Another Strike hits Johannesburg

This is the 4^th strike the Pikitup workers have embarked on since November 2015, and it is another illegal strike. It is all about money.

The worst part is that the strikers are violent. They do not enter into a peaceful strike; they prefer to cause damage and destruction along the way.  Johannesburg city center is a mess and a dangerous place to visit. Isn't South Africa a beautiful country?

SOURCE:

http://www.enca.com/south-africa/johannesburg-pikitip-workers-back-strike

Johannesburg Pikitup workers back on strike

JOHANNESBURG – Pikitup workers affiliated to the South African Municipal Workers Union (Samwu) in Johannesburg on Thursday embarked on yet another illegal strike, after salary negotiations with management reached deadlock.

This is the fourth Pikitup strike since November 2015.

Among issues Samwu wants resolved was the benchmarking of job descriptions with equal salaries for similar occupation at different depots, as well as the immediate resignation of Pikitup managing director, Amanda Nair.

Last year, the trade union went on an illegal strike and laid criminal charges against Nair, but Pikitup obtained a court interdict against its workers.

Samwu’s deputy regional secretary, Paul Tlhabang, speaking on SAfm on Thursday morning, said there was no eargerness from the management to speedily resolve the ongoing dispute.

Tlhabang said some of their members were still earning less than R9,000 a month when their colleagues at other depots doing the same job earned more than R20,000.

“The workers are saying if you (Pikitup) cannot offer us at least R15,000, then indicate to us how much you can put on the table. Instead what management offered was just an insult. But management offered R150 and R200 salary increments, and members cannot accept that,” Tlhabang told the radio station.

Tlhabang said the union would meet with management on Thursday at the Mandating Committee, adding that “as long as the issue of salaries was not corrected, the situation would not improve and service delivery would be affected”.

Tlhabang accused Pikitup boss Amanda Nair of being a “law unto herself and untouchable”, saying Nair was sending managers to “deal” with Samwu members through advocates for issues related to misconduct.

Nair, defending herself, said the issue of benchmarking salaries was a “scientific one” and was out of her hands.

Nair said that she was merely implementing her mandate and she would continue to do her job as long as the Pikitup Board and the political leadership of the City of Joburg were happy with her.

“I’m not part of the benchmarking process, but Mr Tlhabang and Samwu leadership at local and regional have been part of the process, they sit in the technical task team. Samwu wants me to resign but I don’t wake up in the morning and make a determination about workers’ salaries or policies,” Nair said.

The crazy false prophets

If the prophets are not eating snakes, pouring boiling water on people, or eating grass, then this story must be the most ludicrous of all.  Recently a prophet wanting to prove God’s power and probably though he was led by the Holy spirit, charged a lion and was almost killed. Game rangers saved the prophet who is recovering from the silly ordeal.

The false prophets that come and go should be stopped as too much harm is caused to innocent people. People believe the false prophets in the hope of receiving a blessing are being conned, and it is probably all for money. How gullible some people remain. One would assume that the tried and tested faith of believing in one God, the Supreme Power is more than sufficient, like lambs many have lost the way.

SOURCE:

http://thesoutherndaily.co.za/pastor-charges-lion.html.html

Prophet Charges Lion To Prove God’s Power, Nearly Killed, Saved By Game Rangers

A ZCC Prophet was nearly killed by a pride of lions in South Africa's Kruger National Park on Saturday after he charged at them to prove the strength of the holy spirit. The lions called his bluff and attacked him, almost killing me. The man was saved by alert game rangers who shot into the air to disperse the lions.

Prophet Alec Ndiwane who is based in the Pretoria Soshanguve was with fellow church members in the Kruger National Park where they were watching animals.It is believed the prophet went into a trance and started to speak in tongues. Ahead of them was a lion pride busy eating their impala.

Alec must have thought he was the biblical Samson as the prophet opened the car door and went charging towards the lions. Upon seeing the man running towards them, the lions could not believed that manna was coming straight from heaven and instead ran towards the prophet.

Alec must have then come to his senses as he quickly realised this was not going to end well and made an immediate turn and ran back to safety. But before he could safely reach the confines of the car, one lion had snapped its paws on him thus causing major damage to his toilet sitting tool. Also thanks to the game ranger who was near who fired some shots with his gun to scare the lion away.

