Celani Sikhakhane brings you KwaZulu-Natal’s latest news.
Durban: KZN Premier Thami Ntuli has called on Home Affairs officials to move swiftly to process people gathered outside the Che Guevara (Moore Road) Home Affairs Refugee Reception Centre in Durban.
Scores of people from the Democratic Republic of Congo, Burundi, Uganda, Mozambique and Tanzania have been camping outside the centre, saying they have faced threats from South Africans.
Ntuli said helping those willing to reintegrate would go a long way toward building social cohesion and improving relations between local residents and immigrant communities.
Kokstad: Police in KwaZulu-Natal are offering a R50,000 reward for information on the whereabouts of three-year-old Banele Mshubi’s remains, last seen in December 2025 in the Marikana area of Kokstad, southern KwaZulu-Natal.
The child was only reported missing on 4 January 2026. Investigations led to the arrest of his 27-year-old mother for failing to report him missing. She told police her 43-year-old boyfriend assaulted the child over a missing USB drive, and that she believed the boyfriend had assaulted the child to death, though she was unsure where he had buried the body. The boyfriend was also arrested and charged with murder. Both appeared in the Kokstad Magistrate’s Court, where the mother was released on bail while the boyfriend was remanded in custody pending further investigation; he is also linked to a separate murder case in Harding. Banele’s body has not been found, and police are offering the reward for credible information that could lead to the recovery of his remains.
Utrecht: The community of Madlangeni, near Newcastle in northern KwaZulu-Natal, has had its hopes for a reliable water supply restored, after being told the Zaaihoek Dam will finally provide water to local residents.
The announcement was made this week by Amajuba District Mayor Thembelihle Mthembu, during the sod-turning ceremony for an R8-million sewage treatment plant in eMadlangeni. He told the community that the district has finally secured a licence to draw water from the Zaaihoek Dam.
Residents have fought for years over the dam, saying they suffered water shortages despite the dam sitting in their own backyard, while it supplied water to other provinces, including Mpumalanga. Zaaihoek Dam was built in 1988 to supply water to industries and municipalities, but the eMadlangeni community was left out of that original plan. The new licence will allow the dam to provide more than 2 billion litres of water annually to eMadlangeni communities.
Pictured above: KZN Premier Thami Ntuli addresses the media outside the Che Guevara (Moore Road) Home Affairs Refugee Reception Centre in Durban.
Image source: KZN Gov
