SOUTH Africans have come out in bright colours to mark 100 days before the start of the world’s biggest soccer showcase, World Cup 2010, which will begin in June. Hundreds of people took to the streets in Johannesburg in a ceremony aimed at welcoming tourists and fans to what will be the hub of sporting action and tourism for the next few months. At least 10 million people are expected to travel to South Africa for the soccer showcase.
Marion, Illinois – Until recently, people here had little reason to know the name John A. Bredenkamp or anything about his past, a tale worthy of a James Bond villain, filled with allegations of international arms deals, blood diamond trades and ties to despotic regimes in his native Africa. Bredenkamp had visited Marion just once, nine years ago, to look over the Bermuda grass fairways and 96 sand bunkers at the Kokopelli Golf Club he was about to buy. He flew out the same day. A low-profile owner, he sold the course to a Florida group in 2006. He kept only a right to split future profits if the course sold again, his one tenuous tie to this Southern Illinois city. His name might have been forgotten, except for what took place two years later. “It’s just so absurd,” said Fritz Archerd of Gainesville, Fla., head of the group that bought the course from Bredenkamp. “And it’s all because of him.”Marion, Illinois – Until recently, people here had little reason to know the name John A. Bredenkamp or anything about his past, a tale worthy of a James Bond villain, filled with allegations of international arms deals, blood diamond trades and ties to despotic regimes in his native Africa. Bredenkamp had visited Marion just once, nine years ago, to look over the Bermuda grass fairways and 96 sand bunkers at the Kokopelli Golf Club he was about to buy. He flew out the same day. A low-profile owner, he sold the course to a Florida group in 2006. He kept only a right to split future profits if the course sold again, his one tenuous tie to this Southern Illinois city. His name might have been forgotten, except for what took place two years later. “It’s just so absurd,” said Fritz Archerd of Gainesville, Fla., head of the group that bought the course from Bredenkamp. “And it’s all because of him.”
BAE Systems is to pay up to $450m (£288m) in fines after it pleaded guilty to false statements and accounting practices, notably over deals with Saudi Arabia and Tanzania, in a landmark settlement between the defence giant and the US and UK authorities.
The Serious Fraud Office also dropped proceedings last night against Count Alfons Mensdorff-Pouilly, who was charged with making illegal payments to government officials to win jet deals for BAE just last week.
Botswana this week recalled two senior diplomats based in Zimbabwe as the diplomatic row over three Batswana rangers arrested for entering Zimbabwe illegally escalated. The government of Botswana said it would recall its defence and intelligence attaches by the end of the month and asked that Harare withdraw its defence and Central Intelligence Organization personnel from its Gaborone embassy by the same date.
SOUTH African President Jacob Zuma is not an ordinary man. Neither is he an ordinary president for that matter, with 20 children and four First Ladies to his name, the first such record in the history of South Africa, if not in the history the presidency itself.
Moscow and the North African state enjoyed close ties during the Cold War, and much of Libya’s arsenal was purchased from the Soviet Union in its last years. Moscow and Tripoli have stepped up their contacts in recent years. In 2008, Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi visited the Russian capital in his first visit to Moscow since the 1980s.
A High Court judge in Harare will next week rule on whether
emails at the center of treason charges against opposition MDC Treasurer and minister designate, Roy Bennett, are admissible during the high profile trial. The Emails will serve as a test case on the use of intercepted communications under Zimbabwean law.
Zimbabwe is not known for spending its meagre resources in the right places, at least not until the formation of the unity government. The military is replete with hardware and supplies, while other sectors of government go by on a pittance. The health sector is heavily underfunded, and civil servants poorly paid, while warehouses suffocate with teargas and polished military hardware. IA
Former Mosambican President Joaquim Chissano has done a particularly good job of mediating in conflicts in the Great Lakes, but Africa seems to suffer from a lack of retired statesman of his calibre, leaving the few that can do the job overstretched and often with the mammoth challenge of facing their former counterparts.
HARARE- The trial of Zimbabwe’s deputy Agriculture Minister-designate Roy Bennett, accused of illegally possessing weapons for purposes of terrorism, banditry and insurgency, has taken a new twist with the prosecution indicating that it wants impeach its key witness, whom it accuses of being ‘unfavourable.’
