ZAR

Another democracy threatens the Mideast

2008-05-10T00:54:00.001-07:00

Another democracy threatens the Mideast
By MIDDLE EAST TIMES
Published: May 08, 2008
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The 60th anniversary of Israel's founding has understandably focused much of the attention of Middle Eastern analysts on this old and familiar problem. But if they think this remains the prime security issue for the region, they may be looking in the wrong direction.

India this week successfully completed the testing program of its nuclear-capable Agni-3 missile, designed and developed by the state-owned Defense Research and Development Organization (DRDO).

The third test launch took place May 7, and flew 3,000 kilometers to its targeted impact site in the Indian Ocean south of the equator from the Dhamra base in the eastern Indian state of Orissa. The full range is 3,500 kilometers, which would bring Shanghai most of southern China into its range.

Welcome to the new security landscape of Asia, with China and India now capable of repeating what in the bad old days of the Cold war used to be called "the balance of terror" between nuclear superpowers.

Since India and China are each dependent on Middle Eastern oil exports which pass through the Indian Ocean, good relations between these two Asian giants is of prime importance to all Middle Eastern countries. And having less than comfortable memories of living under a similar state of nuclear deterrence between two superpowers during the Cold War, the Middle East is going to have to get used to it all over again.

Of course, the relationship between India and China is far more open and friendly than that between the United States and the old Soviet Union. And there are further nuclear complications in the region involving Israel and Pakistan and the possible nuclear ambitions of Iran.

India has already brought into operational deployment the 700-kilometer-range Agni-1 missile, which is presumably targeted on Pakistan, and the 2,000-kilometer-range Agni-2 missile, which can reach Iran and much of the Gulf. Even before its expected "stretch" to a 5,000 kilometer range, the new Agni-3 missile is capable of hitting targets across the entire Middle East, as well as deep inside China.

Like the nuclear weapon the Agni-3 is intended to carry, the missile is a product of home-grown Indian technology. By contrast, Pakistan's shorter-range missiles depend on Chinese and North Korean technology. Indeed, the Indians are frustrated at the lack of any progress on the vaunted American promise of technological cooperation on space and rocketry. And the U.S. still bans any country from using an Indian launch vehicle to launch a satellite that contains even a single U.S.-made component.

Despite American foot-dragging, India is a nuclear power with the missile capabilities to exert wide regional influence. It also deploys the most formidable navy in the region, which will be even more capable once the fleet of new French-built Scorpene submarines take to sea. The Middle East is going to have to learn to live with another democratic superpower flexing muscles in its back yard.

South Africa: New Stats Show Millions More HIV Positive

2008-05-05T08:57:00.000-07:00

http://allafrica.com/stories/200805040006.html
Cape Argus (Cape Town)

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Cape Argus (Cape Town)

4 May 2008
Posted to the web 4 May 2008

Eleanor Momberg

Shocking new Aids statistics reveal that 2 million more South Africans are infected with HIV than the most recent government estimates show.

According to statistics released by the Development Bank of South Africa (DBSA), more than 7,6 million South Africans are HIV-positive - 2,2 million more than the department of health's figures for 2007 state.

Of these, about 6,1 million are the economically active people between the ages of 20 and 64, who could contribute to the country's economy.

What makes these statistics more alarming is the fact that the data on which they are based are probably more reliable than the department of health's because they were collected at grassroots level and not based on estimates.

The DBSA's 2007/2008 statistics state that:

* 7,6 million South Africans are HIV-positive;

* more than 27 percent of men and women aged between 20 and 64 are HIV positive;

* more than 92 000 babies have been infected, either perinatally or through mother's milk, in the past year;

* the total number of Aids sick by mid-2007 was 1 287 844;

* nearly 722 000 people have died of Aids-related diseases in the past year, bringing the total number of such deaths since 2003 to more than 3,7 million;

* in 2003, the accumulated total Aids-related deaths stood at just under 1 million; and

* 1,2 million of the country's 1,49 million orphans have lost their parents to Aids and this number is expected to increase by more than 336 000 this year alone.

In contrast, the department of health stated last year that there were 5,4 million HIV-positive people in South Africa in 2006. And the Actuarial Society of South Africa (ASSA) estimated in its statistical summary for 2000 to 2015 that there would be 5,6 million HIV-positive people in the country this year.

The ASSA had also estimated that there would be 370 000 Aids deaths in 2008.

UNAids stated in its 2006 Global Report that 18,8 percent of the population of South Africa was infected, and that 320 000 people died of Aids-related deaths in the country during 2005.

The latest DBSA information on one of the biggest killers in South Africa was collected from clinics, local municipalities, development planners, morgues and funeral homes.

Updated annually, the figures are used by the bank to determine funding for municipal projects, such as the upgrading of infrastructure.

Mark Heywood, the director of the Aids Law Project at the University of the Witwatersrand, said the new data, although untested, reflected the fact that the Aids pandemic remained a massive challenge for the country.

"If these figures are accurate, the number of people dying is increasing and the number of people who should be receiving anti-retrovirals, and are not, is increasing," said Heywood.

"The social cost of this is going to be enormous. We are not doing enough as a country and there is a danger that we are becoming complacent because there are now institutions such as the National Aids Council, as well as the fact that the government's approach to HIV and Aids has changed."

The DBSA figures show that South Africa, a country with one of the highest HIV and Aids rates in the world, is reaching the peak of HIV infections and that intervention programmes are beginning to show some success.

Johan Calitz, a senior demographer at the DBSA, attributed the decrease in infections in some regions to the success of nutrition schemes run by NGOs, other non-governmental intervention programmes and the government's roll-out of antiretroviral drugs.

He said the number of infections was expected to "level out" by 2010, but that the death rate would continue to accelerate in the foreseeable future.

"I think it will drop from 2010, and that from 2014 the population will begin to stabilise," he said, adding that this was on the condition that rates of immigration did not increase.

Although the birthrate is declining nationally, and in particular in Gauteng, there is an increase in the total number of HIV-infected babies being born.

Prevalence rates at antenatal clinics have increased to 31,67 percent - up 2 percent from last year.

The good news is that the number of new infections in KwaZulu-Natal - the province worst affected by the pandemic - have dropped dramatically among adults aged between 20 and 59, despite the dramatic increase in the number of its Aids orphans.
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Of concern, Calitz said, was the very high percentage of economically active people between the ages of 20 and 64 who were HIV positive - more than 3,5 million women and more than 3,4 million men.

In Gauteng, there has been a marked decline in children under the age of four, down about 21 000 since 2003. Yet, there are about 2 000 more children under the age of four with HIV.

Some of the highest rates of infection now appear to be among men over 50 and women over 40, with the rate among those adults of child-bearing age apparently slowing down due to illness and death.

How to Conquer Georgia

2008-05-01T04:04:00.001-07:00

How to Conquer Georgia
30 April 2008By Yulia Latynina
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Letters to the editor should be sent by fax to (7-495) 232-6529, by e-mail to oped@imedia.ru, or by post. The Moscow Times reserves the right to edit letters.

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Over the weekend, Foreign Ministry official Valery Kenyaikin cautioned Georgia against using NATO forces to resolve the territorial conflicts in Abkhazia and South Ossetia, saying Moscow would take "all possible measures to protect its citizens if fighting broke out" in these areas. It seems as though Russia is preparing for war with Georgia.

A few days ago I returned from Chechnya, where I observed the swift, bloodless routing of the Vostok regiment by military groups loyal to Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov. Vostok is a local military unit in Khankala, Chechnya, composed of ethnic Chechens that is formally a part of the 42nd Division of the General Staff's Main Intelligence Directorate.

There are several reasons why Vostok was defeated. When Kadyrov cracked down on the unit, Vostok's commander, Sulim Yamadayev, could not come to Chechnya for four days. While Kadyrov's forces were rounding up and bullying Vostok's fighters, Yamadayev was attending a meeting at the Defense Ministry.

In the first Chechen war, then-Brigadier General Yamadayev was probably in the mountains leading his troops, rather than attending meetings in Moscow. How effective can an army be when, during a military flare-up, its commander is attending meetings in Moscow instead of leading its troops on sight, where the conflict is taking place?

Second, while the defeated Vostok soldiers were chastised for "selling out to the Russians," Yamadayev's own division commander told the Vostok troops that their leader, Yamadayev, had been placed on a wanted list for his suspected criminal activity. I don't know who the Vostok soldiers sold out to, but it is clear who Yamadayev's division commander betrayed. Can an army wage war with a division commander like this?

Third, Vostok's commanders did not pay the unit's soldiers their salary in full. Officers simply faked the signatures in the payrolls, and professional soldiers received less than what their contracts stipulated. This is common practice in the Russian armed forces, and you can imagine how this helps increase recruitment into so-called elite, professional military units. Sometimes, officers line conscripts up outside at 6:30 a.m. in temperatures of minus 30 degrees Celsius and tell them that they cannot return to their barracks until they sign contracts for professional military service. Can this type of army ever be fit for battle?

With these three elements taken into account, the Foreign Ministry's declaration that Russia will wage war if NATO invades Abkhazia is just as plausible as a declaration to protect Abkhazia in the event of a Martian invasion.

If Moscow is truly serious about defending Abkhazia and South Ossetia, it must send troops -- and not just additional peacekeeping forces -- there instead of merely making a lot of noise. Making empty threats like Kenyaikin's is a no-win tactic any way you look at it. By doing so, Moscow is perceived as an irresponsible and irrational state and doesn't gain any territory. In the end, Russia is neither feared nor respected.

There is a simple rule that is well known even to street bandits: If you brandish your gun, be prepared to fire. But when Moscow whips out its gun, it only shouts, "We are offended," and then shoves the pistol back into its holster.

But all is not lost. I have a proposal for our leaders that will help them conquer Georgia -- and it is quite simple. All the Kremlin has to do is to convince Georgian officers to attend a training course at the Defense Ministry. This would be a brilliant military tactic. We will teach the Georgian officers to attend meetings instead of battles.

Yulia Latynina hosts a political talk show on Ekho Moskvy radio.

http://www.moscowtimes.ru/article/1016/42/362439.htm

Russia Will Send More Troops to Abkhazia

2008-05-01T04:03:00.001-07:00

Russia Will Send More Troops to Abkhazia
30 April 2008By Matt Siegel / Staff WriterThe Foreign Ministry announced Tuesday that Russia would bolster its peacekeeping forces in Abkhazia in response to Georgian plans to invade the breakaway region.

Tbilisi denied that it had plans to invade the region, which has enjoyed de facto independence from Georgia since a separatist war in the 1990s.

The exchange marked a significant escalation in tensions between the two countries.

The Foreign Ministry said it had intelligence that Georgia had moved more than 1,500 servicemen into the upper Kodor Gorge region and was preparing "a bridgehead" in advance of an invasion.

"According to the information coming in, including from CIS peacekeepers in the Georgian-Abkhaz conflict zone, Georgia is sending weapons, fuel and lubricants, food and other technical means, as well as personnel of the Georgian armed forces to Upper Kodor," the ministry said in a statement.

Russia already maintains a sizeable peacekeeping force in Abkhazia and another breakaway region, South Ossetia. Tbilisi accuses Russia of propping up the rebel governments.

Georgian Deputy Defense Minister Batu Kutelia said Interior Ministry servicemen were in Kodor Gorge but denied the presence of Defense Ministry forces.

"What we have there are only police forces to ensure security for the local population," he told Reuters.

"All recent UN monitoring missions confirmed that Georgia is behaving in this region in accordance with previous agreements," he said.

The United Nations monitoring mission in Tbilisi could not be reached to confirm Kutelia's comments on Tuesday. The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, which also has monitors in the region, was unable to comment on security conditions within the conflict zone.

Russia's Defense Ministry, meanwhile, vowed to use military force if necessary to protect Russian citizens in Abkhazia. Most residents in the region have Russian passports.

The ministry said in a statement that it would deliver "a suitable and tough response" to anyone who attacked Russian citizens, echoing comments made Friday by Valery Kenyaikin, the Foreign Ministry's special envoy for the Commonwealth of Independent States.

UN foreign policy chief Javier Solana planned to urge for calm from Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on Tuesday, said spokeswoman Christina Gallach. The pair was meeting in Luxembourg as part of ongoing EU-Russia talks.

"The basic message [Solana] is going to say is that we're right now in a process of escalation of tension and what we have to do on all sides is to calm down," she said by telephone from Luxembourg.

Relations between the two countries worsened earlier this month after Georgia accused the Russian military of shooting down an unmanned spy plane over Abkhazia, a charge denied by Moscow.

Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili convened an emergency meeting of his Security Council on Tuesday, the second such meeting in less than two weeks. Afterward, Georgian Prime Minister Lado Gurgenidze told reporters that "from now on, we will consider any additional soldier or military hardware [in the Abkhaz conflict zone] as illegal, as potential aggressors and a potential source of destabilization." Saakashvili was to address the country on Georgian national television on Tuesday night. The address was to be made specifically to the residents of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, Itar-Tass reported.

NATO meets on escalating Georgia-Russian tensions

2008-05-01T00:50:00.000-07:00

http://www.besternews.com/related/International+Herald+Tribune/NATO+meets+on+escalating+Georgia-Russian+tensions/?ref=top

NATO meets on escalating Georgia-Russian tensions
Reuters
Published: April 30, 2008
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BRUSSELS: NATO ambassadors discussed escalating tensions between alliance hopeful Georgia and Russia on Wednesday ahead of a meeting with Moscow's NATO envoy.

The regular meetings come after Russia on Tuesday sent extra peacekeeping troops to Georgia's breakaway Abkhazia region to counter what it called Georgian plans for an attack, prompting the European Union to accuse Moscow of stoking tensions.

A NATO spokesman said Georgia would be discussed at both meetings, but declined further comment.

On Monday, NATO ambassadors met Georgian presidential envoy David Bakradze in Brussels. They reiterated support for Georgia and criticized Russian warnings about the possible use of force.

In a further show of support, the 26-nation military alliance also announced plans for the envoys to visit Georgia before the end of the year.
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NATO accuses Russia of stirring tensions in rebel Georgia areas

The mounting crisis between the two ex-Soviet neighbors has alarmed Georgia's Western allies, who see Georgia as a future NATO member and a vital energy transit route.

After discussing Georgia with EU ministers in Luxembourg on Tuesday, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov reiterated that Moscow would use military force if Georgia attacked Abkhazia or a second Georgian separatist region, South Ossetia.

European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana said after the talks that the Russian deployment of extra peacekeepers in Abkhazia was unwise at a time of rising tensions and reiterated EU support for Georgia's territorial integrity.

On Wednesday, Dimitrij Rupel, foreign minister of EU president Slovenia, said the European Union wanted to see the situation resolved in a "tolerant and diplomatic manner."

"After yesterday's talks I believe that this will happen," he told a news conference in Ljubljana.

Reporting by David Brunnstrom in Brussels and Manca Ulcar in Ljubljana.

U.S. says Iran, Syria destabilizing region

2008-05-01T00:48:00.001-07:00

U.S. says Iran, Syria destabilizing region
By CLAUDE SALHANI (Editor, Middle East Times)
Published: April 30, 2008
A U.S. air force F-22 Raptor aircraft refuels 26,000 feet above Alaska. "Terrorists consider information operations a principal part of their effort," the latest country report on terrorism says, adding: "Use of the Internet for propaganda, recruiting, fundraising and, increasingly, training, has made the Internet a 'virtual safe haven.'" (Photo by DoD)
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The year 2007 was marked by the affiliation of regional insurgent groups with al-Qaida, who along with its associated networks remained the greatest terrorist threat to the United States and its partners in 2007, according to the 2007 Country Reports on Terrorism released by the U.S. State department Wednesday.

The report states that al-Qaida has reconstituted some of its pre-9/11 operational capabilities through the exploitation of Pakistan's Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA), replacement of captured or killed operational lieutenants, and the restoration of some central control by its top leadership, in particular Ayman al-Zawahiri.

Although Osama bin Laden remained the group's ideological figurehead, Zawahiri has emerged as al-Qaida's strategic and operational planner.

The report finds that al-Qaida and its affiliates seek to exploit local grievances for their own local and global purposes. "They pursue their own goals, often at large personal cost to the local population." They have become adaptive, reacting quickly in response to countermeasures. Al-Qaida utilizes terrorism, as well as subversion, propaganda, and open warfare; it seeks weapons of mass destruction in order to inflict the maximum possible damage on anyone who stands in its way, including other Muslims and/or elders, women, and children.

Combined efforts by the security forces of both Afghanistan and Pakistan have failed to quell the rise of al-Qaida. Rather, the group has now greater mobility and ability to conduct training and operational planning, "particularly that targeting Western Europe and the United States."

Proving their ability to adapt to rapidly changing situations al-Qaida has managed to replace "numerous senior operatives who were captured or killed.

Last year was marked by the affiliation of regional insurgent groups with al-Qaida, notably the growing threat in North Africa posed by the Algerian Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC). Following the September 2006 merger with al-Qaida, the GSPC renamed itself al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM). AQIM is still primarily focused on the Algerian government.

