Perhaps I shouldn’t have had lunch. Indeed, to be in with even a cat-in-hell’s chance of mustering the waspish proportions of Kylie Minogue, pictured on stage recently twirling a heavily corseted waist, one would surely have to forgo eating, drinking and probably all breathing whatsoever. Not to mention a few ribs. If you’ve ever been stuck in a lift, you will have a hint of what it is like to be laced into a corset.
At first it appears as though the seriously ill Zimbabwean is speaking about someone else’s ordeal at the hands of the notorious Central Intelligence Organisation. Propped up in a hospital bed in South Africa two weeks after her release from Chikurubi Maximum Prison, it becomes apparent that the woman who wants to be known only as ”Itaai” is expressing her own traumatic experience.
The murder of a Free State government official and ANC member should be solved as a matter of urgency, the ANC in the province said on Tuesday. Noby Ngombane, an official in the premier’s office, was shot dead at his home in Bloemfontein last week.
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President Robert Mugabe’s claims of the triumph of his seizures of white-owned farms ring hollow at campaign rallies where people are hungry. Confronted by unenthusiastic crowds, Mugabe has admitted for the first time while campaigning that the country is confronted by widespread food shortages.
Iraq’s Parliament, meeting for only the second time since landmark elections two months ago, failed on Tuesday to pick a new speaker as Sunni, Shi’ite and Kurdish politicians bickered over Cabinet posts. Meanwhile, insurgents continued to cause mayhem as a car bomb exploded in the ethnically divided city of Kirkuk.
A dam ruptured in southern Afghanistan early on Tuesday, unleashing floods that killed at least six people and washed away hundreds of houses and shops, the provincial governor said. The United States military sent Black Hawk helicopters to help with rescue operations after the Bandi Sultan dam burst.
No written complaint has been laid against a South African police officer accused of sexually harassing another officer in Sudan, a spokesperson said on Tuesday. She was responding to media reports that a complaint has been laid against a South African police officer by a female officer, while stationed at El Fashir in Darfur.
As the life of brain-damaged Terri Schiavo hung by a thread on Tuesday, her father feared doctors might hasten her death with morphine, while her husband requested that an autopsy be performed after she dies to prove the extent of her incapacitation. ”He’s requested this very strongly,” said Michael Schiavo’s lawyer.
Three nurses were hijacked with their mobile clinic between Tsolo and Maclear on Tuesday, the Eastern Cape health department said. Their assailants crashed the vehicle shortly after they hijacked it at about 4pm, health department spokesperson Sizwe Kupelo said.
The price of petrol will rise by 38 cents next week, bringing the Gauteng price to R5 a litre — its highest to date. The Department of Minerals and Energy said on Tuesday the price of all categories of fuel will rise. Departmental spokesperson Yvonne Mfolo said the announced prices are projections, which will be finalised on Friday or Monday.