Pretoria: Cabinet has heaped praise on Oscar Pistorius for being the first double-amputee to compete in the Olympic Games.

The executive also congratulated Chad Le Clos who beat his hero Michael Phelps to win the Olympic 200m butterfly gold medal and later won a silver medal, tying for second position in the men’s 100m butterfly in 51.44 seconds.

“Cabinet commends the efforts by Team SA and congratulates the rowing team (Sizwe Ndlovu, Matthew Brittain, John Smith and James Thompson) on winning South Africa’s third gold medal, and once again congratulates Chad le Clos (100m butterfly) on winning silver in his event,” Cabinet said in a statement issued by the Government Communication and Information System (GCIS) after its fortnightly meeting.

Cabinet further appealed to South Africans to continue supporting the Magnificent Fridays campaign and all the national teams.

The teams include the South African Olympic and Paralympic teams at the London 2012 Olympic Games; the Proteas who are touring England as well as the Springboks (Bokke) who will be on a rugby Championship with Australia, New Zealand and Argentina from 18 August to 6 October.