FAMILY SHOCKED to FIND WRONG BODY in COFFIN Kabelo Tlhabanelo
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Thursday 18th February 2021, 0145 Real News. Scrolla.Africa FAMILY SHOCKED TO FIND WRONG BODY IN COFFIN Kabelo Tlhabanelo Dineo Maloko said her sister, Maleshoane Mohapi, was supposed to be buried on Wednesday, but the funeral parlour supplied a boy’s body - dressed in her late sister’s clothes. The family had prepared food for the funeral. But The Will Funerals had lost the body of their mum who had died on 9 February in hospital. “What angered me more was the fact that this strange body was wearing my sister’s clothes,” Dineo told Scrolla.Africa. “We immediately told them it was not Maleshoane and they took the body back to the parlour.” She said her sister’s body could not be found at the parlour. “They arrived at about midnight and said they had found my sister’s body but refused to say where. I suspect my sister had been buried by another family and she was taken out of the grave.” Maleshoane’s daughter, Granny, said she was also saddened by what had happened. Manager Keke Mabule told the family he didn’t know where the body was found. “But I will be investigating and checking the CCTV footage,” he said. “I am prepared to help the family with a casket, tombstone and a sheep to apologise.” The angry family said they also needed to do a cleansing at the house with another sheep because of the strange dead body that spent time there to which Mabule agreed. When Scrolla.Africa confronted Mabule for more questions he declined to comment to the media. The funeral was postponed to Thursday at 10am. When Scrolla.Africa arrived at the family home, the pastor was still waiting for the hearse to bring the coffin into the tent inside the family’s yard. NPA says more charges coming for Ace Lungani Zungu The National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) has shot down Ace Magashule’s claim that he doesn’t know what he’s being charged with. Magashule who is due at the Bloemfontein Magistrate’s Court on Friday said he will be demanding that his case be struck off the roll if the state prosecutor can’t serve him with a charge sheet. “To this day, I don’t know what the charges are,” the ANC Secretary General told Scrolla.Africa. However, Sipho Ngwema, the NPA spokesman, said Magashule received his first charge sheet on his first appearance in court on November 13th. “On Friday when he will appear again, he will receive an updated charge sheet with added charges. There will also be other co-accused brought to court that will appear alongside him,” Ngwema said. Magashule earlier told Scrolla.Africa that “the charge now, prosecute later” modus operandi of the Hawks and the National Prosecuting Authority can’t be allowed to continue. “As citizens, we must speak out against this because if we don’t the status quo will remain the same,” he said. Magashule’s court appearance comes at a time when he is fighting for his position as ANC secretary-general. He was dealt a blow over the weekend after the ANC national executive committee agreed that leaders who were facing charges must step aside until cleared. The NEC has given the party branches 30 days to finalise the guidelines before the policy is officially implemented. Magashule said it was an internal matter of the ANC but added: “But I’m not worried because I know that my hands are clean.” Asked about the factions within the ANC, he said he led one ANC which had one president. Magashule, a strong Zuma man, is believed to be leading an anti-President Cyril Ramaphosa grouping within the ANC. In his first court appearance in November, his supporters outside the court were already calling for him as the next party presidential candidate at the ANC’s elective conference next year. Magashule is out on R200,000 bail facing 21 charges of corruption and fraud, or theft and money laundering. This comes from the R255 million asbestos tender that was issued during his time as premier of the Free State. Picture source: @TimesLIVE Inside Glebelands, the deadly hostel where life is cheap and protection expensive Lungani Zungu From the outside, Glebelands looks like a normal hostel. But inside those grey walls, more than 25,000 residents live in fear as warring groups allegedly fight over what is called a protection fee. According to residents, a protection fee is the money they pay monthly to the people who claim to be protecting them from would-be attackers. They pay anything from R100 to R500. These amounts, multiplied by the 25,000 residents, is a lucrative business for those behind it. Some of those who rebel against this so-called protection fee have paid with their