So severe was the lion paw injury that Alec had to be rushed to hospital for emergency surgery. The man was fearing he would lose his bum but the doctor’s assured him he would still have his left bum intact.

“I do not know what came over me’, Alec confessed, ‘I thought the Lord wanted to use me to show his power over animals. Is it not we were given dominion over all creatures of the earth’, Alec added.


Alec was eventually stitched up and discharged after spending the night in hospital.

Stealing the Money

Three million was stolen from the education budget by  The Matthew Goniwe School of Leadership and Governance (ANC) in Gauteng! It seems they cannot help themselves and we can always count on the ANC to steal the money. 

No wonder there is no money for education, medical and housing. What is going to happen when there is no more money to loot. I guess we will all wait and see what happens in the future. Will the ANC government make amends and set a good example for the upcoming municipal elections or will they ignore the plight of the poor? The stealing does not stop.

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Source:

http://www.iol.co.za/news/south-africa/gauteng/religious-groups-pull-out-after-r3m-goes-missing-1994470

Religious groups pull out after R3m goes missing

Johannesburg - Faith-based organisations have pulled out of a partnership with the Gauteng Department of Education due to lack of clarity regarding what was done with R3 million of funding and failure to honour repeated requests for meetings.

The initiative, known as Faith for Quality Education, saw the two organisations sign a memorandum of understanding in March 2013 for them to work together to enhance teaching and learning in the province.

The Faith Based Organisations (FBO), chaired by Anglican Bishop Peter Lee, said they were terminating the agreement because repeated attempts by them to clarify roles, responsibilities and reporting structures of the partnership had been unsuccessful.

“The programme has been bounced about from one directorate or sub-directorate to another, without consultation or effective follow-up. As a result, the lines of communication, accountability and effective action in both directions between the parties and the MOU remain obscure,” Lee said.

The bishop said that initially the Gauteng Department of Education (GDE) made one person available for their committee to liaise with and the programme was being rolled out with the various churches playing roles in schools like offering counselling, picking up children whose parents had died and helping in fundraising initiatives.

“But then a new person would arrive at every meeting, and then nobody would show up, or they showed up late. We didn't have the same person twice. I had the sense that they would talk about partnering with you, but they were not taking it seriously. We felt like we were being used,” Lee said.

He said that last year the committee was advised that a budget of R3m had been granted to the programme, but that funds must be administered by the Matthew Goniwe School of Leadership and Governance under the direction of the Liaison Committee.

Lee said they were told by the GDE secretariat, Richard Setati, that if they spent the money wisely, they could get R18m in funding the next year. “We had an AGM in October and we asked for a financial report. We got a page with six lines indicating the money had been spent,” Lee said.

He said one of the payments was R1.5m for “QTLC”.

“This we discovered was money spent on a conference. What conference we don't know,” he said.

The bishop said no expenditure had been authorised by the committee.

Having been made aware of the unauthorised expenditure in October last year, Lee said their executive immediately brought this to the attention of the then acting chief officer of the GDE, J van Coller.

“Four months down the line, it would appear that no action has been taken in this respect,” Lee said.

Despite a week of repeated e-mails, phone calls and SMSes requesting comment from the Gauteng Department of Education, no response to The Star's questions was received.

“What is the point of a memorandum of understanding, however noble its intentions, if one of the parties - the GDE - steadily ignored the other party? It is indeed a great pity and deeply saddening that such a worthwhile initiative should flounder in this way,” Lee said.

Millions of questions

According to its website, The Matthew Goniwe School of Leadership and Governance is a semi-autonomous, non-profit organisation established to serve as the training arm of the Gauteng Department of Education.

After public and independent schools, Matthew Goniwe and the Sci-Bono Discovery Centre receive the highest amount of revenue from the GDE – more than special schools.

Last year, Matthew Goniwe received more than R324m and Sci-Bono received R207m. This financial year, the two institutions will get far more with Matthew Goniwe set to receive receive R451m and Sci-Bono R477m.

DA MPL for education in Gauteng Khume Ramulifho said he has observed many programmes going through Matthew Goniwe, but he said it is not clear where the money is spent as they had not seen separate financial reports for the institution.

The last financial reports placed on the website were for the 2012/13 financial year.