In 2007 AQIM carried out eight suicide attacks that resulted in large numbers of government and civilian casualties. The group recruits suicide bombers from easily exploitable groups, such as the teenagers used in the July 11 and Sept. 8 attacks, or the elderly and terminally ill, as in the Dec. 11 UN attack.

But al-Qaida has also suffered setbacks, as in Iraq. The group's alliance of convenience it enjoyed since the start of the U.S. invasion with Sunni groups came to an abrupt and violence divorce as many of these groups turned to support the U.S. war effort, forcing some fighters from Baghdad and Anbar province into the northern Iraqi provinces of Ninawa, Diyala, and Salah ad Din. Regardless of the progress achieved, al-Qaida in Iraq (AQI) remains a threat.

And in Africa, the invasion of Somalia by Ethiopia in late 2006 and the subsequent deployment of African Union forces there have kept al-Qaida East Africa leadership, and elements of the Council of Islamic Courts that harbored them, on the run.

This did not prevent al-Qaida from launching a new assault using information as its primary weapon. According to the State Department al-Qaida has increased all throughout 2007 its propaganda efforts seeking to inspire support in Muslim populations, undermine Western confidence, and enhance the perception of a powerful worldwide movement.

"Terrorists consider information operations a principal part of their effort. Use of the Internet for propaganda, recruiting, fundraising and, increasingly, training, has made the Internet a 'virtual safe haven,'" states the report. "The international community has yet to muster a coordinated and effectively resourced program to counter extremist propaganda," warns the U.S. government analysis of the state of terrorism around the world.

THE TALIBAN

Despite efforts by the Afghan government to strengthen its national institutions, the Taliban continued to threaten the security of Afghanistan. Taliban insurgents murdered local leaders and attacked Pakistani government outposts in the FATA.

STATE SPONSORS OF TERRORISM

Iran remains "the most significant state sponsor of terrorism," according to the U.S. State Department.

"A critically important element of Iranian national security strategy is its ability to conduct terrorist operations abroad. Iranian leaders believe this capability helps safeguard the regime by deterring United States or Israeli attacks, distracting and weakening the United States, enhancing Iran's regional influence through intimidation, and helping to drive the United States from the Middle East."

Hezbollah, designated a "Foreign Terrorist Organization," the report says, "is key to Iran's terrorism strategy."

The report points to the Lebanese Shiite organization Hezbollah as receiving support from Iran and Syria, and accuses them of continuing to undermine the elected government of Lebanon. "They remain a serious security threat," according to the U.S. State Department.

The Islamic republic is judged in the U.S. State department report of continuing "to threaten its neighbors and destabilize Iraq by providing weapons, training, and funding to select Iraqi Shia militants."

It also accuses what it calls Iran's "proxy groups" of perpetrating violence and killing U.S. troops.

Foreign terrorists continued to transit via Syria en route to and from Iraq; a report to Congress stated that nearly 90 percent of all foreign fighters entering Iraq are transiting from Syria. In addition, the government of Iran has recently begun an effort to expand commercial and diplomatic ties throughout the Western Hemisphere. Iran has, in the past, used diplomatic missions to support the activities of Hezbollah operatives.

Countries that continue to support terrorism undermines efforts to eliminate it, finds the 2007 Country Report on Terrorism.

Russian moves inflame tensions with Georgia

2008-05-01T00:35:00.000-07:00

Russian moves inflame tensions with Georgia

01 May 2008 07:18
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Nato on Wednesday accused Russia of ramping up tensions with neighbour Georgia and said Moscow's rapid build-up of troops in the breakaway republic of Abkhazia threatened Georgia's territorial integrity.

The alliance called on Russia and Georgia to resolve their differences over Abkhazia and South Ossetia, Georgia's two rebel republics, amid ominous signs of a looming military confrontation.

Nato's Secretary General, Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, also derided Russian claims that a Nato jet may have shot down a Georgian drone last week over Abkhazia. Georgia says a Russian MiG-29 shot it down. Russia's Nato envoy had suggested the alliance was responsible.

"The secretary general had said he'd eat his tie if it turned out that a Nato Mig-29 had magically appeared in Abkhazia and shot down a Georgian drone," Nato spokesperson James Appathurai said.

"The steps taken [by Russia] ... and the rhetoric that has been used concerning the threat of force have undermined Georgia's territorial integrity," he declared.

On Tuesday, Russia accused Georgia of plotting to attack Abkhazia, and announced that it was deploying additional troops and military equipment in the region. About 1 000 Russian peacekeepers are already stationed in Abkhazia, which broke away from Georgia following a 1992 to 1993 war.

Georgia has denied it has plans to invade Abkhazia, a small and picturesque territory on the sub-tropical eastern coast of the Black Sea. Georgia's special presidential envoy, David Bakradze, has appealed for international solidarity, holding talks on Wednesday with European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana.

"Georgia is being pushed to the edge of a precipice. Without credible and concerted reaction, we are confronted by the prospect of a situation similar to that in northern Cyprus or analogous to what occurred in Taiwan," Bakradze said.

He added: "Russia's end goal now appears to be to force Georgia into armed conflict. It would thus strip it of the opportunity to earn Nato membership, while finally annexing Georgia's territories."

Abkhazia's separatist leadership has echoed Russian claims that Georgia is massing forces in the Upper Kodori Valley -- a strategic enclave controlled by Georgian forces but inside rebel-held territory. About 1 500 troops were there, it said.

Recent developments are likely to alarm the United States and the EU. Both have expressed support for Georgia and its territorial integrity.

Russia has lifted economic sanctions against Abkhazia and given passports to most of its citizens. On Tuesday Russia's Foreign Minister, Sergei Lavrov, said that Moscow had a right to defend them if they came under Georgian attack. On Wednesday night, Abkhazia's Foreign Minister, Sergei Shamba, confirmed Russia had boosted its troop contingent from 2 000 to 3 000. -- © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2008
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# Russia, Georgia tensions rise

Die Mighty Men-saamtrek

2008-04-28T01:48:00.000-07:00

Dis die begin van die einde van die stryd

Now its the End game :

26/04/2008 16:42 - (SA)
Hanlie Retief gesels met Angus Buchan

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Dis in Angus Buchan se stem, in sy eenvoudige, skoon woorde.

Dis ’n warmte wat jy vóél, 2 000 km ver, oor die telefoon.

“Jy bel my op die regte tyd,” sê Angus Buchan. “My hart loop oor vandag. Ek is emosioneel, ek is ’n bietjie oorstelp, want ’n wonderwerk het hier op my plaas gebeur. ’n Herlewing . . .”

Dis Maandagoggend. Die Mighty Men-saamtrek is skaars ure verby. Op sy plaas lê die spore van 60 000 mans nog in die stof.

Die hele Buchan-familie, skoonseuns de lot, het hul vingers stomp gewerk vir die konferensie. Die oudste seun het die sang (“met baie Afrikaanse gospelliedjies”) gelei, die ander het gehelp op die reuse-kampterrein. “Ons het toilette reg gehad, warm storte, drie gratis etes per dag,” sê hy en jy hoor: ons kon voorsien. Ons kon.

Sy vrou, Jill, is besig om in te pak vir ’n asemskep aan die kus ná al die organisasie en emosie van die naweek. “Jill sal my lós as ons nie ’n bietjie alleen wegbreek nie,” skerts hy.

Haar man behoort aan God. Haar man behoort aan almal.

Hy sukkel só om ’n paar minute afgeknyp te kry vir ons onderhoud dat hy naderhand maar koers kies na die plaas se kapel toe, “waar ons in vrede kan gesels”, lag hy in die drafstap.

“So ja, hier’s ek. Nou’s dit net ek en jy en God. Kan ons eers saambid voor die onderhoud begin?”

In ’n paar woorde vra hy seën op die onderhoud.

En dan vertél hy. Van daardie oseaan van gesigte, alkante toe, tot ver in die donkerte, met nie één man wat geroer het nie, aangegryp, wagtend op die boodskap, vir wat God gaan sê.

“Gód,” beklemtoon hy, “nie Angus nie,” net sodat jy nie dalk ’n wanindruk kry van dié nederige boer nie.

Dit eggo in die honderde e-pos-briewe en SMS’e wat Rapport oorstroom het: “Dit was die Here se naweek,” skryf die mense, “Oom Angus” was net hul gewaardeerde tussenganger.

“As jy gesien het hoe 60 000 mans op hul knieë hul sonde voor God bely, wéét jy dis net God wat dit kon doen.

“Sou enige van die groot Christelike leiers dit kon laat gebeur het? Nee. En ek die heel minste. Ek is nie ’n Ray Mc- Cauley of ’n Billy Graham nie. Ek is net ’n dienskneg van die Here.”

Een van die punte van kritiek op die naweek is dat dit weinig meer was as bang, desperate mense wat nie meer herwaarts of derwaarts weet nie wat in ’n geestelike kudde saamgetrek het.

“Beslis nie,” sê Angus en bly ’n sekonde stil. “Hierdie is God se tyd. ’n Tyd vir die Here om te werk. Wat hier gebeur het, is groot, gróót.

“Ek het mans hier gesien wat nie met ’n lang paal aan ’n kerk sou raak nie. Hulle soek reguit antwoorde, maar hulle kry dit nie by die regering nie. En hulle soek nie teologie nie. Hulle soek Jesus.

“Ek dink hulle het gekom, want hulle’s honger en hulle soek die Waarheid. Daar’s vir hulle leuens vertel, of nie die volle waarheid nie. Die waarheid is die Woord van God.”

’n Man het vir hom gesê hy’t nie net met 60 000 mans gepraat nie, maar ook met al die gesinne wat hulle verteenwoordig, die maatskappye, skole en sportklubs, fabrieke, myne, plase . . .

“Nou word dit amper ’n pandemie deur die land. Daar gáán nie ’n herlewing wees nie, dit ís ’n herlewing, my girl!”

Hoekom dink hy het God hóm, Angus Buchan, gekies?

“Ek het daardie vraag al baie gevra. ‘Stru, ek weet nie . . . Van my hegte vriende sê dis omdat ek ’n hart vir mense het.”

Daar’s ’n krakie in sy stem en jy kan hoor hoe vroetel hy met sy sakdoek.

“Ek is nie ’n baie slim man nie. Maar ek ken God. Ek loop al dertig jaar die pad met Hom saam. Al wat ek dié naweek gedoen het, was om vir die mans te vertel wat God vir my gedoen het. En om hulle aan te moedig dat Jesus dit ook vir hulle kan doen.

“Ek’s ’n koninkryk-man, nie ’n em-pire-bouer nie. Ek rokkel nie mense van hul kerke af nie, maar motiveer hulle om in te skakel by hul kerkgemeenskappe.” Hy’t nie sy eie kerk nie, was nooit Bybelkollege toe nie, maar is deur die skool van die lewe.

Hy bly ’n oomblik stil. Bedink weer my vraag.

“Almal van ons het iewers ’n droom om iets te word, iets te beteken. My droom is om mense se lewe aan te raak. Dis nou ver oortref.”

Geloof ís Angus Buchan se lewe. Van 18 Februarie 1979, toe hy in ’n Greytownse kerkie opgestaan het vir God, deur sy lewe van misoeste en geil lande as aartappelboer, deur nege boeke, waarvan die treffer Faith Like Potatoes ’n fliek geword het, loop geloof . . . “tot by hierdie tent hier buite, die grootste ter wêreld. Miljoene rande het die afgelope twee maande deur my hande gegaan, in by die een hand, uit by die ander. Ons het nie begroot nie, God het betaal.”

Nie een keer het Angus Buchan van die verhoog af geld gevra nie. Geen mandjies is rondgestuur nie.

As jy glo, sê hy eenvoudig, sal God voorsien.

“Die naweek was ’n pluimpie vir julle Afrikaanssprekendes, julle was daar in jul menigte – 90% was Afrikaans. Wónderlik. Ek’s ’n Ingelsman. Ek’t vir God gevra hoekom gebruik Hy my en nie ’n Afrikaanse dominee nie . . .”

Hy’t dertig jaar gelede in Greytown aangekom en met níks ’n lewe begin. “Dis hoekom ek Suid-Afrika so liefhet. Dié land het vir my ’n lewe gegee.”

Onlangs in Australië, was hy tussen oud-Suid-Afrikaners wat huis toe verlang. “Mense moet besef hulle vat hul eie probleme saam, waar hulle ook al gaan. Voordat jy loop, stryk dit éérs uit. En onthou, elke land het maar sy probleme.

“As God vir jou sê jy moet gaan, dan moet jy. Maar as God dit nié sê nie, moet jy bly.”

Hoe gaan jy weet?

“Deur stiltetyd. Nie net ’n paar minute nie, die eerste uur van jou dag. As jy daarmee aanhou, sal jy hoor wat God vir jou sê.”

Hoekom Mighty Men – dis net ’n paar letters weg van Macho Men? En hoekom was vroue nie welkom nie?

Hy skater van die lag.

“Ek hoor sommer jy’s ’n regte Afrikaanse meisie wat reguit vrae vra! Ek’s ’n man vir reguit antwoorde.

“Die Bybel praat van Dawid se ‘mighty men who achieved great feats for God’. In ons samelewing word manlikheid afgebreek, mans verloor hul selfbeeld en selfvertroue, hulle voel ontoereikend. Hulle sleep ’n klomp pyn met hulle saam, uit die kinderjare, diensplig, regstellende aksie, afgeneemde plase . . .

“Ek het gevoel God wou hê ons moet die naweek gebruik om mans se manlikheid te herstel, om hulle weer ‘mighty men to God’ te maak.”

Mans moet weer hul regmatige plek in die huis inneem. “En dis nie bókant die vrou nie, maar langs haar. Praat maar met Jill, my vrou, my beste vriend . . . sy sal dádelik vir jou sê ek’s nie haar baas nie!

“As ’n man sy verantwoordelikhede abdikeer, word die vrou onseker en die kinders ongedissiplineerd. En dit kring uit na die hele land.

“Ek is ’n gesinsman, maar God het my dit op die hart gedruk om dié konferensie te reël j?is ter wille van vroue en kinders. Want hul mans en pa’s is stukkend.

“Hier, alleen, kon hulle sonder skaamkry voor die vroue práát oor hul woede, bitterheid, vrees, en die Heilige Gees kans gee om hulle gesond te maak.

“Dit het gewérk. Daar was soveel trane. Manne wat hul koppe op my skouer sit, wat dit nog nooit reggekry het om dinge net te laat gáán nie.

“Dit was nie ’n naweek van grappies of vermaak nie. Herlewing kom deur trane en gebrokenheid. Dit begin in die huis, waar gesinne weer verenig moet word. Dan kring dit uit, op en op, tot in die parlement!”

Hy lag saggies. “Nó? raak ek aan die brand!”

Maar die eintlike toets kom eers volgende week, volgende maand, as alles weer in die ou groewe terugval. As al die emosies van sy Mighty Men-saamtrek afgeblaas het soos ’n ou trekkerband . . .

Gaan dit hó??

“Ja, ek glo so, want dit was nie m?ne nie, dit was Gód se konferensie. Die bewyse daarvan sal in die pelgrims se lewe en getuienis wees. Ek het gepraat oor práktiese Christenskap, oor lewe-in-Jesus.

“Dis wat ek wéét: As ons na God terugdraai, sal Hy ons land genees. Dit het dié naweek begin.”

Hy bly ’n oomblik peinsend stil. Ver in die agtergrond hoor jy mense roep.

Dan sê hy, ter afsluiting: “As dit nié hou nie, dan’t ons gróót probleme in hierdie land. Die land het ’n tekort aan leierskap, aan mighty men.”

Lank nadat ons gegroet het, lank ná sy kort totsiens-gebed, verbeel ek hom nog daar op sy plaas. In sy blokkieshemp en boerehoed, met sy kenkuiltjie en glimlag.

Nederige dienskneg. Mighty man

Analysis: A Mideast nuclear war?

2008-03-10T06:06:00.001-07:00

Analysis: A Mideast nuclear war?
By MARTIN WALKER (UPI Editor Emeritus)
Published: November 22, 2007
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Anthony Cordesman may be the most influential man in Washington that most people have never heard of. A former director of intelligence assessment for the secretary of defense and director of policy and planning in the Department of Energy, he is now the top strategic guru at the Center for Strategic & International Studies.

Most serious politicians and journalists have for some years based their analyses of the Iraq war and its aftermath on his universally respected research. Cordesman is a facts man who likes and reveres good data and cool, clinical analysis as the keystones of policymaking.

He has now turned his laser-like research and forensic intelligence skills to studying the real implication of the endless diplomatic minuet at the United Nations over Iran's nuclear ambitions. In the real world, this matters mainly because an Iranian nuclear capability would transform the power balance in the wider Middle East, and leave the region and the rest of us living under the constant prospect of a nuclear exchange between Iran and Israel.

