November 19, 2014.
For Creamer Media in Johannesburg, I’m Anine Vermeulen.
Making headlines:

The Department of Higher Education and Training commits to intensifying its collaboration with the private sector.

Zambia's interim leader Guy Scott has announced a date for the presidential by-election.

And, Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa halts the disciplinary proceedings against the Economic Freedom Fighters. 

The Department of Higher Education and Training (or DHET) has committed to intensifying collaboration with the private sector to enable learners to receive workplace experience at local companies by aligning the curriculum of technical and vocational education and training (or TVET) colleges with current labour market requirements.

Higher Education and Training Minister Blade Nzimande said that aligning the department’s colleges and curricula to the world of work was “no longer negotiable”.  He said TVET colleges should develop and deliver programmes that provided industry with a “fit for purpose” workforce.

Nzimande said this meant that colleges and employers needed to collaborate so that South Africa has a tertiary education system that is in line with the needs of the labour market, and learners are able to get workplace experience.

This will enable learners to apply what they have learned in their college programmes , while preparing them for the world of work and ease their transition from college into the workplace.

Nzimande also appealed, in particular, to college principals to forge closer links with public and private sector employers and be “committed, creative and innovative” when developing work experience programmes for learners.

Zambia's interim leader Guy Scott announced that a presidential by-election would be held on January 20 and called for calm and tolerance amid concerns about a tense contest to succeed President Michael Sata, who died in office last month.

Interim president Scott, who became the continent's first white leader since the 1994 end of apartheid in South Africa, said that he hoped all contestants, both from the ruling Patriotic Front and opposition parties, would desist from violence.

Questions about the stability of Africa's second-biggest copper producer arose when Scott fired a presidential front-runner, Edgar Lungu, as Patriotic Front secretary-general on November 3, without explaining why. He reinstated him a day later after violent street protests. Scott is barred from running for president because his parents were born in Scotland.

Supporters of Lungu want the Patriotic Front's central committee to pick the party's candidate, while Scott says a party general conference should choose. No date has been set for the internal vote.

Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa has struck a deal with opposition parties that disciplinary proceedings against the Economic Freedom Fighters (or EFF) will be held in abeyance in return for assurances that they will respect parliamentary rules.

Ramaphosa said that opposition parties had pledged to respect leaders of government, who would in turn come to Parliament regularly to account to the legislature and answer "difficult" questions.

These decisions came out of a two-hour long crisis meeting between the deputy president and opposition leaders after riot police were sent into the National Assembly last Thursday to forcibly remove an EFF MP who called President Jacob Zuma a thief.

Also making headlines:

Manufacturers of renewable-energy inputs have called on government to urgently finalise the financial closure for the 17 projects identified as preferred bids following the third procurement round under the Renewable Energy Independent Power Producer Procurement Programme.

A report published by the World Health Organisation says that nearly two-billion people use water contaminated by faeces, posing a global health risk despite billions of dollars spent on sanitation.

And, another Sierra Leonean doctor died of Ebola on Tuesday, bringing the number of doctors killed by the virus savaging the nation's healthcare system to seven.

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That’s a roundup of news making headlines today.