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/ 17 December 2007
South Africa crowned a memorable year for rugby by beating England 15-6 in the final of the World Cup, a gripping tournament in which flair and flamboyance took a back seat to brawn and the boot. Panache might have been largely replaced by pragmatism, but the rugby remained compelling in the IRB’s well-attended 20-team showpiece tournament.
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/ 17 December 2007
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Thousands of delegates to the ANC’s 52nd national conference converged on Polokwane International Airport on Saturday to register in a cavernous hangar for the event. The registration hangar was a free-for-all for groups supporting either Thabo Mbeki or Jacob Zuma.
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/ 16 December 2007
There are moments in history when the future appears as a series of stark choices between life and death, good and evil, progress and regression. Such is the national mood as the ANC gathers at Polokwane. We might call it the end of post-apartheid innocence — something similar to what other African countries experienced after a decade or more of independence.
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/ 16 December 2007
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The first day of the African National Congress’s (ANC) Polokwane conference ended abruptly just after 9.30pm on Sunday, without dealing with nominations for the party leadership. ANC national chairperson Mosiuoa Lekota told delegates to come back on Monday, explaining there were ”a few details” the national executive committee wanted to tie up.
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/ 16 December 2007
Turkish warplanes targeting Kurdish rebels bombed villages deep in northern Iraq on Sunday, killing one woman and forcing hundreds of people to flee their homes, local officials said. In Ankara, the Turkish military’s General Staff said in a statement its warplanes had attacked targets of the separatist Kurdistan Workers Party.
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/ 16 December 2007
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African National Congress (ANC) secretary general Kgalema Motlanthe’s organisational report, delivered on Sunday at the party’s national conference in Polokwane — was the first comprehensive admission from a party leader that the factionalism in the party was a result of a power struggle between two personalities: Thabo Mbeki and Jacob Zuma.
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/ 16 December 2007
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African National Congress (ANC) president Thabo Mbeki has hit out against party members who use lies and dishonesty to achieve their goals. Presenting his political report on the first day of the ANC’s 52nd national conference in Polokwane, he said the conference had to confront ”the virus at the core of the disease”.
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/ 16 December 2007
Latvian authorities have given residents something to cheer about when they invited them to cut their own Christmas trees for free — only to be chased away by forest rangers. A Riga forestry agency said a state body had invited residents to cut their trees from forests located 50km or more outside the capital, but people had instead descended on protected areas.
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/ 16 December 2007
Australian Craig Parry won his first Australian Open title at the age of 41 holding off a pack of challengers in steady rain at the Australian course in Sydney on Sunday. Parry called on all his experience in the miserable conditions to reel off a closing round of three-under par 69 to finish the tournament on 11-under 277.
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/ 16 December 2007
The military wing of Somalia’s Islamist movement plans to intensify its offensive against government troops and their Ethiopian allies, a senior commander said on Sunday. Muktar Ali Robow said al-Shabab had killed nearly 500 Ethiopian soldiers and would fight until foreign troops left the Horn of Africa country.