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/ 16 November 2004
Namibians began a second and final day of voting on Tuesday to elect a new president and Parliament in a poll widely expected to return the country’s ruling Swapo party to power. More than 1Â 160 polling stations across the country opened for about 950Â 000 registered voters on Monday.
Namibia goes to the polls
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/ 16 November 2004
A decade into democracy in South Africa, visitor figures for the country’s national parks still reflect a legacy of racial exclusion. Officials say up to 18 months ago, less than 4% of visitors were black. Although statistics for November show higher figures, perceptions remain of conservation as an elitist pastime confined to a white minority.
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/ 16 November 2004
South Africa’s festive season retail sales in the fourth quarter, which covers the Christian Christmas season, as well as the Hindu Diwali festival, the Muslim Eid festival and the Jewish Hanukkah festival, is expected to be the best in at least 20 years, according to the Ernst & Young festive season retail trends survey.
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/ 16 November 2004
The Zambian government on Monday banned a civic organisation critical of President Levy Mwanawasa for allegedly ”endangering the country’s security”. The Southern African Centre for Constructive Resolution of Disputes has been openly critical of Mwanawasa and has put pressure on him to adopt a new democratic Constitution before the next presidential election in 2006.
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/ 16 November 2004
Alleged drunk driver Benjamin Kleinbooi’s car could end up with Toyota’s financial services division, rather than being forfeited to the state, it emerged on Monday. Kleinbooi’s Toyota Corolla was attached last week by the Asset Forfeiture Unit under a High Court order, after his two drunk driving arrests earlier this year.
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/ 16 November 2004
The battle for control of South African mining group Gold Fields turned nasty on Monday when predator Harmony accused its rival of attempting to ”corrupt” one of its employees to gain information. In an astonishing statement, Harmony said it was ”outraged” at the depths to which Gold Fields was willing to stoop in its effort to fend off a takeover.
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/ 16 November 2004
Spain’s most infamous spy returned from the dead on Monday, five years after his sister published a death notice and paid for the monks at a monastery near the central Spanish city of Burgos to pray for his soul. His supposed death was thought by many to have brought to an end a tale of espionage, trickery, double-crossing and high-living spanning more than 20 years.
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/ 16 November 2004
The man widely expected to succeed Yasser Arafat in next year’s Palestinian elections, Mahmoud Abbas, on Monday appeared to win a power struggle in the dominant Fatah movement after a bloody gun battle in Gaza City. The Fatah secretary general in Gaza, Ahmed Hillis, led dozens of armed men in storming a mourning tent for Arafat on Sunday.
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/ 16 November 2004
Members of a theatrical production staged the largest mass defection of Cuban performers to date on Monday as 43 cast members of Havana Night Club applied for political asylum at a United States federal court in Las Vegas. ”Art should have no boundaries,” Nicole ”ND” Durr, the company’s founder, told the Associated Press.