lives. According to violence monitor, Vanessa Burger, more than 120 people died at the hostel between 2014 and 2019. She said eleven more have died in the last five months. And many of these deaths are allegedly connected to not paying up. Burger said there seems to be more splinter groups fighting over the protection fee. “It seems there are now three splinter groups that were previously connected to the 'Glebelands Eight’,” she said. The Glebelands Eight is the name that was given to the men, including a police officer Bhekimuzi Mdweshu, who were arrested in 2017 for allegedly stoking the violence in Glebelands. They are Khayelihle ‘Mroza’ Mbuthuma, Vukani Manenze Mcobothi, Eugene Hlophe, Mbuyiselwa Mkhize, Ncomekile Matlale Ntshangase, Mondli Talente Mthethwa and Bongani Mbhele. Kgabo’s backyard school for mechanics - and even women can apply Tebogo Moobi Through his township car workshop Kgabo Boshomane is teaching young people the skills to fix cars as he points them towards their dreams. More than 80 young people have benefited from his workshop, Kgabo Cars, in Soshanguve, Tshwane. When Kgabo started his workshop in 2010 while he still had a day job, he wanted to empower the youth and started inviting young men to help him. "Before I became a mechanic, I studied teaching but I never graduated. My passion has always been with cars,' he said. "I made a promise to myself that I will become a mechanic. But I also decided I will not deliver sloppy work.” In 2012, while still working part time he decided to open an artisan centre at his workshop and it was a success. So far he has produced 82 artisans of which 20 are women. Almost all of them are currently employed in different companies across the country. He is currently working on a project to open training schools for eight females so they can do the same thing he is doing. Kgabo said he has been working with Sita and other private companies that have supported his course but he does not have any sponsorship. He said it has always been hard working without government help because he is expected to be compliant and have qualified mentors for his students. "I wish I could get a permanent sponsorship so that I could help more youth." At the moment he has 40 pupils. Kgabo has won different awards including the Automechanica Absa South Africa award, the Tshwane Mayoral Award and the Township Enterprise award, among others. LOVED AND LOST: Maalim Seif Sharif Hamad (1943-2021) Phillip van Niekerk The man is gone but the dream lives on Maalim Seif Hamad’s dream was to se e his beloved islands of Zanzibar turned into the Dubai of Africa, an offshore haven for the bustling economies of East Africa. He embodied the split nature of Tanzania, a country created in haste in 1964 as a merger between the vast nation of Tanganyika and the tiny islands of Zanzibar. He was prominent in Tanzanian politics, a friend and colleague of the country’s legendary founder Julius Nyerere, while being a Zanzibari nationalist. Mostly he was a democrat and a man of high principle, a feature that in the rough world of Tanzanian politics required mountains of patience. Born on the island of Pemba, then part of the British protectorate of Zanzibar, he became a teacher which is why he was always referred to as Maalim. He was a member of the Zanzibar Revolutionary Council after independence and rose to be a member of the central committee and head of economic planning for Tanzania’s ruling party, the CCM, between 1977 and 1987 before becoming Chief Minister of Zanzibar. He was expelled from the ruling party after agitating for multiparty democracy and was imprisoned for two and a half years between 1989 and 1991 before Nyerere agreed to end one party rule in Tanzania in 1992. Hamad along with other former ruling party members founded the opposition Civic United Front Party which despite winning six straight elections between 1995 and 2020 was always denied victory - such was the fear within the ruling party of losing control. He was a beloved figure, especially on Pemba, where he always preached non-violence and reconciliation. Most recently, in the elections of November 2020, members of Hamad’s party, the ACT-Wazalendo party, were shot, imprisoned and bludgeoned, and he was forced to become Vice President in a government of national unity. He soon had to face a new challenge. Tanzanian President John Magufuli denied the existence of Covid in Tanzania, even though it was clear that many people were dying of the disease. Magufuli shunned lockdowns, discouraged social distancing and the use of face masks, banned the release of data and refused to acquire vaccines. He called for prayers and herbal remedies to defeat it.