President Thabo Mbeki had struck ”a cheap and cowardly blow” against South African Communist Party leader Blade Nzimande, the Young Communist League told a news conference in Johannesburg on Monday. The league’s secretary general, Buti Manamela, was responding to Mbeki’s speech to the ANC’s national executive committee meeting over the weekend.
Opposition leader Michael Sata’s threat to run a rival system of government after losing last month’s national elections was branded as treasonous on Monday by Zambian President Levy Mwanawasa. ”What Sata is saying is treason. Let him not push his luck too far. I will sort him out,” Mwanawasa said while unveiling a new Cabinet for his second and final term.
Deputy President Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka is to pay a birthday visit to Minister of Health Manto Tshabalala-Msimang, the Department of Health said on Monday. Tshabalala-Msimang is spending her 66th birthday in the private Folateng section of the Johannesburg Hospital after suffering from a lung infection.
South Africa’s Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP) — which runs about half of the municipalities in KwaZulu-Natal and holds seats in the African National Congress-led government in that province — has warned against ”the peril of complacence” in face of the danger of South Africa descending into a one-party state.
Somalia’s powerful Islamists on Monday declared holy war against Horn of Africa rival Ethiopia, which they accused of invading Somalia to help the government briefly seize a town controlled by pro-Islamist fighters. Both sides confirmed the takeover of Buur Hakaba, the first military counter-strike by President Abdullahi Yusuf’s interim government since the Islamists took Mogadishu in June.
Iraq’s Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki ordered an investigation on Monday into a case of food poisoning that left hundreds of policemen ill. It was not clear if the poisoning of at least 350 police was deliberate, but police sources said they arrested four cooks suspected of tampering with food.
A new team from Britain’s Royal Navy is due in South Africa next month to help train South African Navy officers to work in new ships and submarines, the Chief of the South African Navy, Vice-Admiral Johannes Mudimu, said on Monday. The United Kingdom’s First Sea Lord, Admiral Sir Jonathon Band, is currently on a week-long official visit in South Africa.
Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) general secretary Zwelinzima Vavi and Reserve Bank Governor Tito Mboweni will discuss the proposed quotas on Chinese clothing imports on Monday, Cosatu said. Cosatu spokesperson Patrick Craven said the meeting would take place at 6.30pm at an undisclosed venue behind closed doors.
The United Nations human rights chief said on Monday ”several hundred” civilians — far more than first thought — may have died in late August attacks by militias in the south of Sudan’s violent Darfur region. The Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), Louise Arbour, said the attacks appeared to have been carried out with the ”knowledge and material support” of the government.
The South African Police Service’s claim that all Gauteng police stations have a family violence, child abuse and sexual offences (FCS) officer is ”a total untruth”, the Democratic Alliance said on Monday. A DA survey showed the SAPS was misleading the public about the closure of police family and child violence units.