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Former deputy president Jacob Zuma has appointed a legal team under a former Conservative Party MP to fight his ”crucifixion by the media”, media reports said on Monday. Zuma and his supporters have complained that the media forms part of a plot to stop him from becoming South Africa’s next president.
British men show far more loyalty, commitment and self-sacrifice towards their favourite football team than towards their partners, a study published on Monday showed. About 94% said they would never stop loving their team no matter how badly they fared while 52% would gladly ditch a relationship that was not going well.
Nigerian separatist guerrillas released three kidnapped oil workers — two Americans and a Briton — on Monday after holding them hostage for more than a month, according to a state government spokesperson. "They’re all here. They’re all OK," the Delta State spokesperson said by telephone from his government’s local offices in Warri, an oil port 340km southeast of Lagos.
German media giant Bertelsmann is making preparations to sell its music company holdings including a 50% stake in Sony BMG, the world’s second-largest music group, a report said on Monday. The <i>Financial Times</i> cited unnamed people briefed on the plans as saying the company has arranged for investment banks to prepare the disposals.
"Was it fantastic to walk into it as a new director? Absolutely not," says Nerine Kahn, the new director of the Commission for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration. Since taking on the position at the beginning March, she has had to face irate clients who are furious over the condition of the new building into which the Johannesburg branch has moved.
Tony Blair’s recent announcement that he will hence-forward account only to God for the Iraq war makes perfect sense. Every secular reason he has concocted has turned out to be the reverse of the truth: there were no weapons of mass destruction, we are less safe from terrorism, the Iraqi people do not want the British in their country.
The government’s war against excessive pricing moved into the area of telephone call charges recently, with regulator the Independent Communications Authority of South Africa (Icasa) putting the spotlight on how so-called interconnect fees raise both landline and mobile costs. Mobile call costs could be slashed by 30% if Icasa wins its battle with landline and mobile operators, according to an independent expert.
The Côte d’Ivoire electoral process is falling into place. The Independent Electoral Commission is in place and functioning. Antonio Moneteiro, the United Nations high representative for elections, left the country this week, his job done. The presidential candidates are starting to make themselves heard.
Mining magnate Mzi Khumalo has lost what is reportedly the largest damages claim in Zimbabwe’s history. This is after his company, Pemberton International Investments, the investment vehicle of Metallon Gold Corporation, was ordered to pay Zimbabwe’s Stanmarker US$7,4-million in damages for a breach of contract.
Humans have provoked the worst spate of extinctions since the dinosaurs were wiped out 65-million years ago, according to a United Nations report that calls for unprecedented worldwide efforts to address the slide. The report paints a grim picture of life on Earth, with declining numbers of plants, animals, insects and birds across the globe.