This would mean, Cordesman suggests, some 16 million to 28 million Iranians dead within 21 days, and between 200,000 and 800,000 Israelis dead within the same time frame. The total of deaths beyond 21 days could rise very much higher, depending on civil defense and public health facilities, where Israel has a major advantage.

It is theoretically possible that the Israeli state, economy and organized society might just survive such an almost-mortal blow. Iran would not survive as an organized society. "Iranian recovery is not possible in the normal sense of the term," Cordesman notes.

The difference in the death tolls is largely because Israel is believed to have more nuclear weapons of very much higher yield (some of 1 megaton), and Israel is deploying the Arrow advanced anti-missile system in addition to its Patriot batteries. Fewer Iranian weapons would get through.

The difference in yield matters. The biggest bomb that Iran is expected to have is 100 kilotons, which can inflict third-degree burns on exposed flesh at 8 miles; Israel's 1-megaton bombs can inflict third-degree burns at 24 miles. Moreover, the radiation fallout from an airburst of such a 1-megaton bomb can kill unsheltered people at up to 80 miles within 18 hours as the radiation plume drifts. (Jordan, by the way, would suffer severe radiation damage from an Iranian strike on Tel Aviv.)

Cordesman assumes that Iran, with less than 30 nuclear warheads in the period after 2010, would aim for the main population centers of Tel Aviv and Haifa, while Israel would have more than 200 warheads and far better delivery systems, including cruise missiles launched from its 3 Dolphin-class submarines.

The assumption is that Israel would be going for Iran's nuclear development centers in Tehran, Natanz, Ardekan, Saghand, Gashin, Bushehr, Aral, Isfahan and Lashkar A'bad. Israel would also likely target the main population centers of Tehran, Tabriz, Qazvin, Isfahan, Shiraz, Yazd, Kerman, Qom, Ahwaz and Kermanshah. Cordesman points out that the city of Tehran, with a population of 15 million in its metropolitan area, is "a topographic basin with mountain reflector. Nearly ideal nuclear killing ground."

But it does not end there. Cordesman points out that Israel would need to keep a "reserve strike capability to ensure no other power can capitalize on Iranian strike." This means Israel would have to target "key Arab neighbors" - in particular Syria and Egypt.

Cordesman notes that Israel would have various options, including a limited nuclear strike on the region mainly inhabited by the Alawite minority from which come the ruling Assad dynasty. A full-scale Israeli attack on Syria would kill up to 18 million people within 21 days; Syrian recovery would not be possible. A Syrian attack with all its reputed chemical and biological warfare assets could kill up to 800,000 Israelis, but Israeli society would recover.

An Israeli attack on Egypt would likely strike at the main population centers of Cairo, Alexandria, Damietta, Port Said, Suez, Luxor and Aswan. Cordesman does not give a death toll here, but it would certainly be in the tens of millions. It would also destroy the Suez Canal and almost certainly destroy the Aswan Dam, sending monstrous floods down the Nile to sweep away the glowing rubble. It would mean the end of Egypt as a functioning society.

Cordesman also lists the oilwells, refineries and ports along the Gulf that could also be targets in the event of a mass nuclear response by an Israel convinced that it was being dealt a potentially mortal blow. Being contained within the region, such a nuclear exchange might not be Armageddon for the human race; it would certainly be Armageddon for the global economy.

So in clear, concise and chillingly forensic style, Cordesman spells out that the real stakes in the crisis that is building over Iran's nuclear ambitions would certainly include the end of Persian civilization, quite probably the end of Egyptian civilization, and the end of the Oil Age. This would also mean the end of globalization and the extraordinary accretions in world trade and growth and prosperity that are hauling hundreds of millions of Chinese and Indians and others out of poverty.

Cordesman concludes his chilling but dismayingly logical survey with the warning: "The only way to win is not to play

Analysis: Iran's secret Syrian plan

2008-03-10T05:58:00.000-07:00

http://www.metimes.com/International/2007/11/19/analysis_irans_secret_syrian_plan/7451/
Analysis: Iran's secret Syrian plan
By OLIVIER GUITTA
Published: November 19, 2007
Syria's President Bashar Assad. Some Lebanese commentators say Syria's alliance with Iran should not be a reason to isolate it from the Arab fold by boycotting next month's Arab summit in Damascus, saying this would only deepen the inter-Arab rifts and push Damascus further into Tehran's lap. (KRT via Newscom)
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Israel has been providing intelligence and satellite images to the U.S. about a secret Syrian nuclear program for several months, according to media reports. Discussions between Israel and the United States took place last summer regarding a possible strike. But when Israel found the matter so pressing that when they realized the U.S. was not ready to act, on September 6 they attacked a Syrian nuclear site. Hence the question: what is Syria really up to or more to the point what is Iran up to?

First, let's start with an underreported explosion that occurred in a Syrian military base outside Aleppo on July 26. Jane's Defense Weekly reported, citing Syrian defense sources, as saying the explosion took place during a test to fit a "Scud C" missile with a mustard-gas warhead. It quoted the sources as saying the explosion occurred when fuel caught fire in the missile production laboratory.

But there might be another explanation. Kuwait's Al Seyassah newspaper recently reported that a Shiite Lebanese religious cleric claimed the Iranians were allegedly supervising a chemical weapons manufacturing program and that tens of Iranian experts and engineers died as a result of that explosion. He also said Israelis attacked the base. He added that Western officials told him they received proof from Israel on the Syrian chemical weapons program. Even if Israel's involvement is not proven, what remains sure is that it must be very happy that a chemical weapons facility in Syria has been partly destroyed.

Now regarding the September 6 strike; while we may never know what really occurred, what remains sure is that the situation is direr than one could imagine and that most likely, Israel did not just bomb a nuclear site in the early stages. Indeed, the silence of the international community and especially the Arab world after the attack is a first, and it shows the gravity of what happened. Even though Syria and its Iranian sponsor are detested, and in the case of Iran feared, in the Muslim world, the fact that there was no condemnation of Israel at the U.N. could be interpreted as a tacit relief that Israel acted.

Another proof of what transpired came from ranking Republicans on the House Intelligence and Foreign Relations committees, Ileana Ros-Lehtinen and Peter Hoekstra, who were briefed on the Israeli strike and sworn to secrecy. They wrote an op-ed in the October 20 Wall Street Journal clearly underlining the seriousness of the situation regarding both the North Korean and Iranian involvement in the Syrian arms program.

Finally, the fact that the Bush administration (including President George W. Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney and most notably Defense Secretary Robert Gates) has been ramping up the rhetoric and taking action against Iran (including the latest sanctions against the Iranian Revolutionary Guards) in the past week, might also be linked to what really happened in Syria.

The Syrian story is far from over: in fact, on October 23, Al Seyassah ran a story about potential new secret nuclear sites in Syria. According to Western sources cited by the paper, it is possible that Syria is developing other nuclear sites with the help of North Korea, Iran and Iraqi experts, the latter who fled their country at the start of the Iraq war in 2003. In fact, observation satellites have allegedly located in Syria at least two other sites similar to the one destroyed by Israel last month.

Iran's handwriting is all over the wall from the chemical to the nuclear arms program in Syria. Indeed, in research conducted last year as part of an article published in Washington's The Examiner, this reporter delved into Syrian's secret nuclear program, making the point that Syria might actually be "Plan B" for Iran. By helping develop nuclear sites in Syria, strikes on Iran might turn out to be useless. This was a smart strategy until Israel bombed the Syrian nuclear site on September 6 and made the world notice.

UN warns of new face of hunger

2008-02-25T23:14:00.001-08:00

UN warns of new face of hunger

26 February 2008 07:17
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The United Nations on Monday warned that it no longer has enough money to keep global malnutrition at bay this year in the face of a dramatic upward surge in world commodity prices, which have created a "new face of hunger".

"We will have a problem in coming months," said Josette Sheeran, the head of the UN's World Food Programme (WFP). "We will have a significant gap if commodity prices remain this high, and we will need an extra half-a-billion dollars just to meet existing assessed needs."

With voluntary contributions from the world's wealthy nations, the WFP feeds 73-million people in 78 countries, less than a 10th of the total number of the world's undernourished. Its agreed budget for 2008 was $2,9-billion. But with annual food-price increases around the world of up to 40% and dramatic hikes in fuel costs, that budget is no longer enough even to maintain current food deliveries.

The shortfall is all the more worrying as it comes at a time when populations, many in urban areas, who had thought themselves secure in their food supply, are now unable to afford basic foodstuffs. Afghanistan has recently added an extra 2,5-million people to the number it says are at risk of malnutrition

"This is the new face of hunger," Sheeran said. "There is food on shelves but people are priced out of the market. There is vulnerability in urban areas we have not seen before. There are food riots in countries where we have not seen them before."

WFP officials say the extraordinary increases in the global price of basic foods were caused by a "perfect storm" of factors, including a rise in demand for animal feed from increasingly prosperous populations in India and China, the use of more land and agricultural produce for biofuels, and climate change.

The impact has been felt around the world.

Food riots have broken out in Morocco, Yemen, Mexico, Guinea, Mauritania, Senegal and Uzbekistan, and Pakistan has reintroduced rationing for the first time in two decades. Russia has frozen the price of milk, bread, eggs and cooking oil for six months. Thailand is also planning a freeze on food staples.

After protests around Indonesia, Jakarta has increased public food subsidies. India has banned the export of rice, except the high-quality basmati variety.

"For us, the main concern is for the poorest countries and the net food buyers," said Frederic Mousseau, a humanitarian policy adviser at Oxfam. "For the poorest populations, 50% to 80% of income goes on food purchases. We are concerned now about an immediate increase in malnutrition in these countries, and the landless, the farm workers there, all those who are living on the edge."

Much of the blame has been put on the transfer of land and grains to the production of biofuel. But its impact has been outweighed by the sharp growth in demand from a new middle class in China and India for meat and other foods, which were previously viewed as luxuries.

"The fundamental cause is high income growth," said Joachim von Braun, the head of the International Food Policy Research Institute. "I estimate this is half the story. The biofuels is another 30%. Then there are weather-induced erratic changes, which caused irritation in world food markets. These things have eaten into world levels of grain storage.

"The lower the reserves, the more nervous the markets become, and the increased volatility is particularly detrimental to the poor, who have small assets."

The impact of climate change will amplify that already dangerous volatility. Record flooding in West Africa, a prolonged drought in Australia and unusually severe snowstorms in China have all had an impact on food production.

"The climate-change factor is so far small but it is bound to get bigger," Von Braun said. "That is the long-term worry and the markets are trying to internalise it."

The WFP is holding an emergency meeting in Rome on Friday, at which its senior managers will meet board members to brief them on the scale of the problem. There will then be a case-by-case assessment of the seriousness of the situation in the affected countries, before the WFP formally asks for an increased budget at its executive board meeting in June.

But the donor countries are also facing higher fuel and transport costs. For the biggest US food-aid programme, non-food costs now account for 65% of total programme expenditure.

Global impact: Where inflation bites deepest

1. United States
The last time America's grain silos were so empty was in the early Seventies, when the Soviet Union bought much of the harvest. Washington is telling the WFP it is facing a 40% increase in food commodity prices compared with last year, and higher fuel bills to transport it, so the US, the biggest single food aid contributor, will radically cut the amount it gives away.

2. Morocco
Thirty-four people jailed this month for taking part in riots over food prices.

3. Egypt
The world's largest importer of wheat has been hard hit by the global price rises, and most of the increase will be absorbed in increased subsidies. The government has also had to relax the rules on who is eligible for food aid, adding an extra 10,5-million people.

4. Eritrea
It could be one of the states hardest hit in Africa because of its reliance on imports. The price rises will hit urban populations not previously thought vulnerable to a lack of food.

5. Zimbabwe
With annual inflation of 100 000% and unemployment at 80%, price increases on staples can only worsen the severe food shortages.

6. Yemen
Prices of bread and other staples have nearly doubled in the past four months, sparking riots in which at least a dozen people were killed.

7. Russia
The government struck a deal with producers last year to freeze the price of milk, eggs, vegetable oil, bread and kefir (a fermented milk drink). The freeze was due to last until the end of January but was extended for another three months.

8. Afghanistan
President Hamid Karzai has asked the WFP to feed an extra 2,5-million people, who are now in danger of malnutrition as a result of a harsh winter and the effect of high world prices in a country that is heavily dependent on imports.

9. Pakistan
President Pervez Musharraf announced this month that Pakistan would be going back to ration cards for the first time since the 1980s after the sharp increase in the price of staples. These will help the poor (nearly half the population) buy subsidised flour, wheat, sugar, pulses and cooking fat from state-owned outlets.

10. India
The government will spend 250-billion rupees on food security. India is the world's second biggest wheat producer but bought 5,5-million tonnes in 2006, and 1,8-million tonnes last year, driving up world prices. It has banned the export of all forms of rice other than luxury basmati.

11. China
Unusually severe blizzards have dramatically cut agricultural production and sent prices for food staples soaring. The overall food inflation rate is 18,2%. The cost of pork has increased by more than half. The cost of food was rising fast even before the bad weather moved in, as an increasingly prosperous population began to demand as staples agricultural products previously seen as luxuries. The government has increased taxes and imposed quotas on food exports, while removing duties on food imports.

12. Thailand
The government is planning to freeze prices of rice, cooking oil and noodles.

13. Malaysia and the Philippines
Malaysia is planning strategic stockpiles of the country's staples. Meanwhile, the Philippines has made an unusual plea to Vietnam to guarantee its rice supplies. Imports were previously left to the global market.

14. Indonesia
Food price rises have triggered protests and the government has had to increase its food subsidies by over a third to contain public anger.

FAQ: Food prices
Few winners and many losers

What is the problem?
In the three decades to 2005, world food prices fell by about three-quarters in inflation-adjusted terms, according to the Economist food prices index. Since then they have risen by 75%, with much of that coming in the past year. Wheat prices have doubled, while maize, Soya and oilseeds are at record highs.

Why are food prices rising?
The booming world economy has driven up prices for all commodities. Changes in diets have also played a big part. Meat consumption in many countries has soared, pushing up demand for the grain needed by cattle. Demand for biofuels has also risen strongly. This year, for example, one third of the US maize crop will go to make biofuels. Moreover, the gradual reform and liberalisation of agricultural subsidy programmes in the US and Europe have reduced the butter and grain mountains of yesteryear by eliminating overproduction.

Who are the winners and losers?
Farmers are the obvious winners, as are poor countries that rely extensively on food exports. But consumers are having to pay more, and the urban poor in many developing states will be hardest hit, as they often spend more than a third of their income on food.

How long are prices likely to be high?
The US Department for Agriculture says the country's wheat stocks are at their lowest for 50 years and demand will continue to exceed supply this year. There is potential to bring more land into production in countries such as Ukraine, but that could take time. And as all foodstuffs have risen sharply in price there is little incentive for farmers to switch from one crop to another.

What about the EU's common agricultural policy?
High food prices certainly remove the need to subsidise farmers and so there is a chance, say experts, that badly needed reductions in CAP subsidies, which cost European taxpayers dearly, could now be within reach.

Are other commodity prices also rising?
Oil, metals and coal have seen their prices rise strongly as the global economy has expanded rapidly, driving up demand for almost everything, particularly from emerging economies such as China and India. Some economists think speculation may also play a part. Disappointed by the subprime collapse and falling property values in many countries, investors have piled money into commodities. -- guardian.co.uk © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2008

Sheep Aids hits hundreds of farms

2008-02-25T01:34:00.001-08:00

Sheep Aids hits hundreds of farms

February 25 2008 at 07:22AM

By Karen Breytenbach

The Department of Agriculture has appealed to Western Cape sheep farmers to remain calm in the face of the spread to hundreds of farms of Ovine Johne's Disease, better known as "sheep Aids" because of the emaciation it causes.

The disease was first detected on 47 farms in Caledon, Ceres and Mossel Bay a decade ago, but has slowly spread to hundreds of farms, especially in the Caledon area and Southern Cape. Some cases were also reported in Cradock in Eastern Cape.

But the Western Cape Agriculture Department has moved to reassure farmers that their interests would be protected. "The situation is under control, we have vets working on it full-time," said spokesperson Alie van Jaarsveld.

Click here!

'The situation is under control'
Johne's Disease (OJD), or paratuberculosis, is a chronic and contagious disease found worldwide, characterised by persistent diarrhoea, weight loss, debilitation and eventual death.

It is considered a problem in South Africa because it is hard to detect and can cause losses of up to 20 percent of sheep in very infected flocks.

During a 1996/7 survey of 1 718 farms, when 47 showed infection, tests were ineffective, causing half of infected farms to skip detection.

Van Jaarsveld said an official count of sheep affected was not available yet, but the mutton market could suffer if it spread further and it was decided on slaughtering.

For now, the Small Stock Health Advisory Body has urged that heavily infected areas be declared "OJD Control Areas" to allow free movement of live
animals within these confines, but to prevent their transportation to the outside world, except for slaughter.
'We have vets working on it full-time'

The body also advised farmers to vaccinate their sheep and announced the requirement of vendor declarations on their flocks' OJD status.

