South Africa

Pretoria - The train driver involved in last week's train crash in Soweto has been fired, Metrorail boss, Mosenngwa Mofi, said on Wednesday.

Pretoria - Cabinet will tomorrow begin its annual mid-year lekgotla to review achievements and identify interventions needed to speed up progress on job creation and service delivery.

Pretoria - Transport Minister Sibusiso Ndebele has conveyed his condolences to the families of the Western Cape school bus accident that reportedly killed 16 people, 15 of them children near Knysna.

Paarl - A man born before Nelson Mandela drew lots of applause in the Boland town of Mbekweni on Friday when he received a food parcel from Deputy Social Development Minister Bongi Maria Ntuli.

Cape Town - The Department of Basic Education says while there are known instances of teachers having relationships with learners, it is yet to conduct its own study to establish the facts and statistics of the phenomenon.

Kimberley - Women, Children and People with Disabilities Minister Lulu Xingwana has called for the harsher sentencing of perpetrators of violence against women and children and for the sexual offences courts to be re-established speedily.

Pretoria - Bafana coach Pitso Mosimane is disappointed by the Egyptian Football Association's decision to use their national Under 23 team for the remaining two games of the 2012 Africa Cup of Nations (Afcon) qualifiers.

Pretoria - The Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa (Prasa) has reserved R20 million to assist the Tshwane and Soweto train accident victims.

Pretoria - The Annual National Assessment (ANA) results have been released by Basic Education Minister Angie Motshekga in Pretoria on Tuesday.

Pretoria - South Africa will join other African countries, who will meet on Thursday, to pledge funds to tackle famine in the Horn of Africa.

Cape Town - Deputy Minister of Finance, Nhlanhla Nene, today praised the National Treasury's special pensions unit for reducing the backlog for pension applications of liberation veterans from 3 810 outstanding applications to 48 by last month.

Pretoria - More than three million people have tested for HIV in Gauteng's health facilities since the launch of HIV Counselling and Testing (HCT) in April 2010.

East London - The Eastern Cape Transport Department says it had no choice but to deviate from normal procurement processes when recently awarding a scholar transport contract.

Durban - The KwaZulu-Natal government's fight against fraud and corruption is well on track, with more than 1 000 civil servants currently subject to disciplinary action on various charges.

East London - The Eastern Cape has almost finalized its team that will represent the province at the South Africa Games in October.