Idi Amin called himself ”a pure son of Africa,” but his bizarre and murderous eight years as president of Uganda typified the worst of the continent’s military dictatorships.
This week’s death of Smiso Nkwanyana, the South African Communist Party’s KwaZulu-Natal secretary, could not have come at a worse time for a party out to assert its independence.
Royalty from Africa and Europe will join government ministers ambassadors and business executives in Phokeng this weekend for the enthronement of Bafokeng King Leruo Tshekedi Molotlegi. He will be the 36th king of the Bafokeng tribe.
The Orlando Pirates star showered immediately after the match, as he usually did. He jumped into his car and off he went. It was the last time that his fans, friends and teammates would see him alive.
The Zimbabwean opposition said Friday it would not join a government of national unity with President Robert Mugabe’s ruling party, widening the rift on possible negotiations between the parties to end the country’s political and economic chaos.
Libyan Foreign Minister Abdel Raman Shalgham accused France on Friday of blackmail after Paris threatened to block an agreement on lifting United Nations sanctions unless more money was paid to the families of victims of the bombing of a French airliner in 1989.
Rebels have ambushed trucks belonging to the United Nations’s World Food Programme, which were delivering food to hungry people in the remote Karamoja region of north eastern Uganda. Six WFP employees, three drivers and their helpers are still unaccounted for.
The United States on Friday banned the political wing of the Iranian opposition group People’s Mujahedeen, froze its assets and moved to close down its offices in the US. This move against the People’s Mujahadeen follows a similar crackdown on the group in France.
The trafficking of children, in effect child slavery, is more widespread in Africa than previously realised, a new study by Unicef has found. Poverty has been the driving force in child slavery, but Aids is also taking its toll.
The SACP is discussing fielding candidates under its own banner in next year’s election and will be debated at the SACP’s central committee meeting this weekend. The party is planning to assert its independence from the ANC.