News 18:00

BULLETIN 3 June 6 pm

Good afternoon. I am……..

In this bulletin:

# Fuel prices will drop slightly from tomorrow
# The MK Party removes Floyd Shivambu as the secretary general over an unauthorised Malawi visit
# And Tennis: Aryna Sabalenka beats Zheng Qinwen to reach the French Open semi-finals

# South Africans will see a slight decrease in fuel prices from tomorrow in spite of the increase in the fuel levy. The Department of Petroleum and Mineral Resources announced that petrol drops by five-cents per litre, diesel by 37-cents, paraffin by 56-cents, and LPGAS by 89-cents per kilogram. Energy Department Fuel Pricing Director Robert Maake says these changes reflect a stronger rand and global oil price shifts. He confirmed that adjusted transport tariffs also apply in select magisterial zones:

# The MK Party has announced the redeployment of its secretary general, Floyd Shivambu, to Parliament. This comes after Shivambu took an unauthorised trip to Malawi, which the party says violated its constitution. The visit is linked to Shepherd Bushiri and his wife Mary’s extradition case. Reading the statement on behalf of party leader Jacob Zuma, Nathi Nhleko says Shivambu, who has extensive parliamentary experience, has accepted the redeployment:

# Action Society expressed outrage over a renewed parole application by former Cape Town police officer Marius van der Westhuizen, who was convicted in 2006 for murdering his three children. Van der Westhuizen had been granted parole in June last year, but it was overturned by the minister of Correctional Services, Pieter Groenewald, in August  after a formal review of the decision. Action Society’s Kaylynn Palm says this new attempt is unfair to the children’s mother, Charlotte van der Westhuizen, as well as the public:

# The defence team of an Australian woman accused of killing three people with a home-cooked meal, called the deaths a terrible accident. The court heard that Erin Patterson, who testified today, cooked and served beef wellington containing toxic death cap mushrooms at her home in Victoria in July 2023. Her estranged husband’s parents and his aunt died, while his uncle survived. The prosecution says the 50-year-old Patterson included the poisonous mushrooms deliberately. She denies this and will continue testifying on Wednesday.   

# Tennis: World number one Aryna Sabalenka ended Olympic champion Zheng Qinwen’s winning streak on the Paris clay with a straight-sets victory to seal herself a spot in the French Open semi-finals. The top seed from Belarus won 7-6, 6-3 against the Chinese eighth seed in just under two hours on Court Philippe Chatrier. The 27-year-old fought back after struggling in the first set against Zheng, who had beaten her in the quarter-final on clay in Rome last month, and thereby extended her record against the Chinese player to 7-1.

# And the financial indicators: The dollar trades at 17-rand-91-cents and the euro at 20-rand-40-cents. One British pound costs 24-rand-23-cents and Bitcoin trades at 105-thousand-980-dollars. Gold sells at three-thousand-347-dollars-1-cent a fine ounce and Brent crude oil is quoted at 65-dollars-41-cents a barrel.

Stay tuned for more news………….