OWN CORRESPONDENT, Luanda | Tuesday 5.30pm. ANGOLA’S National Assembly on Tuesday opened debate on a ruling party motion to strip the “special status” accorded to discredited Unita leader Jonas Savimbi. The ruling MPLA wants to divest Savimbi as “leader of the main opposition” with the right to a 400-strong bodyguard, for his failure to respect […]

DAVID LE PAGE, Johannesburg | Tuesday 6.00pm. THE Johannesburg Stock Exchange climbed nearly 2% on Tuesday, helped by a steadily falling yield on the R150, well below 16% at 4pm, and a steady rand-dollar exchange rate. According to Quintus Kilburn of Barnard Jacobs Mellet, the steadiness of the European bourses — now fueled by a […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Lusaka | Tuesday 9.00pm. TWO days of talks aimed at ending the civil strife in the Democratic Republic of Congo ended Tuesday with the adoption, in principle, of a draft ceasefire agreement. A communique issued at the end of the talks said defence and foreign ministers from a dozen countries had also agreed […]

LANSANA FOFANA, Freetown | Tuesday 6.00pm. SIERRA Leone’s rebel leader Foday Sankoh, who was sentenced to death last week for his part in a coup which briefly overthrew the elected government of President Ahmed Tejan Kabbah, has failed to persuade the court to spare his life. Begging Judge Samuel Ademusu, Sankoh, who is believed to […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Dakar | Monday 8.00pm. BISSAU, quiet after a week of heavy fighting, braced itself for the first meeting, set for early Tuesday, between President Joao Bernardo Vieira and his rival General Ansumane Mane. However the venue for the meeting, seen as essential to ending the four-month-old conflict in Guinea-Bissau, remained at issue on […]

JUSTIN ARENSTEIN, Nelspruit | Monday 10.00am. OFFICERS of the West African intervention force Ecomog are preventing it from wiping out the forces of Sierra Leonean rebel Johnny Paul Koroma because of links to the diamond trade, soldiers alleged on Monday. Nigerian Ecomog soldiers on medical leave in Lagos said that some of their officers in […]

MIKE METELITS, Johannesburg | Friday 6.00pm. LOCAL markets continued to weaken on Friday as Asian markets were sharply split and European and US markets continued a downward trend. The Nikkei lost 150 points and the Hang Seng gained 150, while European markets were down by varying degrees. The FTSE-100 was down 58 points at 15:48 […]

RONNIE ELLIOT, Pretoria | Monday 3.30pm. The government would abide by the ruling should a court try to stop the handing over of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s final report to President Nelson Mandela on Thursday. Justice Minister Dullah Omar would not be drawn of the merits of former president FW de Klerk’s Cape High […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Johannesburg | Sunday 1.00pm. THE Springbok rugby squad for the grand slam tour to the United Kingdom in November was announced by Springbok manager Arthob Petersen on Saturday. The squad includes eight new caps, Eastern Province scrumhalf Chad Alcock, EP right wing Deon Kayser, Western Province centre Robbie Fleck, Western Province flanker Corne […]