OJD surveys would be conducted in areas that had not so far come across infection.

Van Jaarsveld said the enforcement of the Animal Disease Regulations, requiring the isolation and slaughter of infected animals and the isolation and testing of all animals in contact with them, would hit sheep farmers hard.

"In an effort to minimise this impact, but at the same time to prevent spread of this disease to uninfected flocks and areas, the veterinary services... launched an intensive round of workshops and meetings with the view to formulate a policy to address this situation," Van Jaarsveld said.

This led to the formation of the advisory body, which will present its final policy proposals to Agriculture Minister Lulu Xingwana and provincial authorities for acceptance and promulgation into law.

The provincial department would also provide funding for post-graduate research on OJD.

# karen.breytenbach@inl.co.za

Isaiah 30 (New International Version)

2008-02-03T09:50:00.000-08:00

Isaiah 30 (New International Version)

New International Version (NIV)

Isaiah 30

Woe to the Obstinate Nation

1 "Woe to the obstinate children,"
declares the LORD,
"to those who carry out plans that are not mine,
forming an alliance, but not by my Spirit,
heaping sin upon sin;

2 who go down to Egypt
without consulting me;
who look for help to Pharaoh's protection,
to Egypt's shade for refuge.

3 But Pharaoh's protection will be to your shame,
Egypt's shade will bring you disgrace.

4 Though they have officials in Zoan
and their envoys have arrived in Hanes,

5 everyone will be put to shame
because of a people useless to them,
who bring neither help nor advantage,
but only shame and disgrace."

6 An oracle concerning the animals of the Negev:
Through a land of hardship and distress,
of lions and lionesses,
of adders and darting snakes,
the envoys carry their riches on donkeys' backs,
their treasures on the humps of camels,
to that unprofitable nation,

7 to Egypt, whose help is utterly useless.
Therefore I call her
Rahab the Do-Nothing.

8 Go now, write it on a tablet for them,
inscribe it on a scroll,
that for the days to come
it may be an everlasting witness.

9 These are rebellious people, deceitful children,
children unwilling to listen to the LORD's instruction.

10 They say to the seers,
"See no more visions!"
and to the prophets,
"Give us no more visions of what is right!
Tell us pleasant things,
prophesy illusions.

11 Leave this way,
get off this path,
and stop confronting us
with the Holy One of Israel!"

12 Therefore, this is what the Holy One of Israel says:
"Because you have rejected this message,
relied on oppression
and depended on deceit,

13 this sin will become for you
like a high wall, cracked and bulging,
that collapses suddenly, in an instant.

14 It will break in pieces like pottery,
shattered so mercilessly
that among its pieces not a fragment will be found
for taking coals from a hearth
or scooping water out of a cistern."

15 This is what the Sovereign LORD, the Holy One of Israel, says:
"In repentance and rest is your salvation,
in quietness and trust is your strength,
but you would have none of it.

16 You said, 'No, we will flee on horses.'
Therefore you will flee!
You said, 'We will ride off on swift horses.'
Therefore your pursuers will be swift!

17 A thousand will flee
at the threat of one;
at the threat of five
you will all flee away,
till you are left
like a flagstaff on a mountaintop,
like a banner on a hill."

18 Yet the LORD longs to be gracious to you;
he rises to show you compassion.
For the LORD is a God of justice.
Blessed are all who wait for him!

19 O people of Zion, who live in Jerusalem, you will weep no more. How gracious he will be when you cry for help! As soon as he hears, he will answer you. 20 Although the Lord gives you the bread of adversity and the water of affliction, your teachers will be hidden no more; with your own eyes you will see them. 21 Whether you turn to the right or to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you, saying, "This is the way; walk in it." 22 Then you will defile your idols overlaid with silver and your images covered with gold; you will throw them away like a menstrual cloth and say to them, "Away with you!"

23 He will also send you rain for the seed you sow in the ground, and the food that comes from the land will be rich and plentiful. In that day your cattle will graze in broad meadows. 24 The oxen and donkeys that work the soil will eat fodder and mash, spread out with fork and shovel. 25 In the day of great slaughter, when the towers fall, streams of water will flow on every high mountain and every lofty hill. 26 The moon will shine like the sun, and the sunlight will be seven times brighter, like the light of seven full days, when the LORD binds up the bruises of his people and heals the wounds he inflicted.

27 See, the Name of the LORD comes from afar,
with burning anger and dense clouds of smoke;
his lips are full of wrath,
and his tongue is a consuming fire.

28 His breath is like a rushing torrent,
rising up to the neck.
He shakes the nations in the sieve of destruction;
he places in the jaws of the peoples
a bit that leads them astray.

29 And you will sing
as on the night you celebrate a holy festival;
your hearts will rejoice
as when people go up with flutes
to the mountain of the LORD,
to the Rock of Israel.

30 The LORD will cause men to hear his majestic voice
and will make them see his arm coming down
with raging anger and consuming fire,
with cloudburst, thunderstorm and hail.

31 The voice of the LORD will shatter Assyria;
with his scepter he will strike them down.

32 Every stroke the LORD lays on them
with his punishing rod
will be to the music of tambourines and harps,
as he fights them in battle with the blows of his arm.

33 Topheth has long been prepared;
it has been made ready for the king.
Its fire pit has been made deep and wide,
with an abundance of fire and wood;
the breath of the LORD,
like a stream of burning sulfur,
sets it ablaze.

South Africa - Civil War or Peaceful split?

2008-01-27T14:08:00.000-08:00

South Africa - Civil War or Peaceful split?

South Africa - Civil war or Peaceful split?
By Mike Smith – Cape Town 9 December 2007

Watching the current power struggle within the ANC, it is clear that the party can no longer exist in its current form after the Polokwane conference or in the run-up to the 2009 elections. A split is inevitable. This will be no peaceful divorce. The split will be messy and we will see similar scenes as that of the early ‘90s; Xhosas against Zulus, Communism against Tribal Nationalism, basically one big orgy of violence and death.

In the early ‘90s the white population of South Africa was mostly excluded from this fight and it was only the army and police who actually got involved trying to keep the sides separate. This time around it will be different. Whites will be sucked into this future conflict and it will be during this time that we might see the Afrikaners reclaiming their two Boer Republics. The Zulu’s will claim KwaZulu Natal and the Cape Coloureds along with some liberal whites will claim the Cape. This break-up of South Africa is a serious possibility if we look at some examples.

The first example is the former Yugoslavia, an artificially created Kingdom since 1918 and an artificially created Socialist state since 1943, until its breakup in 1991. Yugoslavia today are split up into six independent countries and two autonomous provinces and it serves as an example of what happens when different races, cultures and religions are forced together in the name of multiculturalism, diversity and “Nation building”. It is artificial and it cannot last!

We further saw in Yugoslavia that the Communist never give up land or grants a people autonomous rule without a fight. The various freedom wars were bloody and the conflicts are still not fully solved, as can be noted in Kosovo.

A bloody civil war is not always the answer. Are there examples of countries that have had peaceful splits? Yes certainly.

Norway peacefully separated from Sweden in 1905. Norway's growing dissatisfaction with the union with Sweden during the late 19th century combined with nationalism prompted the dissolution of the union. After a national referendum confirmed the people's preference for a monarchy over a republic, the Norwegian government offered the throne of Norway to the Danish Prince Carl and Parliament unanimously elected him king. He took the name of Haakon VII, after the medieval kings of independent Norway. Today the relationship between Norway and Sweden is better than it ever was when they were in a union.

Czechoslovakia is another example. In February 1948 the Communists seized power, winning an electoral victory in May. The country was divided into 19 regions and, in 1960, into 10 regions plus Prague and Bratislava. During the 1960’s there were some uprisings and calls for democratic change, but in 1968 the USSR sent 600,000 troops to brutally suppress these demonstrations and return rule to the orthodox line.

Influenced by events elsewhere in Eastern Europe, a series of initially student-led pro-democracy rallies were held in Prague in November 1989. The 10 million Czechs saw economic reform as more important than State reform, which was high on the priority list of the 5 million Slovaks. Instead of fighting and blocking each other, the Czechs and the Slovaks decided that a split would be in the best interest of both sides. Many people who were opposed to the split, said that it would be catastrophic, but it went smoothly. Buildings in the Czech part were given to the Czechs and those in Slovakia to the Slovaks. Moving assets and debt were split up evenly and the Czech Republic and the Slovak Republic became sovereign states on 1 January 1993.

Recently we have seen the creation of the Scottish parliament, giving the Scots more self rule and it might even lead to an independent Scotland in the future. I certainly will not rule that possibility out.

In Belgium we see the Dutch speaking Flemish wanting to break away from the French speaking Wallonians. The Flemish are economically stronger than the Wallonians and so strong is the cultural and language divide between these two groups, that less than one percent of all Belgium marriages are between Flemish and Wallonians; this in a country where these two groups are both white and Christian. People there say that the split is coming soon, it is only a matter of time and the fuse of the powder keg is burning ever shorter. I certainly hope that the split will be a peaceful one.

If we now turn our attention to South Africa, it is only logical to deduce that South Africa will go the same way as Yugoslavia. South Africa was also artificially created in 1910. The two British colonies of the Cape and Natal along with the two former Boer Republics of the ZAR and the Orange Freestate, were forced together into the Union of South Africa and former autonomous states were reduced to mere provinces. When the ANC took over, they made it nine provinces and artificially created what Mandela refers to as “The Rainbow Nation”. South Africa has nine official languages and fourteen major tribes or ethnic groupings, each with its own distinct culture, traditions and religion. It is madness to think that these groups will live “peacefully” together for much longer. The Marxist, terrorist ANC’s policies of multiculturalism and ethnic diversity is a ticking nuclear time bomb, let alone a burning fuse on a powder keg.

My prediction is that the break up of South Africa will start in KwaZulu-Natal with some student uprisings. The Zulus want to be independent; next will follow the two Boer Republics and lastly the Cape. It is during this time that other smaller nations will also claim independence and new borders will be defined.

A peaceful split would definitely be in the best interest of all, but somehow I do not think it will be possible; not as long as the Communists are in control of South Africa.

Zechariah 14

2008-01-18T11:57:00.000-08:00

10And from Geba to Rimmon in the Negeb, all the land shall turn into a plain; but Jerusalem shall remain exalted in its place. From the Gate of Benjamin to the place of the First Gate, to the Corner Gate; and from the Tower of Hananel to the king's wine presses,
11: they shall occupy her. Never again shall she be doomed; Jerusalem shall abide in security.
12: And this shall be the plague with which the LORD shall strike all the nations that have fought against Jerusalem: their flesh shall rot while they stand upon their feet, and their eyes shall rot in their sockets, and their tongues shall rot in their mouths.
13: On that day there shall be among them a great tumult from the LORD: every man shall seize the hand of his neighbor, and the hand of each shall be raised against that of his neighbor.

woord vir die dag ...........................gee net so 6 maande

14: Judah also shall fight against Jerusalem. The riches of all the surrounding nations shall be gathered together, gold, silver, and garments, in great abundance.
15: Similar to this plague shall be the plague upon the horses, mules, camels, asses, and upon all the beasts that are in those camps.
16: All who are left of all the nations that came against Jerusalem shall come up year after year to worship the King, the LORD of hosts, and to celebrate the feast of Booths.
17: If any of the families of the earth does not come up to Jerusalem to worship the King, the LORD of hosts, no rain shall fall upon them.
18: And if the family of Egypt does not come up, or enter, upon them shall fall the plague which the LORD will inflict upon all the nations that do not come up to celebrate the feast of Booths.
19: This shall be the punishment of Egypt, and the punishment of all the nations that do not come up to celebrate the feast of Booths.
20: On that day there shall be upon the bells of the horses, "Holy to the LORD." The pots in the house of the LORD shall be as the libation bowls before the altar.
21: And every pot in Jerusalem and in Judah shall be holy to the LORD of hosts; and all who come to sacrifice shall take them and cook in them. On that day there shall no longer be any merchant in the house of the LORD of hosts.

Zuma: 'n geleentheid vir die Afrikaner?

2008-01-05T02:03:00.001-08:00

Zuma: 'n geleentheid vir die Afrikaner?

Geskryf deur Dan Roodt

Woensdag, 19 Desember 2007

Teen dié tyd weet almal dat Jacob Zuma die ANC-leierskapsverkiesing loshande gewen het met 2 329 stemme teenoor Mbeki se 1 505. Die Zuma-faksie het ook skoonskip gemaak sover dit die res van die hoogste posisies in die party betref.

Dat Zuma daarin geslaag het om Mbeki te klop, is geen geringe prestasie nie. Immers geniet Mbeki die steun van die sakewêreld, die media, die koloniale mag Brittanje wat hom oor die afgelope jare konstant met Suid-Afrika bemoei, asook die oorblyfsels van die vorige Afrikaner-establishment in die vorm van Nasionale Pers, Marthinus van Schalkwyk en die Afrikanerbond. Een van die segsmanne van dié groepering, prof. Willie Esterhuyse, het ŉ sleutelrol onder Mbeki gespeel om hom van inligting te voorsien oor hoe Afrikaners beter verdeel en verdruk kon word.

Met Zuma se verkiesing betree die land ŉ nuwe, potensieel stormagtige fase. Terwyl Zuma oor die afgelope jaar of twee uitgereik het na Afrikaners, is sy oorwinning egter ook verseker deur die linkse faksie in die vorm van Cosatu, die ANC-jeugliga en die SAKP. Watter invloed die linkse faksie oor hom uitoefen, is in dié stadium nog onseker.

Vanuit die buiteland gaan daar groot druk op Zuma toegepas word om nie te veel aan Suid-Afrika se ekonomiese beleid te torring nie. As ons praat van die buiteland, dan is dit veral Groot Brittanje wat sal poog om soos altyd in die verlede ons binnelandse beleid te beïnvloed om Britse belange voorop te stel.

Die mynhuise word hoofsaaklik uit Londen beheer en dus sal Brittanje wil sien dat mynwinste en –produksie nie geraak word nie. Daarteenoor staan Brittanje, asook die vele Britse nie-regeringsorganisasies wat in die land bedrywig is, radikale grondhervorming voor sodat Afrikanerboere finaal van hul eiendom ontneem kan word. Soos mnr. Willie Lewies van die TLU dit al so dikwels gestel het, sal die grondlose Afrikaner in daardie geval ŉ “swerwersvolk” word.

Die Boer-Britstryd gaan dus onder Zuma se presidentskap voortduur en afhangend van wie se kant hy kies, sal Afrikaners dit moet ontgeld, aldan nie. Vanweë die feit dat Brittanje, asook die VSA, tot dusver die Mbeki-faksie geondersteun het, wil dit voorkom asof Afrikaners darem ŉ billike kans staan om invloed op ŉ Zumaregering uit te oefen. Sodoende kan ons boere, asook Afrikaanse onderwys en kultuur, van die gewisse ondergang gered word waarvoor hulle onder Mbeki bestem was.

Op Pietersburg was die ANC duidelik sterk verdeel tussen die Zuma- en Mbeki-faksies. Die vraag is nou: kan die ANC in die afsienbare toekoms in twee skeur? Myns insiens is dié moontlikheid glad nie uitgesluit nie. Die Mbeki-faksie het nog glad nie gaan lê ná die bloedneus by die partykongres nie. Hulle beheer nog steeds die staatsapparaat en mag dit gebruik om Zuma nog verder in hofsake vas te draai of hom selfs tronk toe te stuur. In so ŉ geval sal die Zuma-faksie waarskynlik tot revolusionêre optrede in die vorm van massa-aksie, betogings en selfs die bestorming van die Uniegebou oorgaan om die Mbeki-faksie uit die kussings te lig.

Soos gesê, geniet Mbeki steeds die steun van Brittanje en kan die Britte via hul magtige media en hul intelligensiediens allerlei planne bedink om Zuma uit die weg te ruim, letterlik of figuurlik.

Wat Afrikaners egter moet besef, is dat die volgende twee jaar aan ons geleenthede bied om te midde van die grootskaalse verdeeldheid in ANC-geledere, asook die Britte wat beheer begin verloor, ons belange te bevorder en moontlik selfs terug te keer na die politieke spel in Suid-Afrika.

Hoewel hy taamlik onvoorspelbaar is en te eniger tyd ŉ ommeswaai kan maak, is die populistiese Zuma ŉ interessante figuur in die SA politiek. Anders as Mandela of Mbeki, word hy nie soos ŉ marionet vanuit Engeland beheer nie en geniet hy steun op voetsoolvlak en veral onder Zoeloes. Hy is die spreekwoordelike swart Piet in die pak kaarte wat die spel deurmekaar kan krap.

Ons Afrikaners moet nou begin saamstaan en kyk of ons nie hier ŉ paar kastaiings uit die vuur kan krap nie. Reeds meer as ŉ jaar gelede het ŉ klein groepie van ons die versiendheid gehad om te sien dat daar ŉ magsverskuiwing aan die kom was en het daarom vroegtydig met Zuma gesprek begin voer. Hierdie gesprekke moet voortgaan en ons moet probeer om in ruil vir Afrikanersteun toegewings van Zuma te verkry, veral indien hy onder druk van die Mbeki-faksie, die Britte, asook Groot Besigheid in Suid-Afrika, sou kom.

