July 24, 2015.
For Creamer Media in Johannesburg, I’m Sane Dhlamini.
Making headlines:

The National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa says its ready to build a new trade union federation.

Nigeria marks one polio-free year, raising hopes for global eradication.

And, the ruling African National Congress will hold it’s mid-year lekgotla.

 

Metalworkers' union the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (or Numsa) says it has exhausted all efforts to try to reclaim the Congress of South African Trade Unions (or Cosatu) and it is now ready to begin building a new trade union federation.

Numsa’s deputy general secretary Karl Cloete said the Numsa National Executive Committee concluded that Numsa, together with other affiliates in the group of nine-plus unions, had done everything in its power to reclaim Cosatu through its legal and organisational endeavours.

He said the time had come to start with the building blocks of forming a new, independent, democratic, worker-controlled, militant, anti-imperialist trade union federation.

Cloete said Numsa, which boasts a membership of 365 000 members, had two matters to take a decision on before going forward. These were whether they should withdraw a legal case pending on the unlawful expulsion from Cosatu and on whether they persue an an appeal to Cosatu to admit them back into the federation.

 

Nigeria marked its first year without a single case of polio on Friday, reaching a milestone many experts had thought would elude it as internal conflict hampered the battle against the crippling disease.

It means the country could come off the list of countries where polio is endemic in a few weeks, once the World Health Organisation (or WHO) can confirm that the last few samples taken from people in previously affected areas are free of the virus.

This achievement turned up the pressure on Pakistan, where most of the few polio cases in the world remained, to follow suit.

Nigeria's polio-free period, dating from July 24, 2014, was the longest it has gone without recording a case.

 

The African National Congress (or ANC) will hold its three-day mid-year lekgotla starting on Friday in Pretoria. The lekgotla is expected to focus on the country's energy crisis, the economy and local government.

It precedes the Cabinet lekgotla which was expected to be held at the end of the month.

ANC national spokesperson Zizi Kodwa said this weekend's meeting would assess government's progress in delivering against the party's priorities, which included job creation, and would give guidance on focus areas to its deployees in government.

At the ANC's last lekgotla in January, Secretary General Gwede Mantashe said the party was focusing on its top priorities: education, health, land and agrarian reform, as well as crime and corruption, and local government.

 

Also making headlines:

Eskom said unit 2 of South Africa's sole nuclear power plant will be shut down for three months from the end of August as part of routine refuelling and maintenance.

Fighting in northern South Sudan is preventing lifesaving aid from reaching thousands of people living in "inhumane conditions", including starving children.

Two Libyan soldiers were killed and ten people were wounded when eastern government forces made a new push against Islamist fighters in the embattled centre of Benghazi.

The US will review aid to Burundi in the next two months over crisis.

And, protests show that the migrant crisis has reached Italian doorsteps.

Don’t forget to follow us on Twitter [@PolityZA]

That’s a roundup of news making headlines today.