News 12:00

BULLETIN 10 November 12 pm

Good afternoon. I am……..

In this bulletin:

# COSATU welcomes the resumption of the Madlanga Commission and planned appearance of key witnesses
# Home Affairs launches a new Digital Asylum System to cut delays and combat abuse
# And cricket: Australia won’t reopen the Sandpapergate probe despite Khawaja’s revelations

# Union federation COSATU has welcomed the resumption of the Madlanga Commission’s hearings, particularly the planned appearance of key witnesses, including individuals accused of serious criminal offences. COSATU’s spokesperson, Matthew Parks, says the hearings are crucial in exposing the full extent of state capture and corruption within law enforcement agencies. He says high levels of crime and corruption were among the major reasons many voters withdrew their support from the ANC during the local government elections:

# The Department of Home Affairs has launched the first phase of the Digital Asylum System today, which aims to speed up asylum applications, strengthen identity verification, and eliminate the scope for corruption. The platform requires asylum applicants to submit biometric information, which Home Affairs will use to verify their identities and establish whether they have previously lodged applications that were rejected. Minister Leon Schreiber says the digitalisation of the asylum seeker process is an opportunity to end the long-standing abuse of the system.

# City Power in Johannesburg is working on the Mayfair substation that had a secondary explosion last night. Spokesperson Isaac Mangena says the outage affects the SABC in Auckland Park, Garden City Hospital in Mayfair, and surrounding areas. Water supply had been affected. Mangena says the area has been cordoned off and personnel remain paramount, while teams will resume work as soon as the site is declared safe:

# The European Union’s high representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Kaja Kallas, has no high expectations for today and tomorrow’s US-led Russian–Ukrainian peace talks in Abu Dhabi. This will be the first trilateral talks aimed at ending the war since February. A key area of disagreement relates to Ukraine’s eastern region of Donetsk, now mostly occupied by Moscow. Kallas says Russia has not shown any signs it is prepared to negotiate in good faith:

# Cricket: Australia won’t reopen the investigation into the infamous sandpaper scandal in South Africa in 2018 despite former batter Usman Khawaja’s explosive revelations in his memoir. He said the whole touring squad knew of the plan to rough the ball with sandpaper, although only captain Steve Smith, vice-captain David Warner and bowler Cameron Bancroft were punished. Cricket Australia CEO Todd Greenberg doesn’t see any compelling reason for a new probe, saying there was nothing to gain from it. Warner backs Khawaja’s claims as 100-percent accurate.

# And the financial indicators: The dollar trades at 16-rand-35-cents and the euro at 18-rand-38-cents. One British pound costs 22-rand and Bitcoin trades at 74-thousand-592-dollars. Gold sells at four-thousand-116-dollars-30-cents a fine ounce and Brent crude oil is quoted at 93-dollars-12-sents a barrel.

Stay tuned for more news………….