Zambia’s President Levy Mwanawasa on Friday said he could drop corruption charges against his predecessor Frederick Chiluba if the former leader returned about 75% of what he allegedly stole. Chiluba (61), is facing a raft of charges including the theft of -million from the state during his tenure as president.
MOVIE OF THE WEEK: ‘Sand is overrated,” murmurs Joel, the hero of this comedy, who’s goofed off work for the day to mope around the beach. ”It’s just … tiny little rocks.” That slacker epiphany could only have come from the pen of Charlie Kaufman, creator of Being John Malkovich and Adaptation. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind is suffused with Kaufman’s charm, writes Shaun de Waal.
Visa applications by South Africans are likely to be more thoroughly examined following the recent visas scam uncovered in London, the United Kingdom High Commission said in Pretoria on Friday. ”Applications will be more carefully scrutinised and will be treated with an element of suspicion,” said a spokesperson.
He had, according to one former colleague, an ”athletic, bouncy swagger, weight balanced towards the tips of his toes — rather like a boxer, aggressive and elusively graceful, or like an elegant jungle cat ready to spring at its prey”. Steve Jobs is a man who inspires superlatives.
<i>Democracy X</i> is an allegory for a typically South African democracy — fragmented, populated by small splinter groups with large grievances, large interest groups with small ambitions, and infinite permutations of both poles. Chris Roper takes a look at an unusual exhibition that’s about history, and about the sometimes uncomfortable legacy of that history.
A reasonable collection of lollipops on six discs, each with its own theme, comprising a selection of edited highlights. And edited they are. Lee Madeley lends an ear to the <i>Best Classics 100</i> compilation.
One-million people have fled fighting in Darfur, Sudan, triggering an urgent humanitarian crisis. Most of them remain displaced within the country, lacking food, clean water, sanitation and medical facilities. Approximately 180 000 refugees have escaped into neighbouring Chad.
The publisher of a banned Zimbabwean newspaper said on Friday that he will go to court next week to challenge the closure of his weekly. Kindness Paradza, publisher of the outspoken Tribune newspaper, said the Harare High Court will on Monday hear his challenge to the year-long closure of the paper announced on June 10 by a state-appointed media commission.
Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP) leader Mangosutho Buthelezi maintained on Friday that irregularities in the last general election "may have robbed the IFP of victory in KwaZulu-Natal". The party withdrew its case in the Electoral Court because it would be difficult to prove, not because it retracted its claims of widespread irregularities, Buthelezi told a rally in Durban.
Trafficking in humans is the third most lucrative crime in South Africa next to drugs and weapons, a statement ahead of a conference said on Friday. At least 500 organised gangs are involved, and researchers have found that trafficking has brought children into prostitution and debt bondage.