The defamation action successfully brought by Leonard Katz against Martin Welz and Chaucer Publications has been settled on the basis that Mr Welz and Chaucer Publications withdraw their appeal, retract the defamatory statements made, apologise unreservedly to Mr Katz and will make a substantial contribution towards Mr Katz’s costs.

UPSIDE: Oil find in the fabled Okavango delta Namibia has every right to celebrate. It has never produced a barrel, but now its Kavango Basin test wells have hit hundreds of meters of oil.  And the ...

Worldwide protests as US Government is allowed to appeal UK court’s ruling refusing his extradition to America

In July, supporters worldwide celebrated Assange’s 50th birthday. Outside his London prison, Roger Waters (of Pink Floyd fame) and a crowd of supporters sang Happy Birthday.

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Rights attorney Steven Donziger (pictured here) pays price for defending indigenous in Ecuador poisoned by oil by Greg Palast

Look at his face. Emergildo Criollo, Chief of the Cofan people of the Amazon in Ecuador. Determined, dignified, in war paint, bare-chested.

Meet Dan Gertler (who denies all wrongdoing).

Joining the dots: Court records in Geneva, New York and Tel-Aviv reveal the vast sums that international companies were paying politicians in exchange for mining rights – and identify Israeli billionaire Dan Gertler “at the centre of a $360m cash laundry” operated for the purpose.

Dan Gertler's dealings with Ivan Glasenberg and Glencore

Born in SA and a Wits  graduate, Ivan Glasenberg has or had citizenship of South Africa and Australia, before acquiring Swiss citizenship in 2011.

He had also once contemplated obtaining Israeli citizenship in order to be able to compete – in speed walking – in the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics, but it was too late to qualify.

In that year he joined the London-listed multinational commodity trading and mining company Marc Rich & Co. AG. founded by soon to be notorious Swiss billionaire Marc Rich.

Glencore and Gertler in the Paradise Papers
Glencore and Gertler’s dealings in the DRC (here referred to as Congo-Kinshasa) were amongst those exposed in the Paradise Papers, a leaked cache of documents, most of which came from within the Bermuda law firm Appleby, which specialises in offshore tax structures for the global super-wealthy - and has a branch in Mauritius. The papers were published by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, The Guardian and more than 90 media partners across the world in November 2017.

Wikipedia on Sexwale and Guinea

In June 2012 Business Insider reported that former ANC cabinet minister Tokyo Sexwale was leading a group of South Africans who had devised a plan to take over mineral assets and mining concessions, which the Guinean government planned to renationalize after revoking deals struck by previous governments in power.

he Mail & Guardian takes up the story in 2016:

In New York in September 2016, Och-Ziff Capital Management and an affiliate agreed to pay a fine of $413m [R5.6bn at the time] for contravening US anti-bribery laws and turning a blind eye to years of corruption.

Where did the story come from – and where did the money go?

Last year, in a series of reports, podcasts and a dramatized video broadcast online, News24 set out to expose the largest evangelical-fundamentalist Christian mission in KwaZulu-Natal as a cult that ­ [thirty years ago – Ed.] allegedly indulged in or condoned various forms of domestic violence and sexual abuse ranging from rape to virginity tests for children.

At much the same time, celebrity private investigator Mike Bolhuis broadcast on Facebook that he had found evidence that some of the mission leaders were involved in witchcraft, drug dealing, large-scale financial skulduggery, and even murder. But it emerged Bolhuis is a conman.

Canaan Moggen Ndlovu, alias Moses Ndlela, arrived at KwaSizabantu Mission in 2015. The 35-year old obese man said he wanted to confess his sins and then kill his family and himself. The first person to hear the story of his “horrific past” was co-worker and KSB-trustee, Eunice Ngcamu.

Ngcamu realized that she was unable to handle Ndlela’s shocking confessions and called her co-trustee, Lydia Dube, to assist. After listening to Ndlela’s story Dube took him straight to Erlo Stegen, KwaSizabantu’s elderly leader. Stegen then sent a vehicle to fetch Ndlela’s wife, Nqobile and their children and gave the family accommodation at the KwaSizabantu main campus near Kranskop in KwaZulu-Natal where the family’s presence was treated as sensitive as Ndlela claimed all along that his life was in danger.

Wait till you hear the Bezos plan to save humanity

According to The Washington Post, Jeff Bezos has come down from space and reported that his flight emphasizes his ultimate goal: space exploration to move heavy industry to space and keep the Earth for residents and “light industry”.

There have been controversies about current renaming of towns and roads – but quite forgotten are the controversies about how they originally acquired their old names. This article briefly looks at how three road names were imposed upon City of Cape Town.

You are occupying a hospital bed when others should be using it. You cannot argue that it is ‘my body, my risk’: your choice affects my health insurance premiums. It affects ICU beds that others could have taken. Nurses and doctors have to work overtime because of you.