Traditionally on May Day the fool plays at pratfalls and buffoonery around local morris dancers, brandishing his fool’s bauble, an inflated pig’s bladder on a stick, with which he bewitches and controls the crowds. To the uninitiated it looks like chaos, but for his own safety the fool must know the dances as well as anyone.
Britain’s Labour Party suffered its worst local election defeat on record and lost control of London on Friday, forcing Prime Minister Gordon Brown to rethink his strategy to avoid losing the next national poll. Conservative Boris Johnson, a journalist-turned-lawmaker prone to gaffes, wrested the prized post of London mayor from Labour’s maverick Ken Livingstone.
African Development Bank pledged -billion more for food aid on Friday as soaring commodity prices raise fears of famine, and it urged grain-exporting countries not to restrict shipments. The bank said that its agriculture portfolio will grow to ,8-billion, and it was restructuring a portion of that to free up -million to be used more quickly.
The Otago Highlanders recovered from 14-11 behind at halftime to beat South Africa’s Cheetahs for only their second win this season. It was another close defeat in a frustrating season for captain Juan Smith and his Bloemfontein men who themselves have won just once this season and are second-bottom of the table.
A hacker has allegedly gained access to suspended National Prosecuting Authority head Vusi Pikoli’s computer and is attempting to blackmail him, his attorney said on Friday. ”An individual is claiming to have hacked Mr Pikoli’s system. The hacker is threatening to release Mr Pikoli’s documents to the press, if he is not paid,” said his attorney Aslam Moosajee.
Japan and China will cooperate in a -million project to reduce carbon dioxide emissions from a thermal power plant, a Japanese daily reported on Saturday. Under the plan of the project, emitted carbon dioxide from a thermal power plant will be injected into a major Chinese oil field to extract more crude oil, the report said.
For Paul Hörer, who first met Josef Fritzl 35 years ago, the Austrian was a ”decent, outgoing and, above all, amusing bloke”. He remembered how Fritzl came to stay with him in Munich, and how he and his family spent happy evenings with Fritzl and his wife, Rosemarie, on the terrace of their ”tip top” house in Amstetten.
Southern Sudan’s Minister of Defence and a presidential adviser were among at least 23 people killed on Friday in a plane crash blamed on engine failure, officials said. ”Two engines failed and there was nothing the pilot could do,” First Vice-President Salva Kiir told a news conference.
Zimbabwe’s opposition leader defeated President Robert Mugabe in the presidential election but faces a run-off vote after he failed to win an outright majority, the electoral body said on Friday. Movement for Democratic Change leader Morgan Tsvangirai won 47,9% of the vote on March 29 and Mugabe took 43,2%, said the chief elections officer.
The South African National Editors’ Forum (Sanef) voiced concern at the African National Congress’s proposed media tribunal, on the eve on World Press Freedom Day. It believed self-regulation was the best mechanism to ensure a free and open press, Sanef said. It supported the existing institutions charged with self-regulation of the media.