Tag: Port Shepstone

Black mother takes out insurance hit on her sons

blackhouseA black mother from KwaZulu-Natal was arrested in Gamalakhe, Port Shepstone, for allegedly trying to hire a hitman to kill her two sons, police said on Wednesday.

The woman allegedly approached a relative, who had recently been released from prison, to kill them, offering R25,000 for each child, Colonel Jay Naicker said.

“The alleged motive for the killing was that she wanted insurance money because she had insured her sons,” Naicker said.

The relative reported the matter to the police. A police officer posing as the hitman arrested her in her home, after she went to fetch photographs of her sons for him. Her sons were home at the time.

The 50-year-old mother of three would appear in the Port Shepstone Magistrate’s court on Thursday on charges of conspiracy to commit murder. – Sapa

Exporting unemployment

No prospects

Under a scheme organised by the local authorities in the town of Soderhamn and by Sweden’s national employment office, anyone aged between 18 and 28 can volunteer to take a “Job Journey” to Oslo and attempt track down gainful employment.

Those who sign up get a ticket to the Norwegian capital and are put up in an Oslo youth hostel for a month, with Soderhamn council picking up the £20 a night bill. The package also includes on-the-spot guidance on how to get a job in Sweden’s northern neighbour.

“We had an unemployment rate of over 25 per cent, so we had to find solutions,” Magus Nilsen, the man in charge of the project at Soderhamn council, told the Daily Telegraph. “Going to Norway to find work has always been quite popular with young people, but sometimes they want to go but don’t know how to find a job or accommodation so we thought we’d give them a bit of help with both.”

So far around 100 people have decided to leave Soderhamn, a town of 12,000, 250 kilometres due north of Stockholm, to try their luck in the bright lights of Oslo, and some, at least, have struck gold.

After two years on the doll in his hometown Andreas Larsson opted for a “Job Journey” to Norway and now works as a lorry driver in Oslo.

“I came here on a Thursday and on Monday morning I had a job, so it was fast,” he told Swedish Radio. “It almost felt a bit unreal, as if you have come to the promised land.”

Soderhamn and Port Shepstone in South Africa have a twinning partnership as part of the Sweden South Africa Formal Partnership.