OWN CORRESPONDENT and ELLIS MNYANDU, Johannesburg | Monday TENSIONS within South Africa’s governing coalition will come under the spotlight as the annual congress of labour federation COSATU gets underway, with analysts highlighting ”serious policy differences” between government and the unions. President Thabo Mbeki will open the four-day meeting of the 1.8million-strong Congress of South African […]

ARMED assailants managed to get into the home of Ivory Coast’s military ruler, General Robert Guei, in the early hours of Monday, but Guei was still alive, a senior military source said. The attackers had forced the driver of an armoured car stationed near the residence to drive into the gates to break them down […]

GODFREY MUTIZWA, Nairobi | Monday THREE Rwandan journalists accused of inciting the genocide of up to 800 000 people in Rwanda in 1994 go on trial in a UN court this week on charges of conspiracy and incitement to commit genocide and crimes against humanity. Jean-Bosco Barayagwiza was director of public affairs in the Rwandan […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT and REUTERS, Johannesburg | Monday PRESIDENT Thabo Mbeki has played down tensions between labour federation Cosatu and the ruling African National Congress (ANC) in the opening address at Cosatu’s annual congress, where ”serious policy differences” between government and the unions are expected to emerge. Addressing the delegates in Midrand, he instead joked about […]

ARMED assailants managed to get into the home of Ivory Coast’s military ruler, General Robert Guei, in the early hours of Monday, but Guei was still alive, a senior military source said. The attackers had forced the driver of an armoured car stationed near the residence to drive into the gates to break them down […]

THE rand has hit a historic low of R7,2450 to the US dollar, a fall that driven by weakness in the euro. Dealers said offshore and local banks that continued to offload large amounts of rands exacerbated the slide. Another increase in crude oil prices to $36 a barrel drove the dollar firmer against all […]

CATHERINE Bertini, the United Nations secretary-general’s special envoy, has arrived in Nairobi for an updated assessment of the drought now threatening 14 million people in the greater Horn of Africa region. Bertini, executive director of the UN World Food Programme (WFP), is visiting Kenya and Ethiopia, the two worst-affected countries in the region. Large areas […]

THE central bank of the West African CFA franc zone, the BCEAO, has cut its 2000 forecast for real GDP growth in the region to 3.2% from 5.0%. That compared with real growth of 3.4% in 1999, the Senegalese-based bank said in a statement. It said growth within the West African Economic and Monetary Union […]

AFP, Gusau, Nigeria | Saturday THE governor of a Nigerian state where strict Islamic law against prostitution and other vices has been introduced has distributed more than $400000 to prostitutes to discourage them from soliciting. Northwestern Sokoto state governor Attahiru Bafarawa said the amount, distributed to more than 100 beneficiaries, was part of efforts to […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT and AFP, Sydney | Sunday SOUTH Africa has produced a major upset, shocking Brazil 3-1, to draw level on points with the South Americans in Group D of the Olympic men’s football tournament. Substitute Siyabonga Nomvethe, who missed a string of chances in last Thursday’s defeat at the hands of Japan, rose to […]