy against Jacob Zuma. Hume’s murder was allegedly the result of Kunene planning to make her as a defence witness in the e-mail case. Read the full story here.

5. The Pretoria High Court is expected to decided before the end of the week if Clive Derby-Lewis, who masterminded the murder of South African Communist Party leader Chris Hani in 1993, can get parole after serving 15 years of his life term.

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1. We have to make 302 runs today on the last day of the Ozzie Test in Durban. Yikes! It can be done as we’re 244 for four. Come on, guys, give us some heroics!

2. There’s a big storm brewing over the Sunday Times story about Schabir Shaik, Jacob Zuma’s former financial adviser, who got medical parole last week because he’s supposed to be in the final stages of terminal illness. Now the doctor who told the Sunday Times that he had discharged Shaik from hospital four months ago because he was well enough to leave is saying he was misquoted while the health department has complied a report for Health Minister Barbara Hogan on how he was allowed to stay in a private ward in a state hospital for four months at taxpayers’ expense.

3. The percentage of mortgage applications turned down by banks leapt to 61% in February, compared with 41% in the same period last year, reports News24. This means, says property economist Erwin Rode, that you need to get saving for a deposit if you want to buy a house. Best you buy a caravan and park it your parent’s yard if you’re a first-time home buyer and give up those dreams of a holiday home if you have bought a house. Read the full story here.

4. And more gloom on the property front. Business Day reports that house prices are expected to fall more this year before recovering early next year. The price index from one of the big South African mortgage origination firms shows that prices fell a further 0.7% last month compared with a year ago. The average house price was R827553. Read the full story here.

5. Two-thirds of the 62 firefighters at Cape Town International Airport are “poorly trained” and have little or no general firefighting experience, says IOL which has laid its hands on internal airport documents. So no sneaking off for smokes in the toilet at Cape Town airport, people! And stay clear of the area when the puff-happy Germans hit town for the soccer World Cup next year. Read the full story here.

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