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/ 2 June 2006

The great Cape gas con

South Africans pay more for gas than consumers in most parts of the world, and Capetonians are essentially subsidising Eskom’s inability to supply electricity in the region. And while Eskom’s ”Turn on to Gas” campaign in the Western Cape might provide a short-term solution to the winter energy crunch, in the longer run, consumers will fork out more for energy.

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/ 2 June 2006

Khalid papers falsified — claim

The advocate for Pakistani national Khalid Mahmood Rashid, Zehir Omar, has accused the Department of Home Affairs of fabricating a document from the Pakistani Ministry of the Interior to show that Rashid was deported to Pakistan. South African authorities arrested Rashid in October, and the Department of Home Affairs said he was deported to Pakistan the following month as an illegal immigrant.

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/ 2 June 2006

E-mail scandal rocks Namibia

A "hoax" e-mail campaign similar to the one that implicated top government officials in an alleged plot to smear African National Congress deputy president Jacob Zuma has surfaced in Namibia, strengthening suspicions that the e-mails are the work of an "outside force".

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/ 2 June 2006

Mbeki’s plan of action

President Thabo Mbeki will reinforce the message of clean, morally unquestionable leadership, dispel concerns about a centralised Presidency and bank on his urban, middle-class support in countering damaging attacks on him in the presidential succession battle.

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/ 2 June 2006

The rift is a myth

The rift that is said to divide the African National Congress into two competing camps is a bit like the Loch Ness monster. Sightings are frequently reported in the media. But no one has ever been able to locate the animal or verify its existence. And, like the ever-elusive creature that is said to lurk in the dark waters of the Scottish highlands, the myth of deep-seated divisions in the ANC’s highest leadership structures remains pervasive.

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/ 2 June 2006

The mealie vs Event 3 272

The genetic modification (GM) battlefield has been extended to biofuels production, with South Africa featuring among a number of countries that are being asked to allow the import of GM maize to make ethanol. The GM industry worldwide wants to use GM to boost the energy properties of crops for ethanol production, says an environmental lawyer.

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/ 2 June 2006

She has her father’s eyes. In her lunchbox

Standing in the doorway of her tent, Angelina Jolie tasted the sweet desert air. The Namibian landscape was breathtakingly beautiful, now that all the unsightly people had been removed. Her tongue flickered delicately from her mouth, unsoiled now by the rank flavour of the humans, and contentedly she licked the morning dew off the sunken bridge of her nose.

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/ 2 June 2006

Poor kids easy prey for rebel recruiters

Sixteen-year-old Chris Neil Sugui ponders his future as he and younger brother Mark cast their finely meshed net in the warm waters of the South China Sea for milkfish fingerlings. The few pesos they will earn for their hard day’s work will not buy them out of their bleak predicament — they do not have enough money for school.