2oceans Vibe

We know; we also thought it was some kind of elaborate joke, or that we’d been mistaken for seeing an extra zero. We hadn’t. And nor is it a joke. The South African Municipal Workers Union is demanding that all vacant positions in the Local Government Sector be filled as a matter of urgency. Which makes sense, because that would benefit a lot of people.

SONY Corporation has declared an annual loss of 457 billion yen ($5,7 billion) in 2011, its fourth straight year of hemorrhaging money, and the worst in its 66-year corporate history. In spite of which, the company – which appointed a new president, Kazuo Hirai last month – is predicting return to profit by the end of 2012.

Politicians reacted angrily at the decision to move Lieutenant-General Richard Mdluli out of his crime intelligence position yesterday. A collective feeling amongst opposition parties was that this was simply not good enough, and that Mdluli should be suspended again.

South Africa’s Industrial Development Corporation, and state-owned lender, has a plan to sell about 15 billion Rand’s worth of investments it currently holds over the next five years. The initiative is part of its divestment plan, Chief Financial Officer, Gert Gouws said in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia’s capital, today.

We had been wondering what might have been stolen from advocate Muzi Sikhakhane’s home in Northcliff, Jozi, last month. Sikhakhane is acting in a matter against controversial police crime intelligence boss, Lieutenant-General Richard Mdluli. Turns out, one of the documents stolen was an affidavit penned by Tokyo Sexwale, which accused Mdluli of abusing state resources.

One of President Jacob Zuma’s many sons, Edward, is being sued for R1,5 million by Functions for Africa CC. The company says Edward still owes them the shortfall from his lavish wedding that cost R2,5 million at Tala Game Reserve in KwaZulu Natal last year.

LG Electronics, the world’s second biggest TV maker, will launch Internet-enabled TV based on Google’s platform in the United States in May. The South Korean firm is after a share of the emerging Internet TV market, a senior LG executive said today.

47 Ethiopian men were rescued on the weekend from being sold into slavery by a human-trafficking syndicate in Limpopo. Snatched for ransom, those whose families can’t pay, have their relatives unwillingly sold into slavery in SA. The United Nations now estimates that there are more than 27 million slaves in the world.

On World Press Freedom Day, the highly acclaimed writer, and Nobel Prize winner for literature, Nadine Gordimer, called for the Protection of Information Bill to be “rejected in its entirety.” She launched the scathing rebuttal in an article entitled, “South Africa: The New Threat to Freedom”, on the New York Review of Books website.

South Africa’s next poaching epidemic could emanate out of the trade in lion body parts. Lion bones are being used as a replacement for tiger bones to concoct traditional Asian medicines like tiger brew wine because of the demise of the region’s tiger populations. Lion are already being poached in the northern section of the Kruger National Park.

It’s been the rhetorical question on everyone’s lips for quite some time: will Cricket South Africa ever get the unlawful bonus money back from those who received it? There seems to be a chance that they will. CSA is attempting to recover R3,3 million from suspended chief executive, Gerald Majola and former chief operating officer, Don McIntosh.

Nando’s didn’t hesitate accepting the challenge that Santam had set them this week. In fact, Nando’s delivered a day early, and then bettered it, showing they definitely weren’t chicken. Some might call it a very good example of symbiotic radvertising.

The Brazilian Chamber of Deputies has approved contentious new legislation that eases rules on how much land farmers must preserve as forest. Environmentalists are up in arms, and say the new forest legislation will be a disaster, and lead to further destruction of the Amazon.

We all knew that they were going to be bad, but to be told that one in four of Jozi’s drivers were asked for a bribe in 2010 is quite something. 154 440 motorists were asked to pay a bribe, but only 184 cases of corruption were reported.

Forbes.com released a list of Africa’s 20 most powerful business people yesterday (they do like a list over there at Forbes) and it wasn’t too hard to pick up a trend on the list of the continent’s commercial high flyers – no less than 12 of them are South African. Are we awesome, or what? We’ve got the full list, including our Mzansi business powerhouses, after the jump!

The Eastern Cape education crisis deepened yesterday as it was announced that Modidima Mannya had resigned as Eastern Cape education department head. Eastern Cape Premier, Noxolo Kiviet, made the announcement and said the agreement was “in the best interest” of education in the province.

Both James and Rupert Murdoch are due to give new evidence to the Leveson Inquiry into press standards, starting today. James will appear first, followed by his father, tomorrow. The inquiry will now focus on the relationship between the press and politicians.

Interorbital Systems, an American aerospace company that constructs rocket and spacecraft, has announced an exciting product development: you can now very cost-effectively buy, and launch your own satellite into orbit.