July 18, 2012
From Creamer Media in Johannesburg, I’m Motshabi Hoaeane

Making headlines:

Former Limpopo education administrator Anis Karodia, says tenders must be controlled.

The International Crisis Group says Mali’s political crisis must be fixed before taking on rebels.

And, a new forensic lab in Cape-Town is part of the SAPS ‘s turnaround plan.

Former Limpopo education administrator Anis Karodia has called on Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan to take over the department's tender allocations, invoice processing and payments.

He said the department's responsibilities of authorisation, processing, recording and reviewing of transactions should be separated.

He also blames the province's education MEC, Dickson Masemola, for contributing to the department's unauthorised expenditure of R2.2 billion. This resulted in the department’s failing to provide textbooks to learners seven months into the school year.

The International Crisis Group says, any efforts to tackle the crisis in Mali must focus on rebuilding a central state authority before trying to recapture northern desert zones. These zones are now mainly in the hands of al Qaeda-linked Islamists.

Former colonial power France said last week that military intervention in Mali was "probable". Neighbouring Niger, meanwhile, has led African calls for swift action to prevent extremist groups, including al Qaeda and Nigeria's Boko Haram, from consolidating their positions across the Sahara-Sahel band.

Mali, once seen as one of West Africa's most stable nations, has imploded since a March coup removed the country's president weeks before elections were due. It is a move that has accelerated the fall of the north to a mix of secular and Islamist rebels.

Police Minister Nathi Mthethwa said on Tuesday that a new forensics lab in Cape Town is part of the police's turnaround plan to increase convictions through clear-cut evidence.

The minister was speaking at the opening of the R600-million lab in Plattekloof, now the fourth forensics facility in the country, which took six years to build.

The lab has been in operation since November, servicing the province as well as the Northern Cape and parts of the Eastern Cape. It has made a 63 percent caseload increase in the past financial year, and backlogs have decreased by 30 percent within the same period.

Also making headlines:

Libya's Prime Minister Mahmoud Jibril beats Islamists in a landmark election.

Fights breakout in an Egyptian court as judges meet on constitution rulings.

And, advisory services provider Grant Thornton says poor government service delivery is crippling South African businesses.

That’s a roundup of news making headlines today.