Thursday July 07, 2011

From Creamer Media in Johannesburg, I’m Jessica Hannah

Making headlines:

Claims of fraud and corruption against Public Protector Advocate Thuli Madonsela are an attempt to intimidate and stop her from investigating the police, several organisations said on Wednesday. "We call upon all South Africans who care about the rule of law and the Chapter Nine institutions, to join together in defence of the Public Protector," the Council for the Advancement of the Constitution said. South African Women Lawyers' Association president Noxolo Maduba said the claims were a ploy to distract her from releasing reports on alleged wrongdoing in leases for police headquarters in Pretoria and Durban for R500-million and R1.1-billion respectively. In her preliminary report, Madonsela found Police Commissioner Bheki Cele guilty of maladministration for his role in the leases.

Proposed changes to South Africa’s broad-based black economic empowerment (BBBEE) legislation would result in penalties and blacklisting of parties guilty of fronting, Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) deputy director-general for empowerment and enterprise development Sipho Zikode said. The “sophisticated practice” could no longer be tolerated in South Africa as it was a significant constraint to “true economic transformation”, he said. Fronting practices necessitated the amendment of legislation and the strengthening of enforcement. The DTI would present the amendment, along with other critical and key changes to South Africa’s BBBEE legislation, to Parliament by September

South Africa was once again failing to align its economy to the strong post-crisis commodity boom and was instead witnessing a further shrinking of the mining sector, which was being undermined further by the nationalisation rhetoric, an economist said. Speaking at a Siemens breakfast, Efficient Group chief economist Dawie Roodt said the mining industry’s direct contribution to South Africa’s GDP growth would be less than 5% in the next two to three years. He expected South Africa’s overall GDP growth to hover around the 4% mark in the next two to three years. “While this is much better than the recession, it is not the 7% or 8% that we need to sufficiently grow the economy and tackle our high unemployment rate,” said Roodt.

Also making headlines:
Rebel fighters seized a village south of the Libyan capital and another group advanced towards Tripoli from the east on Wednesday in the biggest push in weeks towards Colonel Muammar Gaddafi's main stronghold.
And, retailers undermining the Rica Act and jeopardising its aims and objectives were guilty of an offence, and stood to be fined or imprisoned for contravention of the law, government officials warned.

That’s a roundup of news making headlines today.