Die logika van “my vyand se vyand is my vriend” wil hê dat Zuma die Afrikaner se vriend is. Dit mag ook wees dat die Afrikaner-Zoeloe-alliansie waaroor daar al jare lank in regse Afrikanerkringe gedroom word, met Zuma se hulp tot stand kan kom.

So iets sal egter slegs gebeur indien Afrikaners met verbeelding, intelligensie en vasberadenheid begin optree.

Iranian Navy receives stealth-capable submarine - national TV

2007-12-26T12:35:00.001-08:00

Iranian Navy receives stealth-capable submarine - national TV
17:31

28/ 11/ 2007

TEHRAN, November 28 (RIA Novosti) - Iran's Navy commissioned Wednesday a domestically designed and produced light submarine featuring extended stealth capability and strong firepower, state television reported.
The submarine, dubbed Ghadir, is reportedly fitted with noise-reduction features and is capable of firing missiles and torpedoes simultaneously.
"This submarine is equipped with advanced weapons and electronics systems. It has been developed in the last decade by [Iranian] scientists and engineers," a TV program quoted Navy commander, Admiral Habib Sayyari, as saying.
The admiral also said the Navy commissioned a destroyer and a missile boat.
According to various intelligence reports, Iran has been spending a considerable share of its defense budget on modernizing its naval forces over the last decade.
"The Iranian Navy - surface ships, submarines and naval bases - is equipped with all the necessary modern weaponry, including missiles," Sayyari said. "Their [the missiles] range is sufficient to protect effectively our southern flank in the Persian Gulf."
In a separate development, Iran, which received no invitation to the Mideast peace conference in Annapolis, announced on Tuesday that it had produced a ballistic missile with a range of 2,000 kilometers (1,240 miles). The missile's range would allow it to reach Israel, as well as United States military bases in the Middle East.
http://en.rian.ru/world/20071128/89970209.html

Russia to sell advanced air defense systems to Iran - 2

2007-12-26T12:34:00.000-08:00

Russia to sell advanced air defense systems to Iran - 2
18:01

26/ 12/ 2007

(Adds Russian official's quote, details on Tor-M1 crew training in paras 13-14)
TEHRAN, December 26 (RIA Novosti) - Iran signed a contract with Russia on Tuesday for the delivery of advanced S-300 air defense missile systems to the Islamic Republic, an Iranian news agency reported on Wednesday.
An advanced version of the S-300 missile system, called S-300PMU1 (SA-20 Gargoyle), has a range of over 150 kilometers (about 100 miles) and can intercept ballistic missiles and aircraft at low and high altitudes, making this system an effective tool for warding off possible air strikes on Iran.
"S-300 air defense systems will be delivered to Iran under an earlier contract signed with Russia," the Fars news agency quoted Iranian Defense Minister Mostafa Mohammad Najjar as saying.
The minister provided no contract details or a schedule for future deliveries, Fars said.
The signing of the deal follows last week's session of the Russian-Iranian commission on military-technical cooperation in Tehran, where the sides reviewed existing agreements and discussed future steps to extend cooperation in the military sphere.
The closest western equivalent of the S-300 is the U.S. MIM-104 Patriot system or the U.S. Navy RIM-66 Standard Missile 2 (SM-2).
U.S. authorities have repeatedly called on Russia to stop arms deliveries to countries whose political regimes Washington disapproves of, including Iran.
However, Russian President Vladimir Putin said in October that Russia would not take into consideration attempts to impose arms deal restrictions "based on unilateral and politicized assessments".
He also said deliveries of Russian weapons were aimed exclusively at increasing the defense capability of the countries receiving them, and at maintaining their stability.
Russia earlier supplied Iran with 29 Tor-M1 air defense systems under a $700-million contract signed in late 2005.
In February, Tehran successfully tested Tor-M1s during a military exercise by the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps in southern Iran.
The Iranian defense minister said on Wednesday that during last week's meeting Russian and Iranian officials discussed the possibility of using Russian experts to train the crews of Iranian Tor-M1 systems in the Islamic Republic.
Meanwhile, a senior Russian military official said that dozens of Iranian Tor-M1 specialists, including radar operators and crew commanders had already completed training in Russia in 2006 and 2007.
"They [the Iranians] have successfully completed the training program and returned home," said Colonel General Nikolai Frolov, commander of the Ground Forces' air defense.

XDR-TB is taking its toll on patients

2007-12-04T04:43:00.001-08:00

XDR-TB is taking its toll on patients
14 November 2007, 09:23
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By Louise FlanaganSouth Africa has identified 481 extremely drug-resistant tuberculosis patients so far - and nearly half have died.Statistics from the Department of Health show that 216 XDR-TB patients died by the end of last month, while almost 90 percent of the survivors - 235 - were in hospital. The department recorded just five patients who defaulted on treatment and three more who had not started treatment.Gauteng has seen 37 patients, or 8 percent of the total. Of these, 11 have died and 20 are being treated in hospitals.The biggest caseload is in KwaZulu Natal, the province where the disease was first identified in early 2005. It has seen 188 cases, or 39 percent of the country's total.The Eastern Cape has the second-highest burden, with 157 patients (33 percent), followed by the Western Cape with 64 (13 percent) and then Gauteng.The department said the statistics reflected only true XDR-TB cases.XDR-TB is TB which is resistant to the two first-line drugs used against TB plus at least two of the six main classes of second-line drugs.The Health Ministry emphasised yesterday that all confirmed XDR-TB patients would be admitted to multi-drug-resistant TB units until they tested negative, which usually took at least six months.
This article was originally published on page 2 of The Star on November 14, 2007

Why quarantine may backfire

2007-12-04T04:39:00.000-08:00

Why quarantine may backfire
Created: Wednesday, November 14, 2007
Recently a patient was shot and a guard stabbed when XDR-TB patients were protesting at the Sizwe hospital in Edenvale. According to reports the patients were unhappy with some of the medicines they were receiving and wanted passes allowing them to leave the hospital.

AdvertisementThe incident illustrates some of the difficulties regarding enforced isolation of XDR-TB patients and is symbolic of what some critics consider to be the department of health's harsh response to the threat posed by XDR-TB.In fact, at some sessions at last week's 38th Union World Conference on Lung Health the general feeling seemed to be that forced isolation is not the most effective way to face the threat of XDR-TB.
According to Nathan Geffen, spokesperson for the Treatment Action Campaign,incarceration is a bad idea for various reasons, which he lists as follows:
It is at hospitals and clinics that most XDR infections are taking place.
It can never be done on a scale that would make a significant difference to the epidemic.
It scares people off getting screened for TB and therefore might have a very deleterious effect on managing the epidemic.
People who get locked up without having committed a crime realise their human rights are being breached. Sometimes they riot, as happened at Sizwe hospital. It's particularly cruel to incarcerate people with fatal diseases for six months or more, especially children.
In a statement on the issue, the South African Medical Research Council warns that, "Public anxiety coupled with the risk that XDR-TB may rise to epidemic levels in SA is putting increased pressure on government and public health authorities for quarantine of patients and coercive measures to curtail the spread of XDR-TB. The dual stigma associated with TB and HIV, now compounded by XDR-TB, poses a real risk of driving the XDR-TB problem underground, especially if isolation measures are coercive. This is a situation that SA can ill afford."
Perspective on the diseaseAccording to Judy Seidman, writing in the Mail and Guardian, quarantine of actively infectious people forms a standard part of the medical response to drug-resistant TB. The emphasis here is very strongly on "actively infectious."
She points out that, "many people with TB (and even XDR-TB) are not infectious. Patients who do not cough do not spread infection through the air. Patients who respond to treatment are no longer infectious after the drugs take effect. Patients need to be quarantined only until the drugs start to work - for days, not weeks or months."
On a similar note, much of the societal concern with drug-resistant forms of TB seems to be based on misconceptions regarding the disease.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), drug-resistant forms of TB are not more infectious than strains that are not drug resistant. In fact since they are less prevalent, the risk of being infected is much lower.
According to the WHO, "the majority of healthy people with normal immunity may never become ill with TB, unless they are heavily exposed to infectious cases who are not treated or who have been on treatment for less than about one week. Even then, 90% of people infected with TB bacteria never develop TB disease. This applies to XDR-TB as well as to ‘ordinary’ TB."
Why HIV ups the riskThus, unless your immunity is compromised and you are in relatively close contact with an infected person in a closed space, the risk of infection is very low. This is why there is a particularly high risk of drug-resistant forms of TB spreading in hospitals. The compromised immunity is also what places HIV-infected people at a higher risk.
The WHO writes that, "People with HIV infection, however, in close contact with a TB patient, are more likely to catch TB and fall ill. The TB patients whom they meet should be encouraged to follow good cough hygiene, for example, covering their mouths with a handkerchief when they cough, or even, in the early stages of treatment, using a surgical mask, especially in closed environments with poor ventilation."
The way forwardVoices at the conference generally seemed to be in favour of a decentralised, community-based model in the fight against drug-resistant TB.
According to Geffen, "What we've got to do is improve infection control in health facilities."
"XDR patients should be educated on infection control measures (e.g. cough etiquette, maybe wearing masks and a few other simple measures) that can reduce the risk of them passing on the disease," he said.
Government not budgingThe department of health, however, seems very much to be keeping the focus on the isolation of infected persons.
Presenting South Africa's new plan to fight TB at last week's conference, the director general of the department of health, Thami Mseleku, said the department is looking for ways to make it easier to commit people with drug-resistant tuberculosis to treatment facilities against their will.
Until now, health authorities had to get a high court order every time they wanted to commit someone who posed a danger to the community.
"We're still exploring the alternatives," he said. The department was looking for clauses in existing legislation that would allow "a general approach to the matter".
On the legality of enforced isolation, the MRC writes that, "current health legislation in SA empowers authorities to detain patients with infectious diseases until the disease no longer poses a public health threat, thereby allowing quarantine restrictions to be enforced for a limited period. Herein lies the dilemma: many XDR-TB patients may have untreatable disease and confinement would have to be until death or, conceivably, could be indefinite. From a human rights perspective prolonged isolation could, without sufficient procedural safeguards, violate several SA Constitutional rights and international human rights law."
According to Seidman, the media's response, like that of the government, has been rather one-dimensional. She writes, " These articles present arguments saying we should protect ourselves by harsh “control” of sick people, even where this negates their human -- and constitutionally guaranteed -- rights. This theme has become our most common response to XDR-TB."
False sense of securityIn the New England Journal of Medicine, researchers write that, "excessive reliance on compulsory measures can lull the public into a false sense of security and at the same time prompt people who are at risk to do exactly what Speaker did — run." (Andrew Speaker is an American man who fled from authorities after being diagnosed with drug-resistant TB.)
They continue writing that, "fortunately, most persons infected with tuberculosis want treatment and have no desire to infect others. When clinicians and health officials work with patients and have their trust, most will co-operate. By ensuring that coercion is used only when less restrictive alternatives will not work and with due regard for the rights of those detained, the law can foster public trust, minimizing the need for compulsion and laying the groundwork for the comprehensive and costly control programs needed to prevent the spread of XDR tuberculosis and other contagious pathogens."
- (Marcus Low, Health24)
Sources:

SOUTHERN AFRICA: Struggling with soaring cereal prices

2007-12-04T04:22:00.001-08:00

SOUTHERN AFRICA: Struggling with soaring cereal prices
Photo: IRIN
Bread is not on the menuJOHANNESBURG, 12 October 2007 (IRIN) - Record high wheat prices globally are forcing consumers in Southern Africa to dig deeper into their pockets: the price of bread has almost doubled since the beginning of the year, and according to the UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), have already caused food riots in some parts of the world.Wheat and maize prices have been at their highest in the past few months: the price of yellow maize doubled from an average of US$88 per metric tonne (mt) in 2000 to $177 per mt in February 2007, while the price of wheat rose from an average of $119 per mt in 2000 to $277 per mt in August 2007. The combination of higher export prices and soaring freight rates has pushed up domestic prices of bread and other basic foodstuffs in importing developing countries, hitting the group of Low-Income Food-Deficit countries particularly hard, said Paul Racionzer, of the FAO's Global Information and Early Warning System. A drop in production has been reported in major exporting countries – which are also among the leading stockholders – notably the United States, where stocks are forecast to sink to a 10-year low of 11 million mt, as well as in Australia, Canada and the European Union (EU), said the FAO's Crop Prospects and Food Situation report for October. "Among other countries, sharply smaller stocks are forecast for Egypt, Morocco, Tunisia, Turkey, and nearly all major wheat producing countries in the CIS [Commonwealth of Independent States]." Racionzer said lower wheat production in major exporting countries was expected to result in a drawdown of at least 14 million mt in world inventories to 143 million mt, the lowest in 25 years. Consequently, the price of wheat has shot up to an all-time high of $343 per mt, compared to $208 per mt at the same time in 2006. "Those high prices have spilled over to other markets, impacting on the prices of most other cereals," he commented. "Higher grain prices are wearing through the food chain, increasing the cost of many basic food items, which has already led to social unrest in some countries such as Uzbekistan, Yemen and Morocco." Drought-hit Southern African countries are net importers of wheat, and in Namibia and Botswana the price of bread has almost doubled since January. But the FAO is particularly concerned over the impact of high wheat prices on Swaziland and Lesotho, which had their worst-ever harvest. "The cost of importing the wheat will put a huge strain on their economies," said James Breen, the FAO's Regional Emergency Agronomist.
Higher grain prices are wearing through the food chain, increasing the cost of many basic food items, which has already led to social unrest in some countries such as Uzbekistan, Yemen and Morocco Swaziland's annual cereal production this year was 22kg per head, while Lesotho produced 38kg per head, against an annual requirement of 180kg per head in both countries, according to the report on a joint FAO and World Food Programme crop and food supply assessment mission. Unable to access maizemeal, their staple food, the Swazis and the Basotho have had to buy bread, which has become at least 20 percent more expensive since the beginning of 2007. In South Africa the cost of wheat is 125 percent higher than it was in 2005, a local magazine, The Farmers' Weekly, pointed out. Phumzile Mdladla, who heads the Southern Africa office of the USAID-funded Famine Early Warning Systems Network (FEWS-NET), said the price of wheat had almost doubled, from $246 per mt in October 2006 to an average of $455 per mt last week, which was higher than the international price. Earlier in the year, political organisations in South Africa suggested fixing the price of bread, but this was ruled out by the government. "Food security has two legs, namely availability and affordability," said Jannie de Villiers, head of the South African Chamber of Baking, the national millers' association, who welcomed the government’s response. "The free market in agriculture has proven very successful in assuring the availability of food to all South Africans. We have, however, in the past ten years of deregulation experienced two cycles of very high food prices, which seriously impact on the affordability of food to especially the poor and vulnerable groups in our communities." The industry had not only had to contend with sharply higher wheat prices, but ever-increasing fuel costs. "The distribution cost constitutes almost a third of the total cost of baking and distributing bread," said de Villiers. "We are doing our utmost to delay passing on these huge spikes in our wheat and flour prices." The outlook According to the FAO's Racionzer, production could improve next year. "In the United States, conditions are generally favourable for fieldwork, and although planting has got off to a slower start than normal, early indications all point to the likelihood of a record area." Winter wheat crops for harvest in 2008 are already being planted.
Unable to access maizemeal, their staple food, the Swazis and the Basotho have had to buy bread, which has become at least 20 percent more expensive since the beginning of 2007 The EU has removed its 10 percent obligatory set-aside requirement for 2008, which could return up to an estimated three million hectares of arable land to production for the season, he added. Under the requirement, producers had to set aside a defined percentage of their declared areas to limit cereal production in the EU. In a press release in late September, the EU said removal of the set-aside should increase the 2008 cereals harvest by at least 10 million mt; intervention stocks have shrunk from 14 million mt at the beginning of 2006/07 to around one million mt at present. Racionzer said, "Early indications from the large producing areas in eastern Europe also suggest that farmers have intentions to plant larger wheat areas if weather and inputs allow." However, based on the latest forecasts for world production and utilisation in the FAO's latest Crop Prospects and Food Situation report, global cereal stocks, including wheat, are expected to stand at 420 million mt by the close of the seasons in 2008. This is unchanged from the reduced opening levels, and only three million mt above the 20-year low in 2004. "The food price situation is not going to improve any time soon," said the FAO's Breen

http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportId=74758

FEWS Southern Africa Food Security Outlook Oct 2007 - Mar 2008

2007-12-04T04:13:00.001-08:00

FEWS Southern Africa Food Security Outlook Oct 2007 - Mar 2008
This report covers the period from 9/13/2007 to 10/30/2007
The FEWS NET Outlook for Southern Africa incorporates the findings from six country outlooks for the period October 2007 to March 2008. This outlook provides a basis for regional and global resource allocation and contingency planning, as well as in-country planning. This report summarizes the results of this process for Southern Africa, highlighting what FEWS NET believes are the major threats to food security in the period October 2007 to March 2008.
The most likely regional food security scenario between October 2007 and March 2008 is a continued decline in food security conditions in areas now facing moderate to high levels of food insecurity as noted above. The exception is Zimbabwe, where the situation as at end of September is expected to improve marginally between October and December, as the number of areas with high levels of food insecurity declines as a result of improvements in emergency interventions. The situation will however deteriorate again between January and March, during which the hunger season peaks, and more districts become moderately food insecure. This analysis takes into account the regional seasonal forecast which in general indicates a normal to above normal rainfall season for the period of the outlook.
The worst case scenario would arise if the assumptions under the most likely scenario do not hold, and instead, conditions deteriorate leading to extremely high levels of food insecurity, particularly in Zimbabwe and southern and central Mozambique, countries which face moderate to extreme food insecurity even in the most likely scenario. The situation would be further exacerbated if rainfall performance is poor with a delayed start and/or lengthy dry spells. Extreme levels of food insecurity will arise in parts southern Mozambique in the period October to December; while in Zimbabwe, most extreme levels would occur in the January to March 2008 period.
In Lesotho and Swaziland, where widespread food insecurity has been assessed, the situation is likely to be mitigated through on-going emergency interventions targeted at vulnerable households. However adequate assistance will depend on improvements in the responses to appeals for resources by governments and humanitarian agencies. Currently the UN appeals for emergency assistance are 18 percent funded in Swaziland, and 49 percent in Lesotho.

