Soccer scores - homeless loose

Plans to build hundreds of thousands of new low-cost homes could fall victim to shifting budget demands in the run-up to the 2010 Soccer World Cup, South Africa’s housing minister said on Thursday.

While the government has targeted the eradication of all shack dwellings by 2014, Housing Minister Lindiwe Sisulu said there was a danger that her ministry’s demands for both cash and infrastructure “could be completely wiped off the radar screen”.

Sisulu said there was a “clear and present urgency” to secure the finance, raw materials and land needed to re-house the 2,4-million families currently living in informal settlements before the competition for resources becomes even more intense.

“This [low-cost housing for the poor] is a constitutional requirement of this government, so we want to make sure that … in the next two years we can have a massive injection in housing,” she said.

The minister said housing delivery would have to double from the current 250 000 units a year to achieve the goal of eradicating shantytowns by 2014.

A shortage of cement was only one of the obstacles, with retailers more willing to sell to private companies than the government, Sisulu said.

South Africa, with unemployment estimated as high as 40% and millions living in poverty, has budgeted R15-billion to host the first World Cup on the African continent. — AFP

Scroll down the page to find a sustianable eco-alternative to cement - why yes ITS THE CANNABRICK. 1 5th the price - readily available. Carbon trap. Green-building

At last some truth...

Skweyiya said the most abused substance in the country was alcohol, followed by Cigarettes.

A SA Risk Survey conducted in 2004 found that 49 percent of South African teenagers consumed alcohol.

It showed that 31 percent smoked and 13 percent used dagga on a regular basis.

These figures are well within the norm.

To identify the problem a comparative pie chart showing the extent of the health and societal risk and burden, would be useful...

South African teenagers that report for treatment of:
Dagga Abuse?
Alcohol abuse?
TIK abuse?
Sugars abuse?

...while asking these questions...

It would be pertinant to start with a measureable cost to society.

Lets see what the comparative piechart looks like when we measure the Foetal cost:

• What are the Foetal methamphetamine syndrome figures?
• What are the Foetal alcohol syndrome figures?
• What are the Foetal cannabis syndrome figures?
• What are the Foetal crack/coke/heroin syndrome figures?

When compared against each other - we should be able to see which drug is causing the biggest problem to our unborn. A measureable statistic!

At home in the western Cape we have the worlds largest occurrence of FAS...?

and at a rate of 10 000 abortions a week?

One would believe that we have the right to choose what we do to our body.

What the state regulates as social harm, and allows other harms which are much greater in nature and number, than say smoking a doob...

Makes you think ? I hope! Please follow the links in the post for the revelations

Cop van packed with dagga

Bloemfontein - A tip-off led to a constable being arrested and dagga with a street value of about R500 000 being seized from a police vehicle on Tuesday, said eastern Free State police.

Superintendent Motarafi Ntepe said the Bloemfontein dog unit was tipped off that a police vehicle was about to load and transport dagga in the Ficksburg area.

"On Tuesday, about 00:30, 10km from Ficksburg, they noticed the police bakkie travelling towards Rosendal."

Ntepe said the driver of the bakkie sped off when he realised he had been spotted.

In uniform and on duty

The bakkie was chased for about 30km until it was found parked on the premises of Rosendal police station.

The driver, who was trying to run away, was stopped and the vehicle searched.

Three bags of dagga were found on the front seat and there were another 16 bags in the back.

Ntepe said the 23-year-old constable was in full uniform and on duty when he was arrested.

Free State police commissioner Amon Mashigo said: "This kind of corrupt police official does not have a place in the South African Police Service.

"We are not going to tolerate this kind of behaviour in the police service," he said. SAPA

Dagga 'trees' cut down

Ladysmith - Dagga smokers have been tossing their joint ends, and Nature has done its work, causing a massive growth in dagga bushes in and around the CBD.

SAPS area spokesperson, Captain Charmaine Struwig told the Witness that SAPS members had removed 7 321 dagga bushes valued at around R500 000, from vacant lots in between residential areas including Acaciavale, Lennoxville and areas adjacent to the CBD.

"They were more like trees, taller than our tall cops. The stems were 10 to 15cm in diameter. If we had not been using tree-poppers we would have been struggling," Struwig explained.

She said that the trees had not been deliberately cultivated, but were more likely the result of people discarding joints containing dagga seeds, speculating that dagga growers would have harvested the plants before they became so tall.

"There are a lot of vacant plots of land in Ladysmith in between residential areas which are densely overgrown. I mean, some of the weeds were as tall as the dagga trees," she said, adding that while Ladysmith had experienced "shoulder-high" dagga plants in previous years, this year had set records. The removed plants were all burnt, downwind of human settlements.

The SAPS would be monitoring the re-growth of the offending dagga plants, Struwig confirmed.

According to figures from a recently released South African Risk survey, in 2004 49% of teenagers used alcohol, 31% smoked and 13% used dagga regularly. The Witness

World's poor to be hardest hit by global warming: UN

The world's poor, who are the least responsible for global warming, will suffer the most from climate change, United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon told environment ministers from around the world on Monday.

"The degradation of the global environment continues unabated ... and the effects of climate change are being felt across the globe," Ban said in a statement after last week's toughest warning yet that mankind is to blame for global warming.

In comments read on his behalf at the start of a major week-long gathering in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, Ban said all countries would feel the adverse impact of climate change.

"But it is the poor, in Africa and developing small island states and elsewhere, who will suffer the most, even though they are the least responsible for global warming."

Experts say Africa is the lowest emitter of the greenhouse gases blamed for rising temperatures, but due to its poverty, under-development and geography, has the most to lose under dire predictions of wrenching change in weather patterns... Reuters