ANC WOMEN MAY DUMP WINNIE
THE ANC Women’s League issued a surprise statement on Monday criticising its own president, Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, for her attack on the ANC in a newspaper interview last week, which was made “without consultation or mandate”.
The national working committee also said the league would meet this weekend to ‘evaluate its nominations list” for top ANC posts — implying strongly that it may dump Madikizela-Mandela as its candidate for deputy president.
INITIATES IN HOSPITAL
ELEVEN Xhosa circumcision initiates, one in critical condition, have been admitted to hospitals in the East London and Queenstown areas in the past few days after ceremonies involving hundreds of young men. Last yer several initiates died of gangrene from inappropriate dressings, or dehydration, because the young men are refused water for seven days after the initiation.
MARKING IN THE DARK
AT least 35 Port Elizabeth schools have no electricity this week — because the Eastern Cape education department failed to pay its bills. The education department, which owes about R800 000 to the Poet Elizabeth municipality, said it would attempt to pay immediately. Although pupils finished school on Friday, teachers are still in the classrooms marking exams.
SPENCER CUTS A SECRET DEAL
AFTER 11 hours of negotations, Earl Spencer and his estranged wife agreed on a divorce settlement in Cape Town in the early hours of Tuesday morning — chiefly, it seemed, to avoid more embarrassing revelations about the earl in the British tabloid press.
The terms bind both parties to secrecy about the details, and to reveal no further embarrassing details about the earl’s alleged “serial adulteries”. But the British press has already published a figure: the earl will pay up 2 million, seven times his original offer, plus a luxury home in Cape Town’s Constantia and 500 000 in legal costs.
The earl and countess moved to South Africa two years ago, along with their four children. His current girlfriend is Josie Boraine, 34, daughter of deputy Truth Commission chairman Alex Boraine.
TEACHERS SCUFFLE WITH POLICE
TEACHERS scuffled with policemen in Durban centre on Tuesday during a march protesting proposed cutbacks that could put 20 000 teachers out of work. Some 600 teachers carried placards and blocked traffic as they marched to demand the resignation of provincial education chief Vincent Zulu. Despite the clashes, no-one was arrested or injured, say police.
THE OFF-ON SOMALIA PEACE IS OFF
SOMALIA’s warlords, who seemed to have finally reached a peace agreement on Monday, were in dispute again by Tuesday morning as the Rahanwein Resistance Army (RRA) announced that it was about to capture the town of Baidoa — the venue for peace talks on December 20.
An RRA spokesman said his troops were outside the town, and there would be no peace talks unless his men unseated warlord Hussein Mohamed Aidid, whose troops occupy the town. Meanwhile the rival Somali Salvation Democratic Front (SSDF) refused to join talks in enemy-held Baidoa and announced plans to set up its own government.
TAIWAN DEMANDS ‘UNTENABLE’
TWO of Taiwan’s major demands in negotiating its future ties with South Africa are untenable, Foreign Minister Alfred Nzo said on Monday. Nzo said Taiwan had asked to maintain its symbols, flag and name at whatever SA premises its representatives continue to occupy after 1997. “Unfortunately that would mean maintaining its current status,” Nzo said. Taiwan also wants to keep open its consulates in SA — a position that can only apply when diplomatic relations exist between countries, Nzo said. President Nelson Mandela announced last year that South Africa will relinquish its diplomatic ties with Taiwan in favour of mainland China at the end of 1997.
NO E CAPE VOTE FOR WINNIE
THE 13 branches of the Eastern Cape region of the ANC, one of Winnie Madikizela-Mandela’s strongholds, failed to nominate her for a single top ANC office at the weekend. With all the key ANC nominations now in, only the ANC Women’s League has remained behind Madikizela-Mandela.