Uganda: Forecast for 2008 - Famine, Floods, Fear And Fighting

2007-12-04T04:07:00.000-08:00

http://allafrica.com/stories/200709210989.html

COLUMN21 September 2007Posted to the web 21 September 2007
Timothy Kalyegira
For most of the year since about February, something strange has come over Kampala. A city, usually warm and pleasant all year round, has taken on the chilly weather often associated with high altitude western Ugandan towns like Kabale and Fort Portal.
A few of us who enjoy sleeping nude can no longer do so. We are now experiencing the much-dreaded effects of the climate change, so long forewarned about.
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At the beginning of August as the rainy season started, the United Nations' Food and Agricultural Organisation, in a report, spoke optimistically about the prospects for a good food harvest in several countries of West Africa.
Sure enough the rain came. But this was not rain. It was something maniacal. When you start getting 12 inches of rain in a week, it becomes the worst of nightmares. In this case, they are worst nightmares in living memory for Africa.
The casual and often quoted remarks by some politicians from northern Uganda that should the National Resistance Movement government continue to neglect the north, it will break off and form a Nile Republic, appeared to inadvertently come to reality.
Vital bridges over rivers in Acholi and Teso have been destroyed by the greatest floods in more than 60 years, if not more. Access by road to many parts of the north has become impossible. By an act of nature, a Nile Republic virtually cut off from the rest of Uganda has been created.
The government this week declared a state of emergency. (The last time such a state was declared was in December 1969 over Buganda, in the aftermath of the attempted assassination of president Milton Obote.)
Take a look at a map and see the African countries that have most been affected by the current deluge of rain: Uganda, Mali, Rwanda, Nigeria, Ethiopia, Senegal, Chad, Ghana, Sudan, Kenya, Niger, Togo, the Gambia, Burkina Faso, Guinea-Bissau, and Mauritania.
By some strange coincidence, these are the same countries that are either in the grip of civil war, are on the verge of or in a delicate state in which civil war is always possible or live in the neighbourhood of centres of conflict.
Even away from my endless talk of a seer's predictions, more conventional sources speak much the same thing. In its annual review of the year 1984, Compton Encyclopedia stated: "In 1984 famine continued to threaten millions of Africans, particularly in the southern, eastern, and Sahelian regions of the continent....The drought damaged the economies of almost half of the continent's 51 countries and contributed to further reductions in food production."
It continues: "Forecasting the situation by 2008, the UN Economic Commission for Africa warned of 'unimaginable poverty and a proliferation of shanty town full of beggars, delinquents, and job-hunters engaged in a desperate struggle for survival.'" (Compton's Yearbook, 1985, page 5).
What does all this mean?
Already, a crisis that seldom makes front-page news has been creeping upon the world. It is the rising world food prices. As world oil prices have risen and the Middle East remained unstable, there has been a move away from fossil fuels like petroleum to increasing experimentation with fuel extracted from ethanol.
Most ethanol is taken from maize, wheat, and cow dung. Because of this, a large stock of world maize (or in American English, corn) production has been diverted to the production of ethanol.
So, the world has sought to fight high oil prices and the pollution of the earth's climate by turning to cereals --- which is now, most ironically, producing a new crisis, the shortage of food and increase in world food prices.
What are the costs of this?
In Africa, 18 countries (a third of the 53 countries) have seen their harvest devastated by massive flooding. Much of the world, from Asia to Europe and North America, has also experienced abnormal heavy rains and floods, with millions of acres of farm land destroyed.
After these massive rains will obviously come an extended period of drought and dry conditions. This means that in the next two years, even the World Food Programme will start finding it difficult to raise the emergency food it needs to help stricken areas.
Relevant Links
East Africa Climate Sustainable Development Uganda
Imagine a combination of a world food shortage, high and rising world food prices, extremes of weather that is either dust or floods, then world oil prices recently reaching new record highs of more than 83 US dollars a barrel (or drum).
To all this, add the civil wars gathering steam in or near the same 18 African countries that have been treated to a Biblical Noah-like floods and suddenly (if it had not yet occurred to you, 2008) starts looking like a year of disaster with no compare.
We are about to witness the social conditions portrayed in Charles Dickens' novels or depressing urban life, with millions of people reduced to a grim, animal-like existence.

HUMAN POPULATION AND GLOBAL WARMING

2007-12-01T09:50:00.000-08:00

HUMAN POPULATION AND GLOBAL WARMING
By Gary W. Harding
The relationship between humans and the state of the ecosystem is not only dependent upon how many people there are, but also upon what they do. When there were few people, the dominant factors controlling ecosystem state were the natural ones that have operated for millions of years. The human population has now grown so large that there are concerns that they have become a significant element in ecosystem dynamics. One of these concerns is the relationship between human activities and climate, particularly the recent observations and the predictions of global warming, beginning with the alarm sounded by W. Broecker (1975).
The relationships among humans, their activities and global temperature can be assessed by making the appropriate measurements and analyzing the data in a way that shows the connections and their magnitudes. Human population can be closely estimated and the consequences of their activities can be measured. For example, the volume of carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide emissions is an indicator of human's energy and resource consumption. An examination of population size, atmospheric concentrations of these gases and global temperature relative to time and with respect to each other is presented here to demonstrate the relations among these factors.
POPULATION GROWTH
Many of us have seen linear graphs of human population showing the enormous growth in the last two centuries. However, significant changes in population dynamics are lost in the exponential growth and long time scales. If the data are replotted on a log-population by log-time scale, significant population dynamics emerge. First, it is apparent that population growth has occurred in three surges and second, that the time between surges has dramatically shortened (Deevey, 1960).
Figure 1. Population (Log-population verses log-time since 1 million years ago). Time values on x-axis, ignoring minus sign, are powers of 10 years before and after 1975 (at 0). Vertical dashed-line at 1995. Filled circles for known values are to left of 1995 and open circles on and to right of 1995 are for projected values. (Data updated from Deevey, 1960).
Deevey's 1960 graph has been brought up to date in Figure 1 to reflect what has been learned since then. The data have been plotted relative to 1975 with negative values before 1975 and positive values thereafter. The reason for this will become clear below. The values of the time scale, ignoring the minus signs, represent powers of 10 years.
It has been argued that a population crash occurred about 65,000 years ago (-4.8, Fig. 1), presumably due to the prolonged ice-ages during the preceding 120,000 years (Gibbons, 1993). Humans came close to perishing and Neanderthal became extinct. However, by 50,000 years ago (-4.6, Fig. 1), humans had generated population mini-explosions all around the planet. Deevey's data for population size since 500 years ago have been replaced with more recent estimates taken from The World Almanac, (1992 - 1995) including population projections out to 2025. A vertical dashed-line has been placed at 1995. Filled symbols for the known values are to the left of it and open symbols on and to the right of it are for values projected into the short-term future.
The first surge coincides with the beginning of the cultural revolution about 600,000 years ago, interrupted by the population crash 65,000 years ago. Population size rebounded 50,000 years ago and then growth slowed considerably. The second surge began with the agricultural revolution about 10,000 years ago and was followed by slow growth. Deevey argued that moving down the food chain was the underlying cause of this large and rapid spurt. The timing of the present surge matches the rise of the industrial-medical revolution 200 years ago.
A relation between innovation and population growth is embedded in the log-log plot. There was rapid growth at the start of each surge. Then, growth rate slowed as people adapted to the precipitating innovations. Each surge increased the population more than 10-fold. It appears that we are nearing the end of the present surge as recent growth rates have declined. After the initial spurt, subsequent innovations did not perpetuate growth rates. The only significant innovations were those that produced the next surge. However, accumulated innovations during the surges may have played a role in the eventual decline in population growth rates. Starting with high birth and death rates, death rate declines and longevity increases, but birth rates stay high. Some time later, birth rates decline so that eventually, net births minus deaths produces slow growth. The result is a spurt in population size. When referring to the industrial revolution, this phenomenon has been called the "demographic transition". It appears that this dynamic may have occurred twice before.
The decreases in time between surges suggests that, if past behavior is the best predictor of future behavior, we are due for another surge. It may have already begun, as indicated by the upturn in the projections at the right end of the curve in Figure 1. What might the basis for another surge be? One can think of several possibilities, including the "green revolution" and the "global economy". A dominant element in past surges has been innovations in energy use (e.g., fire, descending the food-chain, beasts of burden, fossil fuels, high-energy agriculture). Thus, the development of an abundant and cheap energy source would have a profound effect. Another 10-fold (or more) surge would produce a population of 60 to 125 billion.
GLOBAL TEMPERATURE AND GREENHOUSE GASES
Figure 2. Greenhouse Gases and Mean Global Temperature (Greenhouse gas concentrations and mean global temperature verses time). Time scale same as in Fig. 1. Gas-concentration data have been normalized to the 0 to 1 scale on left: CO2 (squares) - 190 to 430 ppm; CH4 (triangles) - 600 to 2400 ppb; N2O (diamonds) - 280 to 340 ppb. Mean global temperature (circles) plotted relative to oC on right. Vertical dashed-line at 1995, horizontal dotted line at maximum CO2 concentration and global temperature over human history before 1990. Filled and open symbols same as in Fig. 1. Projections in short-term future are based upon continuation at current growth rates. (Data measured from graphs in Gribbin, 1990 and Khalil and Rasmussen, 1992).
Mean-global-temperature (MGT) is related to the concentration of greenhouse gases (carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, water vapor and other trace gases) in the atmosphere. The most prevalent greenhouse gas is carbon dioxide (CO2). It has been shown that there is a strong relation between the atmospheric concentration of CO2 and MGT over the last 160,000 years (Gribbin, 1990). It has been suspected that the burning of fossil fuels and the clearing of land has reached such proportions that these activities have precipitated a significant increase in atmospheric CO2 concentration. The concentrations of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere have been directly measured since about 1960 and have been determined over the more distant past from air-bubbles trapped in old Antarctic, Greenland and Siberian ice and from deep-sea sediments. Mean-global-temperature has also been measured directly over the last few decades. Estimates of global temperature in the distant past have been deduced from a variety of sources. From these data, the relation among atmospheric greenhouse-gas concentrations, MGT and time is illustrated in Figure 2.
The time scale in Figure 2 is the same as that in Figure 1. Because CO2, methane (CH4) and nitrous oxide (N2O) concentrations have different scales, the data have been normalized on a 0 to 1 scale on the left. For CO2 (squares; Gribbin, 1990), 0 is equivalent to 190 parts per million (ppm) and 1 is equivalent to 430 ppm. For CH4 (triangles; R. Cicerone in Gribbin, 1990), the range is 600 to 2400 parts per billion (ppb). For N2O (diamonds; Khalil and Rasmussen, 1992), the scale is 280 to 340 ppb. Mean global temperature (circles; Gribbin, 1990) has been graphed relative to the degrees-centigrade scale on the right. The vertical dashed-line is the same as that in Figure 1. The horizontal dotted-line is the highest CO2 concentration and temperature in human history before 1990. Greenhouse-gas concentrations and MGT in the short-term future are based upon continuation at the current growth rates. This will be justified in another context below.
Figure 3. Population and Global Warming (CO2 concentration and mean global temperature verses log-population) CO2 concentration (circles) and mean global temperature (squares) plotted relative to their absolute scales, ppm on the left and oC on the right, respectively. Vertical dashed line at 1995. (Data from Figs. 1 and 2)
It is clear that the concentrations of all three gases have increased exponentially since 1950 (-1.4, Fig. 2) and that MGT has done so since 1975. Carbon dioxide concentration began to rise in conjunction with the use of fossil fuels after 1850. Although methane comes from a variety of sources, including plant decay, termites and bovine flatulence, CH4 concentration rises at the same time as CO2. This is probably due to its association with fossil-fuel production. Nitrous oxide concentration does not begin to rise until 1950. At this time, the use of human-made fertilizers and internal-combustion-engine exhaust increased dramatically. Ten thousand years ago (-4, Fig. 2), MGT increased substantially just as the agricultural revolution got started. Over the previous 200,000 years, the ecosystem was dominated by ice-ages. Projected MGT in 2025 (1.7, Fig. 2) is about 17oC, 1.5oC higher than in human history prior to 1990.
POPULATION AND GLOBAL TEMPERATURE
We have seen in Figures 1 and 2 that recent population, atmospheric greenhouse-gas concentrations and MGT have grown exponentially over about the same time-course. The relation of CO2 and MGT relative to population size can be observed by graphing these variables as above. Figure 3 shows this graph, where the log of population replaces log-time and CO2 concentration (circles) and MGT (squares) are plotted relative to their absolute scales, ppm on the left and oC on the right, respectively. The vertical dashed-line denotes 1995, as in Figures 1 and 2. When the population reached 4 billion in 1975, the converging relation between population and the other two variables becomes apparent.
The magnitude of the relations in Figures 2 and 3 can be determined by calculating the correlation coefficient between pairs of variables. Table 1 lists these coefficients for the population, greenhouse-gas concentration and MGT variables that we have been examining. The coefficients for the relations during the industrial revolution, 1800 through 1994, are above the diagonal of the table. The coefficients since 2000 years ago through 1994 are below the diagonal. Over the past 2000 years, there is a nearly perfect correlation between the concentration of greenhouse gases and population and between the greenhouse gases themselves. However, the correlations between both population and greenhouse-gas concentrations and MGT (bottom row) are not as strong. After 1800, the latter correlations increase to near perfection (rightmost column). The conclusion from the graphs and table is that there is a strong relationship among population size since 1800, greenhouse-gas concentrations and MGT.
TABLE 1. Correlation coefficients among population size, atmospheric greenhouse-gas concentrations and mean global temperature (1800 through 1994 above the top-left to bottom-right diagonal, n=10; 2000 years ago through 1994 below the diagonal, n=15).
Pop CO2 CH4 N2O Temp
Pop .996 .984 .977 .916
CO2 .990 .994 .974 .942
CH4 .991 .992 .949 .945
N2O .959 .943 .942 .932
Temp .718 .716 .728 .829
GLOBAL WARMING AND CLIMATE
Determining that there is a strong relation between population size and global warming does not tell us what the underlying mechanisms are. However, documentation of the relationship between human activities and the release of greenhouse gases produces a strong inference that population size and global warming are closely related (Gribbin, 1990).
Forecasting the future is risky business. Growth rates for greenhouse-gas concentrations and MGT could decline from those at present due to unanticipated innovations or natural events. For example, volcanoes can spew enough ash into the atmosphere to block sunlight and temporarily reduce MGT slightly. However, short-term continued growth at current rates is probably an underestimate. Although population growth rate has slowed, the population is still growing. The dominating factor is that per-capita energy and resource consumption rates are increasing much faster than the population. This is not only due to anticipated increases in standards of living in underdeveloped countries, but also to future increases in the demand for energy in the developed countries (e.g., air conditioning) as summer temperatures rise. Since most of the energy will come from fossil fuels, at least for the next few decades, we can expect the atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases and MGT to rise in the short-term future at a faster rate than they have recently. As MGT rises, water vapor, another greenhouse component, will become a more and more significant factor due to increased evaporation.
Although a 1.5oC increase in MGT above where we were in 1990 (1990 to 2025 in Fig. 2) does not seem like much of a change, it is enough to precipitate major changes in climate. A 1.5oC drop in MGT from where we were in 1990, for example, would put the ecosystem on the verge of an ice-age. Already, there is a suspicion that, since 1975, the persistent El Nino is the first sign of the relation between global warming and climate (Kerr, 1994). As MGT increases further, we can expect more frequent and severe hurricanes and perpetual summertime droughts in many places, particularly in the US Midwest. Paradoxically, more intense winter storms will occur in some places and climatic conditions for agriculture will improve in some areas, such as in Russia (Gribbin, 1990; Bernard, 1993).
There has been considerable debate over the ecosystem's carrying capacity for humans. If we define that carrying capacity as the level that the ecosystem can support without changing state more than it has over the duration of human history, then Figures 2 and 3 indicate that we exceeded that capacity in 1975. This is the point in time where exponential growth began to push MGT along a path which has taken it outside the previous range. This does not necessarily mean that humans could not survive if MGT is about 2oC higher than it has ever been in their history. However, we will have to adapt to a radically different climate pattern and, if MGT goes any higher than that, there could be disastrous problems.
If MGT continues to increase beyond 2025 to 4oC above that in 1990, high-northern-latitude temperatures could be as much as 10oC higher than at the equator. The Arctic ice-cap would begin to melt and the permafrost under the tundra would start thawing out. As a consequence, a thick layer of rotting peat would contribute further to atmospheric CO2 and CH4 concentrations (Gribbin, 1990). With a number of human-made and natural positive-feedback elements in operation simultaneously, a threshold could be crossed (Meyers, 1995; Overpeck, 1996). Are these risks that we should be willing to take for the sake of short-term gains?
REFERENCES
Bernard, H. W. Jr., "Global Warming Unchecked", Indiana Univ. Press, Bloomington, 1993
Broecker, W., Science, 189:460, 1975
Deevey, E. S., Scientific American, 203:195, 1960
Gibbons, A. , Science, 262:27, 1993
Gribbin, J. , "Hothouse Earth", Grove Weidenfeld, New York, 1990
Kerr, R. A., Science, 266:544, 1994
Khalil, M. A. K. and R. A. Rasmussen, J. Geophys. Res., 97:4651, 1992
"The World Almanac", Pharos, New York, 1992 - 1995
Meyers, N. Science 269:358, 1995
Overpeck, J. T. Science, 271:1820, 1996
Post Script
After this document was written (about a 2 years ago), two books came out which provide much more detail relevant to some of these issues:
HOW MANY PEOPLE CAN THE EARTH SUPPORT? by Joel E. Cohen; Norton, 1995.
DIVIDED PLANET: THE ECOLOGY OF RICH AND POOR by Tom Athanasiou; Little Brown, 1996.
Both are superbly done and provide a much more comprehensive and up to date treatment of the population and economic topics included here.
Recent evidence (Mora et al.; SCIENCE 271:1105, 1996) indicates that the possibility of a "greenhouse runaway" on Earth is much more remote than indicated at the end of the previous version of this document. Therefore, the former apocalyptic ending has been changed. Although the data presented points to a catastrophic conclusion, this was (perhaps) an overstatement of the case.

