‘Make Abducted Girls Sacrificial Lambs’ - Chibok Chairman

Its been over 130 days since the over 200 Chibok school girls were kidnapped by the dreaded Boko Haram sect on April 14 in Borno, the traumatized parents have called on the Federal Government to go to Sambisa forest and bring back the corpse of their children dead or alive.

Speaking on behalf of the parents, the chairman of Chibok Local government, Tsambido Hosea, in an interview with Premium Times on Friday, August 29 during a protest to mark the 130th day in Abuja said the parents have not been able to move on with their lives since the abduction of the girls.

He said the parents have given up hope and are seeking a logical end to their trauma either by burial or reunion.

Chibok Chairman, Tsambido Hosea said: “The parents say they don’t care about their life but let them go in. If they can take care of this Boko Haram, so that they will not spread to other places. So that they cannot continue with their menace.

South African stuck in Ebola-hit Liberia

Cape Town – A South African, working and living in Liberia has found himself unable to return home, due to stringent Ebola travel restrictions.

Gerhard van Zyl, a mechanic from Bloemfontein who has been working at a diamond mine next to the Sewa river, shared his frustrations with Volksblad on Thursday, saying that he is unable to return to South Africa, as flights to and from the Ebola-hit nation have been cancelled.

According to Van Zyl, three people have died due to the virus and 200 others have been put in quarantine in Koidu, the town closest to the mine where he works, which means that the miners are pretty much surrounded by the disease.

SA needs more teachers - Zuma

                                                                             President Jacob Zuma

Johannesburg - South Africa needs more teachers in order for the level of education to increase, President Jacob Zuma said on Thursday.

"Without good teachers, our targets of boosting the level of education and skills development in the country will fall flat," Zuma said in a speech prepared for delivery at the anniversary of the Progressive Professionals Forum.

"I am therefore mobilising you as professionals to partner with us in promoting teacher development and empowerment, as well as in supporting education in every part of the country."

Church fires priest over ties to ANC

Johannesburg - A Limpopo priest has been fired because of his close ties with the ANC, the Sowetan reported on Friday.

Reverend Timothy Xaba, 52, of the Uniting Reformed Church in Southern Africa (URCSA) was fired in July as minister of the Polokwane central congregation.

In June last year, Xaba was approached to help lead Polokwane communities in prayer for the then sickly former president Nelson Mandela. After a moving prayer, he was appointed chaplain of the African National Congress.

SA woman has key role in Ebola battle

Pietermaritzburg - A KwaZulu-Natal woman is the key officer marshalling the two “armies” in Sierra Leone’s war on Ebola.

Sharon Ekambaram is head of a human rights unit at Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) - Doctors Without Borders in English - and is acting as the liaison officer co-ordinating the responses between the disease-hit country’s health department and the medical NGO, which is leading treatment in west Africa.