Zimbabwe’s week-long agricultural showcase kicks off Monday, despite the country’s collapsing farm industry and worsening food shortages. The Harare Show, to be opened by Equatorial Guinea dictator Teodoro Obiang Nguema, will feature exhibitions including more than 100 cattle, goats, pigs, guinea fowl, rabbits and chickens.
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The legal battle between former deputy president Jacob Zuma and South Africa’s National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) will continue this week in the Bloemfontein Supreme Court of Appeal. Security will be tight at the court where the state will on consecutive days argue in three search-and-seizure appeal hearings related to investigations against Zuma.
Monhla Hlahla, MD of the Airports Company of South Africa, is riding the crest of the tourism wave. Robust domestic growth, increased business travel and the introduction of budget airlines has sent air passenger demand soaring, which is good news for a monopoly airport operator. Revenue reached R2,564-billion (up 18%) for the year ending in March.
A mass free distribution of mosquito nets in Kenya that has nearly halved child deaths from malaria in high-risk areas has led the World Health Organisation to recommend for the first time that nets should be given away, rather than sold, in the developing world. In a project that is being hailed as a model for other African countries, Kenya’s ministry of health has distributed 13,5-million insecticide-treated nets across the country since 2003.
Surinder Arora arrived in London at the age of 13, unable to speak a word of English. He was met at Heathrow Airport by a couple he thought were his aunt and uncle. After a few days, they sat him down and told him the truth. He was their son, and they had handed him to a childless couple in India, his real aunt and uncle, when he was born.
With returns from virtually all polling stations announced by the National Electoral Commission (NEC), it is clear now that a run-off poll will take place between the two leading presidential contenders in Sierra Leone. In two weeks the opposition All People’s Congress (APC) candidate, Ernest Bai Koroma, will face the current Vice-President, Solomon Ekuma Berewa in a one-on-one contest that will bring the electoral process to its logical conclusion.
Refugee camps can be dangerous, expensive and degrading. Is this how South Africans want to treat their fleeing Zimbabwean neighbours? The <i>Mail & Guardian</i> ("SA’s Zim exodus plan", August 10) reported that the government may update a 2002 plan to help structure its response to Zimbabweans entering South Africa, writes Tara Polzer.
Black Economic Empowerment (BEE) ownership deals get the most attention, but their capacity to change the racial bias in the South African economy seems to be limited. Preferential procurement, however, is the sharpest tool in government’s transformation armoury. But it could also increase corruption and cronyism, writes Reg Rumney.
Most media coverage of Zimbabwe unthinkingly repeats and reinforces a Western and neoliberal perception of the history and causes of that country’s political and economic crisis. The dominant view is that "socialism" explains Zimbabwe’s economic collapse and political repression.
It was a potent symbol of a new world order on August 21 when China raised interest rates for the fourth time this year in a desperate attempt to cool an overheated local economy. The move comes at a time when central bankers in the West are wondering whether they should be cutting the cost of borrowing to stave off a potential economic downturn caused by the credit crisis.