The Department of Health is poised to gazette new smoking laws, including those governing smoking outside, which could come into effect early next year. Smoking outside, within five metres of your office door, will soon be illegal and companies found guilty of contravening the rule could face fines of up to R50 000. Dr Yussuf Saloojee, Director of the National Council Against Smoking, says that regulating smoking in the workplace should also apply to domestic workers whose workplace is inside a home.

Last week’s publication of a confidential government report on provincial health departments would have been a crime if the proposed Protection of Information Bill was in force. And if the activists who made the information public had shared the document with the writer of this article, she may also have been facing a jail term simply for being in possession of the paperwork. The reports were commissioned by former Health Minister Barbara Hogan after the Free State stopped providing Aids drugs to new patients in 2008, apparently because it had run out of money. The probe is in effect an investigation of years of neglect and mismanagement by Hogan’s predecessor, Manto Tshabalala-Msimang, and her Director-General, Thami Mseleku.

The Mumbai High Court has ruled against Vodafone in a tax case that could deal a blow to foreign investors that own or want to buy shares and companies in India. In terms of the ruling, Vodafone is liable for taxes on its $11-billion acquisition in 2007 of a controlling stake in an Indian cellphone company. The ruling is a setback for Vodafone in a case that is seen by investors as a test of India’s tolerance toward the use of tax havens for acquisitions. Vodafone intends to appeal the decision.

The Competition Tribunal has rejected a proposed settlement between the Competition Commission and Rooibos, saying that it benefits the tea company. It says that Rooibos’ undertaking not to engage in exclusive supply arrangements with packers of bulk tea is, in effect, undone by the inclusion of an “efficiency defence” that allows it to continue the practice and gives it a loophole to escape any meaningful sanction. The tribunal says that the clause also raises questions about the ability of the commission to take on anticompetitive behaviour effectively.

The mining industry says that the sector is being damaged by a blend of ambiguous laws, empowerment demands and a vague Mining Charter. Lonmin CEO Ian Farmer says: “The law is imperfect, we have a weak administration, yet you have a degree of reliance on individuals to do the right thing”. He singles out the Mining Charter, which lays out social, labour and equity empowerment requirements that companies are obliged to comply with in order to get new-order mining and prospecting rights. Mineral Resources Minister Susan Shabangu says that her department is aware of ambiguities and gaps in the Act and is preparing a number of amendments to push through Parliament before the end of the year.

President Jacob Zuma has again defended his party’s call for the establishment of a media tribunal. This amid local and international protest that a tribunal will restrict the work and independence of the media. Zuma insists that media freedom is enshrined in the Constitution and that his government has no intention of changing this: “The question of human rights to us is very important. We fought for it, including the right of the media to exercise its expression freely”.