http://members.aol.com/trajcom/private/popco2.htm

Food prices: Africa shows first signs of trouble

2007-11-23T12:50:00.000-08:00

Recent violent unrest over soaring food prices in several West African nations points to new signs of trouble on a continent where nearly half the people live on a dollar a day, experts warn.After Mauritania and Morocco, Senegal this week was the latest country hit by violent protests.The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation chief Jacques Diouf last month warned of a "risk of social and political troubles in Third World nations in the months or years to come" due to the global rise in cereal prices."Soaring international prices have obviously had much more impact in the countries that depend a lot on imports for their [food] needs," UN World Food Programme (WFP) spokesperson for West Africa Stephanie Savariaud told Agence France-Presse.The mounting demand for biofuels and escalating prices of fossil fuels mean farmers cultivate less food in preference of fast cash-spinning biofuel crops.And the internationally rising oil prices are reflected in imported food costs."The growing demand for biofuels and the high prices of fossil fuel have a dramatic impact on millions of people," said Savariaud."Food prices in Mauritania, Guinea-Bissau and Senegal shot up steeply in 2007," she said, citing countries that depend heavily on imported staples.In the vast and arid Mauritania, where national cereal output is less than 30% of needs, the price of imported flour shot up nearly 100% -- from $200 per ton last year to $360 in September, according to WFP.Shops there were vandalised and torched earlier this month to protest spiralling food prices, leaving one person dead and 17 wounded.In Morocco, about 50 people were injured during September food protests.Escalating food prices have affected almost every nation on the continent, but so far without sparking the kind of violent outbreaks witnessed in West Africa, home to the greatest number of the world's most poverty-stricken countries.Chances of controlling the high food bills are not easy in the short term, warned FAO chief of Global Information and Early Warning System, Henri Josserand."It is something that cannot be changed quickly," he said."Prospects are not good for countries that strongly rely on imports because in the short-to-medium term, we forecast that food prices will remain extremely firm, at least in the next 10 years," Josserand said.Countries are therefore left with no choice but to change dietary habits by substituting imports with local produce, said Josserand. But home-grown food production is also threatened by climate change, with the continent facing desertification and in cases oscillating between extreme conditions of droughts and floods.Climate change might mean African countries that depend on rain for food production would harvest half their normal output 12 years from now, WFP chief Josette Sheeran warned during a visit to West Africa last week.Climate change, rising food prices and population growth could combine to create a "perfect storm" on the continent, she said.Already in the Democratic Republic of Congo, for example, three-quarters of the 60-million people don't have enough food and 1,5-million are actually facing hunger, according to WFP.And so far, the leading coping mechanism is hunger.From Côte d'Ivoire in West Africa to Southern Africa's worst-hit Zimbabwe, already buckling under the world's highest inflation rate, families have no option but to skip a meal or two a day in an effort to stretch the little available. -- Sapa-AFP

http://www.mg.co.za/articlePage.aspx?articleid=325865&area=/breaking_news/breaking_news__africa/

This is biblical ---- Famine will take 1/3

Russian Military Chief Calls America "Evil"

2007-11-17T10:19:00.000-08:00

'Russias top military chief has dubbed America "evil" while cautioning that the "insidious" U.S. missile defense shield weapons system has nothing to do with countering Iran and is aimed squarely at Moscow, as tensions continue to heat between the two superpowers.';

Russian Military Chief Calls America "Evil" Baluyevsky says U.S. missile defense is aimed at Moscow as tensions rise
Prison Planet November 13, 2007 Paul Joseph Watson
Russia's top military chief has dubbed America "evil" while cautioning that the "insidious" U.S. missile defense shield weapons system has nothing to do with countering Iran and is aimed squarely at Moscow, as tensions continue to heat between the two superpowers.
The Chief of the Russian General Staff, Gen. Yury Baluyevsky told Russia Today , an English-language state TV channel, that Washington's plans to place a radar in the Czech Republic and ten missile interceptors in Poland supposedly to counter Iran was just a pretext to deploy weaponry close to Russia's borders.
"If the Americans deploy the radar by 2011 and anti-ballistic missiles by 2012-2013, they will certainly be directed against Russia, and we can easily prove it," said Baluyevsky.
(Article Continues Below)

"There will be no Iranian threat to the United States in the near future. Iran will be unable to create intercontinental ballistic missiles capable of reaching the United States until at least 2020," he added.
In the same interview , Baluyevsky labeled America as "evil" and swore to defend Russian military interests while absolving Russia of the responsibility of defending the rest of the world against American imperialism.
"Today, there is no need to be afraid of the Russian Armed Forces. However, I do not believe that the Russian military is obliged to defend the world from the evil Americans," he said.
Baluyevsky's inflammatory comments are likely to sour increasingly hostile relations between Washington and Moscow and they come just a month after Russian President Vladimir Putin compared the Pentagon's plan to deploy weapons in central Europe to the Soviet Union's 1962 deployment of nuclear missiles in Cuba, which led to the Cuban Missile Crisis and brought the world to the brink of nuclear war.

http://infowars.com/articles/ww3/russia_military_chief_calls_america_evil.htm

Soviet plan for WW3 nuclear attack unearthed

2007-11-17T10:13:00.000-08:00

Soviet plan for WW3 nuclear attack unearthedBy Henry Samuel in Paris
Last Updated: 3:54am BST 21/09/2007
Chilling Soviet plans to launch massive nuclear strikes in Europe followed by a ground offensive in Germany and southern France have been unearthed by a Nato historian.

Soviet troops were to storm across Europe
According to scenarios drafted in 1964, Warsaw Pact forces planned to use 131 tactical nuclear missiles and bombs to sideline NATO armaments and destroy Western Europe’s political and communications centres, in the event of an “imperialist” strike.
In an alarming insight into the “Doctor Strangelove” mindset of Soviet strategists, the Czechoslovak People’s Army, CSLA, was then expected to immediately march over deadly radioactive landscape and invade Nuremburg, Stuttgart and Munich, then bastions of West Germany.
On the ninth day the troops would take Lyon, south eastern France.
Soviet reinforcements would then continue the offensive towards the Pyrenees in the west.
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Historian Petr Lunak from NATO’s information office in Brussels, found the 17-page Warsaw Pact plan while sifting through declassified communist-era documents in Prague’s military archives.
“Russians outlined the general (war) plan, while the (leaders of) individual Warsaw Pact armies prepared precise military blueprints, with details on front lines, deployment of troops and arms,” said Mr Lunak.
The text, written in Russian and entitled CSLA Plan of Action for a War Period, was signed by the Czech defence minister of the time and carried president Antonin Novotny’s stamp of approval.
According to Mr Lunak, the plan was still an option until 1986, three years before the fall of the Berlin Wall.
It was shelved by Vaclav Havel in 1990 when he was elected Czech president.
While most Western planners were convinced that any first strike would lead to total mutual destruction, the plan - written in matter-of-fact language - shows that Warsaw Pact nations presumed a massive ground war would follow nuclear attacks.
Mr Lunak described the military plans as “fairy tale” thinking based on World War II warfare: “They (the Soviets) really planned to send ground troops out in the field and have them fight for a few days until they died from radiation,” he said.
The final draft of the invasion plan was completed under Soviet Communist Party chief Nikita Khrushchev, shortly after the 1961 Cuban missile crisis, when the United States and the Soviet Union had teetered on the brink of war.
According to the Prague documents, Moscow’s commanders fully expected western “imperialists” to make the first nuclear strike.
Mr Lunak includes the plans, as well as interviews with Czech generals of the time in his book, Planning the Unthinkable: Czechoslovak War Plans, 1950-1990.
The first English translation of the text was published earlier this month by the Parallel History Project on Cooperative Security, which analyses and publishes declassified NATO and Warsaw Pact archives.
Vojtech Mastny, a senior fellow at the National Security Archive in Washington, D.C., who coordinates the project, said the 1964 document is the first such detailed war plan to come to light. “There’s no doubt that the plan would have been used if the green light was given from above - the political leadership of the communist bloc,” he said.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/09/20/wwthree120.xml

Russia abandons arms treaty

2007-11-17T00:44:00.001-08:00

Russia abandons arms treaty

Geskryf deur Yahoonews
Saterdag, 17 November 2007
The Russian senate voted Friday to suspend compliance with a key Cold War treaty limiting conventional military forces across Europe, drawing renewed Western criticism.The unanimous vote in the upper house Federation Council followed last week's decision in the lower house of parliament, the State Duma, to freeze Moscow's participation in the Conventional Forces in Europe (CFE) treaty from December 12.The 1990 CFE treaty places strict limitations on the deployment of tanks and other military hardware across Europe.President Vladimir Putin ordered the moratorium on July 13 amid a row over US plans to install an anti-missile shield in eastern Europe.In a statement, the Federation Council said Russia had been forced to look at suspending the treaty "for as long as all the countries of NATO have not ratified" an adapted version of the accord.General Yury Baluyevsky, Russia's chief of the general staff, said the move was "the correct, logical step from the political and military point of view," ITAR-TASS news agency reported.Responding to Friday's vote the Western military alliance NATO reiterated earlier criticism it had made."Any measure which takes forward the process by which Russia would unilaterally withdraw from the treaty is regrettable," said NATO spokesman James Appathurai.The state-run RIA Novosti news agency said Russia could still return to the CFE if Putin reversed parliament's decision.But a NATO diplomat, requesting anonymity, questioned what Russia meant by suspending the treaty, saying it contained no provision for suspension and that Moscow was intentionally muddying the waters."Russia's decision to use the term 'suspension' only adds an element of doubt," he said."Does this mean the CFE treaty is dead? Nothing is clear. It's an ambiguous situation that could satisfy both parties," he said.The treaty's demise highlights deteriorating relations between Moscow and countries of the Atlantic alliance as Putin's administration pushes to reassert Russia on the international stage."This will be an indicator of Russia's seriousness in its uncompromising stand on ensuring its defensive capabilities, including in answer to US plans to put anti-missile defences in eastern Europe," State Duma deputy Leonid Slutsky told ITAR-TASS.Last week Deputy Defence Minister Alexander Kolmakov said that plans were being considered for boosting troop deployments on the western flank, something impossible under the CFE.This is not the first indication of a return to Cold War-style tensions.Russia has also this year renewed long-distance strategic bomber patrols, threatened to retarget nuclear missiles at European cities, and to withdraw from other bedrock disarmament treaties.Moscow says the CFE is not working because an updated version agreed on in 1999 has been ratified by Russia, but not by NATO countries.NATO members, led by the United States, say they cannot ratify the pact because of Russia's military presence in ex-Soviet Georgia and Moldova.But for NATO, Appathurai stressed: "NATO countries want to see the adapted treaty enter into force as soon as possible."Although Russia this week handed over a third Soviet-era base to the pro-Western Georgian authorities, there is controversy over a fourth.Although Russia says that the base has been decommissioned, Georgian officials are unable to inspect the facility because it is in the Russian-backed separatist Abkhazia region.Adding to the tension is the growing unease in the West with wide-ranging limitations imposed by Putin on democratic reforms and what critics call Russia's aggressive use of massive energy resources.Moscow accuses Washington of interfering in Russia's backyard and attempting to rule the world as the sole superpower.Speaking about the decision to quit the CFE, Baluyevsky said: "The US and NATO political leadership hoped that Russia would flinch at the last moment and not take the decision about introducing a moratorium," RIA Novosti reported

http://www.praag.org/mambo/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1138&Itemid=107

S.African Farm Murders: Who is actually behind them?

2007-11-16T08:26:00.000-08:00

From the News Archives of: WWW.AfricanCrisis.OrgDate & Time Posted: 12/30/2006
S.African Farm Murders: Who is actually behind them?
[Here is another piece concerning Farm Murders and what I was told directly by someone senior in one of the few remaining Commando Units. The Govt will be shutting down ALL of the Commando units. So far, 70 of the 90 commando units have already been shut down.The Commando units have been in existence for over a century and they are volunteer groups who protect the rural areas. The man I spoke to spoke from personal experience of things he had seen and operations he had been on.He told me that while the "Commandos" have been offered positions in the Police Reserve, that most of them will NOT join the Police Reserve. He said that the view of many of them is that the Police PART OF THE PROBLEM. They feel that shutting down the commandos is a way of "disarming" them and that in the long term, they expect this to cause the Farm Murder rate to pick up once more!He told me that in the course of his Commando duties, he and many others were sent on courses and they interacted with other specialists. He told me a fascinating thing which I did not know. He said that both the Police and the South African Army have got specialised units that investigate Farm Murders! (I never knew this and never saw it mentioned in the news). He said there are specialists who go to the scene of every single farm murder and they take photos and get video footage. They gather STACKS of data quietly. He said one guy once showed them on his laptop photos of farm murders. He said you could name any farm murder incident and this guy would pull up photos of the murder. He said he saw all sorts of horrific stuff including people with pieces of wire around their throats, etc. *ALL* Farm murders are documented - but its just not available to the public.He said these officers are very interested in defeating this farm murder scourge. But he said that in discussions with some of these people, he realised that they are very unhappy themselves and that they know they will be worked out of the system - and ultimately removed from the Army, etc. They have in the course of their duties come across very fascinating information. He said that informally, when "chatting", some of these people have hinted at their "belief" that Farm Murders are orchestrated by particular political forces. I use the word "belief" above, but later you'll see some of the hard evidence they have uncovered. He said there is talk about "communism" being behind the farm murders - and I will deal on the possible Eastern European connection in another post. There is also a whole "underground crime organisation" that may be linked to farm murders and all these things may work together. However, he said there is "talk" that three particular people connected to the ANC are actually the driving force behind the Farm Murders. The three names he has heard people talk of are:-1. Jacob Zuma (former Deputy President that Mbeki fired but whom the commies love and who will try to stand for President in 2009).2. Jackie Selebi - the man who heads our national Police force. (In recent months the Mass Media has been bringing up hard evidence showing Jackie Selebi's connections to organised crime). 3. Mosiuoa Lekota - the Minister of Defense here in S.Africa. (Interestingly, when I spoke to PW Botha shortly before his death he also mentioned that he thinks Lekota is a very dangerous man. He did not elaborate on what made him think that. The Media love him, but PW had another view of him which surprised me).My informant told me that some of these people in these specialised Police/Army Farm Murder units are themselves very demoralised and they know that their careers won't last. Jan]

http://www.africancrisis.org/default2.asp

In Subprime Crisis, the Worst Is Yet to Come

2007-11-16T05:44:00.000-08:00

In Subprime Crisis, the Worst Is Yet to Come
By Beat Balzli and Frank Hornig
The consequences of the US real estate crisis are far greater than previously suspected. Wall Street could face losses of over $200 billion, and German banks are unlikely to escape unscathed. The full extent of the disaster will not be known for months.

