Thursday July 21, 2011

From Creamer Media in Johannesburg, I’m Jessica Hannah

Making headlines:

The biggest issue around the drive to toll the freeways, which were refurbished under the Gauteng Freeway Improvement Project, was the lack of consultation, says South African Transport and Allied Workers’ Union (Satawu) general-secretary Zenzo Mahlangu. Speaking at a debate yesterday on the proposed tolling of around 200 km of Gauteng freeways, he described the consultation that took place after the February announcement of the toll fee structure, by the South African National Roads Agency Limited, as only symbolic. Public anger over the toll structure as proposed in February saw the Department of Transport initiate a consultation process which produced new, lower toll fees at the end of June. However, these tariffs are still to be approved by Transport Minister Sibusiso Ndebele.

New data shows that global spending on humanitarian aid hit a record $16.7-billion in 2010 despite the financial crisis, but devastating disasters and rising delivery costs meant almost 40% of needs still went unmet.
Governments poured $12.4-billion into emergency relief, up 6% from the year before, while private donors gave $4.3-billion, according to preliminary estimates by Global Humanitarian Assistance (GHA), a Britain-based aid monitoring group. The latest annual report on aid flows by the GHA states that while the overall international response to humanitarian crises shows an upward trend, many governments are coming under pressure to justify existing levels of aid spending.

Economic recovery in South Africa is gathering strength, with economic growth expected to pick up to 3.5% in 2011, the World Bank’s country director for South Africa Ruth Kagia said at the release of the inaugural ‘South Africa Economic Update’ yesterday.  But the development finance institution warns that South Africa’s modest performance on savings and investment was not consistent with government’s objective of attaining 6% to 7% gross domestic product growth. The South African authorities calculated that such levels of growth were needed to begin making a dent in South Africa’s chronically high unemployment rate, which stood formally at worse than 25%, but was even higher on broader definitions.

Also making headlines:
Zimbabwe's Empowerment Minister reports that Zimbabwe has rejected all 175 local ownership proposals it received from foreign mining companies.
African National Congress (ANC) youth league leader Julius Malema says it is nobody's business where he gets his money from – and his supporters do not mind his lavish lifestyle.
And, France, who are keen to prevent Nato-led military action in Libya dragging on interminably, signalled that moves were afoot to let Colonel Muammar Gaddafi stay in his country as long as he commits to relinquishing power.

That’s a roundup of news making headlines today.