MONDAY, 8.30AM
A TEAM of South African financial experts, including representatives from the Reserve Bank, the Department of Trade and Industry, the Development Bank, and foreign affairs, will fly to Congo-Kinshasa this week as the first part of a South African aid package to the new government.
Deputy foreign minister Aziz Pahad said: “The new authority now has to deal with a bankrupt treasury and budgetary processes that are new to them.” Pahad said the government had been in discussions with local business leaders over sending a second team later to identify areas in which South Africa could be helpful.
Laurent Kabila may have prompted a diplomatic storm when he impounded a South African Learjet as it flew into Lubumbashi on the weekend, on the grounds that the pilot had been rude to him five weeks, ago, before he seized power.
On May 9, Kabila had asked the Learjet pilot to fly him to South Africa to meet President Nelson Mandela, but the pilot had flown off without him after waiting six hours for the rebel leader to show up.