Pope John Paul II does not consider Mel Gibson’s controversial movie The Passion of the Christ anti-Semitic, Vatican spokesperson Joaquin Navarro-Valls said in an interview published on Thursday. Navarro-Valls said the Vatican would not issue an official statement distancing itself from the biblical epic about Christ’s crucifixion.
<img src="http://www.mg.co.za/ContentImages/41909/10-X-Logo.gif" align=left>Former president Nelson Mandela on Thursday put aside his tight schedule to pay tribute to his lifelong comrade Joe Slovo, the past chairperson of the South African Communist Party (SACP), at Slovo’s Avalon grave in Soweto. Mandela’s visit coincided with the launch of the Joe Slovo Election Trail campaign by the SACP.
<li><a class=’standardtextsmall’ href="http://www.mg.co.za/Content/l3_fl2.asp?o=40922">Special Report: Elections 2004</a>
Airport baggage handlers on strike since December 18 said on Thursday they are prepared to settle for a pay increase of 6% to 7,5%, but will not accept worsened conditions of employment. Equity Aviation has proposed an increase in the number of hours worked per week from 40 to 45.
The Department of Labour plans to remove bogus trade unions and employer organisations from the job market, Minister of Labour Membathisi Mdladlana said on Thursday after the Labour Court dismissed with costs an urgent application filed by the National Employers Forum challenging its deregistration.
Show us the profits, the skeptics shout. Nanotechnology will amount to nanoprofits, they worry as they tick off a list of technologies from artificial intelligence to virtual reality that looked cool in the lab but have foundered commercially.
<img src="http://www.mg.co.za/ContentImages/41909/10-X-Logo.gif" align=left>The Democratic Alliance has rejected African Christian Democratic Party complaints about the DA’s election radio adverts that urge voters not to waste their vote on one of the smaller parties, saying the ACDP has missed the point.
<li><a class=’standardtextsmall’ href="http://www.mg.co.za/Content/l3.asp?ao=32518">ACDP: ‘Greedy’ DA not playing fair</a>
<li><a class=’standardtextsmall’ href="http://www.mg.co.za/Content/l3_fl2.asp?o=40922">Special Report: Elections 2004</a>
Africa’s last absolute monarch, Swaziland’s King Mswati III, has fired the elected speaker of Parliament after failing to remove him by exerting pressure. The sacked speaker, Marwick Khumalo, told Parliament that ”as of yesterday, I was called to the royal residence, where I was informed (by) the head of state that I should resign from my position as speaker of the House of Assembly”.
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The Democratic Alliance is showing its ”greed for power” by urging voters in radio adverts not to vote for other opposition parties, the African Christian Democratic Party said on Thursday. ”By telling voters that their vote will be wasted on a ‘smaller’ opposition party, the DA has once again showed its greed for power,” an ACDP MP said.
Special Report: Elections 2004
<img src="http://www.mg.co.za/ContentImages/41909/10-X-Logo.gif" align=left>Official opposition Democratic Alliance leader Tony Leon has taken the New National Party Western Cape premier to task for pledging that he would open a new airport near Atlantis in the Western Cape. "There is no way that Van Schalkwyk can deliver a new airport in Atlantis," Leon said on Thursday.
<li><a class=’standardtextsmall’ href="http://www.mg.co.za/Content/l3_fl2.asp?o=40922">Special Report: Elections 2004</a>
Cyclone Gafilo was downgraded to a moderate storm and about to leave Madagascar on Thursday after leaving 32 confirmed dead, 155 missing and thousands others injured or homeless, local meteorological services said. A Comoran ferry, the Samson, with 113 people on board, is still missing.