Neha Patil (Editor)

1998 in South Africa

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The following lists events that happened during 1998 in South Africa.

Contents

Incumbents

  • President: Nelson Mandela
  • Deputy President: Thabo Mbeki

    • January

  • 3 January - Six policemen from the North East Rand Dog Unit set their dogs on three suspected illegal immigrants, allowing the animals to savage the three men while the officers hurl racial insults.

    • March

  • 9 March - Robert McBride, official in the Department of Foreign Affairs, is arrested for gun smuggling by the Mozambican police in Ressano Garcia, Mozambique.
  • 18 March - A recently restored South African Air Force Museum ex-Rhodesian Air Force Percival Provost Mk 52 crashes. Pilot Rick Culpan, test pilot for Denel Aviation, dies from his injuries four days later.
  • 21 March - The Socialist Party of Azania (SOPA) is founded.

    • May

  • 19 May - Voortrekkerhoogte is renamed Thaba Tshwane.

    • June

  • 4 June - Ferdi Barnard, Civil Cooperation Bureau member, receives 2 life sentences plus 63 years in prison for the murder of David Webster.
  • 5 June - Thulane Malinga, super middleweight boxer, wins the World Boxing Federation (WBF) title.

    • July

  • 16 July - Bulelani Ngcuka is elected as the first National Director of Public Prosecutions.

    • August

  • 21 August - South African President Nelson Mandela calls for a summit over the Congo conflict on Saturday, inviting the leaders of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Rwanda, Uganda and Zimbabwe to come.
  • 25 August - A pipe bomb explodes at Cape Town's Victoria & Alfred Waterfront's Planet Hollywood restaurant, seriously injuring 26 people of which two later die in hospital.

    • September

  • 3 September - South Africa now says it supports the intervention of DRC by Namibia, Zimbabwe and Angola, supporting Kabila.
  • 14 September - Robert McBride, official in the Department of Foreign Affairs, is conditionally released from prison in Mozambique.
  • 16 September - A South African Air Force Impala Mk I crashes at AFB Bloemspruit.

    • October

  • 9 October - The Constitutional Court invalidates the sodomy laws in the case of National Coalition for Gay and Lesbian Equality and Another v Minister of Justice and Others.
  • 29 October - Nelson Mandela receives the Truth and Reconciliation report.

    • December

  • Sivan Pillay discovers SA Rock band Watershed in Times Square, Sandton.
  • 10 December - South Africa states it opposes the Congo talks set in Zambia next week.

    • Unknown date

  • The Black Tie Ensemble is founded by Mimi Coertse and Neels Hansen.

    • Deaths

  • 22 April – Kitch Christie (58), Springboks rugby coach who led the team to victory in the 1995 Rugby World Cup, dies from leukemia.
  • 4 May – Worsie Visser (35), singer, dies when his aircraft crashes near Saldanha Bay, Western Cape.
  • 7 May – Allan Cormack (74), physicist, dies of cancer in Massachusetts.
  • 7 July – Theuns Swanepoel (70), policeman, the "Rooi Rus", who gave the order to open fire on Soweto uprising rioters.
  • 17 December – Dorothy Nyembe, political activist.

    • Athletics

  • 22 February – Frank Pooe wins his first national title in the men's marathon, clocking 2:13:09 in Pinelands.

    • References

    1998 in South Africa Wikipedia
    (Text) CC BY-SA