The archetypal Western bar brawl is curious for its wanton pointlessness: everybody slugs everybody else with considerable vigour, and yet very few seem to know — or care — what the circumstances of the original disagreement were. It’s as if there are two default states — placid chaw-mastication, and wholesale butt-kicking — separated by nothing but a couple of seconds.
Sudanese Islamist leaders say they will take up arms against United Nations peacekeepers if they deploy to Darfur, and some have warned they will also fight the Khartoum government if it agrees to the force. The threats conjure up a disturbing image of more bloodshed in the western Darfur region, where tens of thousands of people have been killed in more than three years of conflict.
The French President, Jacques Chirac, opened the way for the formation of a 15 000-strong United Nations peacekeeping force for Lebanon on Thursday night by promising France would contribute 2 000 troops. Other European countries are likely to follow France’s lead by making firm commitments at a meeting in Brussels on Friday.
Sixty-three percent of Israelis want Prime Minister Ehud Olmert to resign in a sharp public backlash over his handling of the war in Lebanon, a newspaper poll showed on Friday. The Yedioth Aronoth, Israel’s biggest circulation newspaper, called the poll a political ”earthquake” for the Olmert government.
Bafowethu — Our Brothers — are taking a breather halfway through a photo shoot in a grungy-chic Cape Town studio, and seeing them sprawled, stylishly slothful, across a couple of couches in their uniform tracksuits, it’s easy to assume that one has stumbled across a Santos or Ajax development squad.
South Africa is proud to boast that it has the highest number of people on anti-retroviral treatment should be a matter of shame, rather than pride. The state and private sectors have been successful in giving ART to about 220 000 South Africans, but this reflects just 20% of the people thought to need it.
In a move that is likely to spark controversy, the government looks set to promote a two-tier system of higher education, with some universities selected for growth and additional funding. In the process, the Department of Education has revised its hotly contested 2004 proposals for capping student enrolments at all universities on grounds of low graduation and high dropout rates.
”Malibongwe igama lamakhosikazi [Let the women’s name be praised]” — the rallying cry of the African National Congress Women’s League first adopted at the party’s national conference in 1957 — is today the name of a trust that appears, through its proximity to the ruling party’s women’s wing, to have landed a string of lucrative empowerment deals.
The Donen Commission investigating abuse of the Iraqi oil-for-food programme is on the comeback trail. It is demanding testimony including how African National Congress secretary general Kgalema Motlanthe intervened with Saddam Hussein’s regime on behalf of the central figure in the Oilgate saga, Sandi Majali.
Eskom is planning up to 15 extra coal-fired power stations to cater for South Africa’s soaring electriÂcity demand — which would at least double South Africa’s contribution to global climate change. Eskom coal speciaÂlist Johan Dempers identified the Waterberg in Limpopo as a new expansion area.