AP
The full extent of the fall-out from the subprime crisis is still not known.Only a few weeks ago, in October, the world still seemed a fairly orderly place to Charles Prince, the chairman and CEO of Citigroup. Although the bank's earnings were already heading south as a result of the subprime crisis (more...), Citigroup's largest individual shareholder, Saudi Arabian Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, wasn't losing his cool. What was happening on the financial markets was a "mere hiccup," the Arab multibillionaire explained.
A short time later, at the beginning of last week, it was time for another Citigroup executive to take the company jet to the Saudi Arabian capital Riyadh for some urgently needed damage control. Until 2003, Sandy Weill (more...) was chairman of Citigroup, the world's biggest bank at the time. Weill, who is now 74, is credited with having expanded the company in the 1990s into the broadly diversified financial services conglomerate it is today. Now his life's work was in jeopardy.
FROM THE MAGAZINE
Find out how you can reprint this DER SPIEGEL article in your publication. Weill knew that the "hiccup" had quickly turned into a serious threat. "We discussed the situation, what was wrong and why things are happening like that," Prince Alwaleed told the magazine Fortune, describing his crisis meeting with Weill.
News of the meeting in Saudi Arabia sent faraway Wall Street into turmoil. Only a few days after Merrill Lynch CEO Stan O'Neal was let go, Citigroup chief executive Prince was also asked to clear his desk.
Both executives were guilty of a fundamental miscalculation. As a result, the two companies will each be forced to write off between $8 billion and $11 billion in bad debt. But, as dramatic as the events at Merrill Lynch and Citigroup were, they do not mark the end of the banking nightmare that began in mid-summer.
That was when the first financial institutions and hedge funds began issuing warnings that the US real estate bubble was on the verge of bursting. Many homeowners who had borrowed heavily against the equity in their homes, confident that real estate prices would continue to rise, were suddenly faced with the realization that they could no longer afford to keep up their mortgage payments.
PHOTO GALLERY: CASUALTIES OF THE SUBPRIME CRISIS

Click on a picture to launch the image gallery (6 Photos)The repercussions of the crisis have mushroomed since then, with billions at stake now instead of millions. And despite ongoing efforts by politicians and central banks to bring calm to the market, a crisis that began among smaller banks has since spread to the industry's giants.
The effects of the disaster on almost every major Wall Street institution and many European banks have been far more severe than previously supposed. The 10 biggest losers have already reported losses of more than $40 billion, and even this is only the beginning.
"I believe that we are still not aware of all the risks," said Alexander Dibelius, the head of investment bank Goldman Sachs's German office, only two weeks ago -- shortly before the CEOs at Citigroup and Merrill were let go.
Economists and central bankers are already predicting total losses in excess of $200 billion. "The bloodbath in credit and financial markets will continue and sharply worsen," Nouriel Roubini, a highly regarded American economist, recently wrote on his blog.
His fears stem from the fact that so far banks have only published their results for the third quarter of 2007, which, for most institutions, ended in August or September. The real estate crisis has worsened since then, with even greater losses expected for the fourth quarter.
The true scope of the debacle will likely become apparent only after annual financial statements are published next spring. Quarterly statements are an imperfect indicator, because they enable banks to defer their losses relatively unnoticed.

DER SPIEGEL
It's been a nasty few weeks for the global banking giants.One of the results of the dismal news is that, after weeks of rising prices, the US's leading stock market index, the Dow Jones, took a sharp downward turn in recent days. The central banks' efforts to improve the situation by increasing liquidity and lowering interest rates have evaporated like drops of water on a hot stone. Fear and suspicion are the prevailing sentiments on the world's stock markets. A banker in Frankfurt predicts: "We are just at the beginning of the second tsunami wave."
Its effects will likely extend beyond the banking sector. AIG, America's largest insurance group, is already reporting a 27-percent loss for the third quarter. In addition to the now notorious high-risk subprime mortgages, financial worries in the United States are now also being stoked by concern over subprime credit cards and subprime auto loans. For consumers unable to pay their mortgages, the monthly credit card bill or the car loan are also likely to present a problem.
With the price of oil close to the $100 mark and the dollar in a nosedive, the outlook for the US economy -- and the world economy -- is becoming increasingly bleak.
In a hearing before the US Congress last Thursday, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke warned lawmakers of the consequences of the crisis: higher inflation, declining consumer spending and lower growth rates. On the same day, Bernanke's counterpart in the European Union, European Central Bank President Jean-Claude Trichet, expressed concern over what he called the "brutal moves" in the euro-dollar exchange rate.
To make matters worse, the banks' mortgage problem is developing into a crisis of confidence reminiscent of the collapse of the scandal-plagued US corporations Enron and WorldCom. The first investor lawsuit has already been filed, and the US market watchdog, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), is taking a closer look at questionable accounting practices. New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo has also launched his own investigations.

Part 2: Foolhardiness and Greed

But as complex as today's banking transactions are, the motives behind key players' actions are as simple as ever: foolhardiness and greed.
Take Stan O'Neal, for example. As chairman of Merrill Lynch, he pushed the company into increasingly risky real estate deals. Highly profitable in the short term, these deals earned O'Neal handsome bonuses. The fact that the entire model stood on shaky ground was water off a duck's back to O'Neal, who left the company with $162 million in severance pay.
PHOTO GALLERY: CASUALTIES OF THE SUBPRIME CRISIS

Click on a picture to launch the image gallery (6 Photos)To meet their profit goals, banking executives and their brokers had repeatedly delayed performing risk assessments of their financial instruments. "What would happen if Boeing Co. or Johnson & Johnson rolled out products with similar defect rates?" the Wall Street Journal asked rhetorically. The subprime crisis, the paper writes, acts as "a vital portal onto Wall Street, helping us understand just how upside-down the place has become."
In addition, the banks' boards of directors, blinded by the celebrity status of their senior executives, neglected to draft recruitment scenarios for top-level positions. The consequences of their neglect are now coming home to roost, as they face a limited selection of qualified candidates. The few remaining prospects, like Deutsche Bank Chairman Josef Ackermann, are suddenly in high demand.
Other US banks are also feeling the pinch. Morgan Stanley and Wachovia reported write-offs of $3.7 billion and $1.1 billion, respectively -- and those were only the numbers being reported late last week.
While Wall Street brokers are worried about their usually lavish Christmas bonuses, analysts at market research company CreditSights are busy calculating expected losses for the fourth quarter. Their predictions include a loss of $5.1 billion at Goldman Sachs, $3.9 billion at Lehman Brothers and $3.2 billion at Bear Stearns, whose CEO, James Cayne, has also faced heavy criticism. Trouble is also brewing at British bank Barclays.
Meanwhile Germany has by no means remained untouched by the fiasco. Despite posting substantial write-offs, Deutsche Bank, Commerzbank and Hypo Real Estate managed to report earnings growth in the last quarter. Nevertheless, this has by no means eliminated the uncertainty.
Only after their annual reports have been audited will "they all be able to breathe easier," says a risk management expert. "In other words, all kinds of things can reappear in the last quarter." According to the risk management expert, so far the Germans have taken a less hard line in their assessments than the Americans or Swiss banks like UBS. Does this mean that it's all just a question of valuation?
The valuation of complex credit products, for which there are currently almost no market prices, is a hotly debated issue among bankers, auditors and industry groups. Neither the German Federal Financial Supervisory Authority (BaFin) nor the Institute of Public Auditors in Germany (IDW) has offered clear guidelines. The resulting vacuum creates the temptation to doctor the numbers.
Fraudulent labeling is a hotly discussed issue at the moment, especially among Germany's state-backed banks, which are currently revising their accounting rules. Under the proposed new rules, the types of assets banks used to acquire purely for trading purposes, to earn a quick euro, so to speak, could now be declared as a long-term capital investment. The advantage of this approach is it would allow painful market losses in trading positions to be posted directly to the profit and loss statement. Securities held to maturity, however, would not have to be valued at current market prices, but instead at their acquisition prices. It's the perfect recipe for concocting an accounting fairy tale.

Part 3: 'Buy, Buy, Buy'
But the fear of time bombs on balance sheets raises worries on precisely the financial markets on which banks lend money to each other. Despite all efforts by central banks to intervene, everyone in these markets distrusts everyone else.
PHOTO GALLERY: CASUALTIES OF THE SUBPRIME CRISIS

Click on a picture to launch the image gallery (6 Photos)The year-end rally over funds that won't have to be repaid until January is already underway. No bank wants to risk no longer being able to guarantee its daily monetary transactions. "That's because most of them close their books starting in mid-December," says a London banker. "There's hardly any money available after that."
This scarcity makes borrowing money more costly. Financial managers use freshly borrowed cash primarily to plug the holes in their bank's sizeable investment funds. But the different possible solutions present the funds with a painful choice. Fund managers can either inject new cash, which could easily be consumed in no time, or they could face the prospect of devastating forced sales, which would lead to yet another broad decline in prices for credit products.
This is precisely the acute danger facing Sachsen Funding I, a €2 billion fund. In the next four weeks, Landesbank Baden-Württemberg and other investors will have to decide whether to inject additional cash or close the fund.
A rescue operation is already underway at an investment firm called Ormond Quay, which was responsible for the emergency sale of SachsenLB to Landesbank Baden-Württemberg.
To prevent a collapse, a consortium of German savings banks provided Sachsen Funding I with a €17.3 billion emergency funding package several weeks ago. Of German bank DekaBank's €6 billion share of the package, only about €500 million has been used to date.
WestLB, another German state bank, is also involved in an extensive bailout effort. According to a spokesman, WestLB had to provide its €3.3 billion Kestrel fund with "a credit line to support liquidity."
The credit line, says the WestLB spokesman, "guarantees the full repayment of all debt securities." It has also saved the fund from being downgraded by ratings agency Moody's.
WestLB believes that the prices in the Kestrel portfolio will recover. This reflects the current focus on faith in a world normally dominated by hard numbers. The situation is also tense at Harrier Finance, another WestLB company with assets of $11 billion.
NEWSLETTER
Sign up for Spiegel Online's daily newsletter and get the best of Der Spiegel's and Spiegel Online's international coverage in your In- Box everyday.
Is Harrier about to face a complete fire sale? This would be all too convenient for some financial jugglers. The first vultures hoping to turn a profit from the debacle are already circling.
One of them is market guru Bill Gross. For the past few days, Gross, who founded German insurance conglomerate Allianz's PIMCO pension fund, has been buying up the supposedly junk securities at bargain-basement prices.
Giants like Goldman Sachs and the Royal Bank of Scotland have been doing the same thing, investing their wealthy customers' money. If the market bounces back, these high stakes players could end up raking in huge profits in the global financial casino.
"If I had the money," says an envious chairman of a German state bank, "all I would do now is buy, buy, buy."
Translated from the German by Christopher Sultan

http://www.spiegel.de/international/business/0,1518,517139,00.html

Stormberger

2007-11-16T04:41:00.000-08:00

from Crawford2000 Website
"Iron rods will be built and iron monsters will bark though the wilderness. Cars without horses and shaft will come, and man will fly through the air like birds "....

"The catholic faith will almost completely disappear, the religiousness will be quite badly respected, they will not earn any respect due to their way of living, there won't be many good Christians among the people, the Commandments of God are no longer respected by the aristocracy as well as by the smallest worker, one will not think the greatest unfairness to be a sin. When the faith disappears also the love of the next one will completely lose itself, one will not estimate the justice, often the poor one will not be given right and he will be less respected than a dog. After this a mischief will arise that has to be regretted, there will be no order among the people""When in the outskirts of the forest the iron road will be finished, and there the iron horse will be seen, a war will begin, to last twice two years ...It would be fought with iron fortresses that move without horses". Two or three decades after the first war it will come one a Second War still larger. Almost all the nations of the world will be involved. Millions of men will die, without being soldiers. The fire will fall from the sky and many great cities will be destroyed. And after the end of the Second Great War, a third universal conflagration will come, so that it will determine everything. There will be weapons totally new. In one day, more men will die than in all the previous wars. The battles will be accomplished with artificial weapons. Gigantic catastrophes will happen. With the open eyes, the nations of the planet will go through these catastrophes. They won't know what is happening, and those that know and tell, will be silenced. Everything will be different from before, and in many places the Earth will be a great cemetery. The third war will be the end of many nations".

"You, my children, won't experience the largest mischief, you, my grandchildren, won't also experience it, but the third stock, that will easily experience it." "Over night it will take place - in a pub in Zwiesel many people will be together, and outside the soldiers will ride over the bridge." ........

"The people will run out of the forest. Those, who hide themselves at the "Fuchsenriegel" or at the "Falkenstein", remain spared. Who survives must have an iron heading. The people become ill, and nobody can help them... however it will continue, and what follows then, is the end of the world. Sky and earth burn, because it is the time, when everything comes to an end. And this time will be, when the wild hunt with fire and sulphur roars over the country. But it is still long time, till it will happen, then no humans will know anymore, where "Zwiesel" and where "Rabenstein" (German towns) have been. Of all frights the this will be the last. When the people fall off the bank like the flies off the wall, the last time begins. It will be horrible." ........

"But when however someone at the whole Danube stream finds still another cow, then she is worth it to be attached with a silver bell by the owner." ....

"After these events it will be a miracle, if one still sees two or three rulers going together, after these events the clarity will be anew, and those who survived, will face a good time for hope".
HOGUE'S TEXT
from Millennium Book of Prophecy by John Hogue

Railroads, Cars, and Planes
"Iron roads will be built, and iron monsters will bark through the wilderness. Cars without horses and shaft will come, and men will fly though the air like birds."
World War 1
"When in the outskirts of the forest the iron road will be finished, and there the iron horse will be seen, a war will begin, to last for twice two years. It will be fought with iron fortresses that move without horses, and with powers that come from the earth and fall from the sky."
According to Hogue:
"The day WW1 began was pinpointed two centuries before it happened by a simple and reclusive cowherd in the Bavarian forests bordering Czechoslovakia. On Aug. 1, 1914, a new railroad line between Kalteneck and Deggendorf (running on the edge of Stormberger's forest) officially opened -the day hostilities began. The war did last four years and saw the introduction of terrible new weapons such as mines "from the earth", poison gas "falling from the sky" and tanks-"iron fortresses" that move.
1929: The Stock Market Crash
"Right after this horrible war there will come a time when money will have no value. For 200 guilders not even a loaf of bread will be available, and yet there shall be no famine. Money will be made of iron, and gold shall become so valuable that for a few gold coins a small farm can be bought."
The Interval Between World Wars
"Two or three decades after the first great war will come a second, still greater war. Almost all nations of the world will be involved. Millions of men will die, without being soldiers. Fire will fall from the sky and many great cites will be destroyed."
WW3
"And after the second great struggle between the nations will come a third universal conflagration, which will determine everything. There will be entirely new weapons. In one day more men will die than in all previous wars combined. Battles will be fought with artificial weapons. Gigantic catastrophes will occur. With open eyes will the nations of the Earth enter into these catastrophes. They shall not be aware of what is happening, and those who will know and tell, will be silenced.Everything will become different than before, and in many places the Earth will be a great cemetery. The third great war will be the end of many nations."

SA will be better if I’m president - Zuma

2007-11-15T01:41:00.001-08:00

http://www.thetimes.co.za/News/Article.aspx?id=613695

Sapa
Published:Nov 15, 2007
ANC deputy president Jacob Zuma said the country would become even better if he became president, according to a newspaper report.
Speaking at the 1926 Club at Johannesburg’s Rand Club, Zuma’s response to those who were thinking of leaving SA if he became president was: "I can assure you that this country will become even better."
He reportedly denied that either he or his spokesman had told a Johannesburg weekend newspaper that if he went down, he would take the ANC with him.
Zuma said that if one examined the article closely, it attributed the remark to one of his supporters. However, he did not say whether the remark accurately reflected his sentiments, the Star said.
He said that he wanted the ANC congress next month to introduce term limits for its presidents, with the aim of prevent two conflicting centres of power emerging within the ruling party.
Zuma reportedly said the party had at its Mafikeng congress (1997) briefly debated whether it should introduce term limits by bringing the ANC and national presidential terms into line - but it decided against this.
He believed terms limits had become an issue again and should be debated in Polokwane - "rather than leaving matters to chance".

Mboweni favours a rate hike

2007-11-14T08:20:00.000-08:00

Mboweni favours a rate hike
By Michael Hamlyn, I-Net Bridge
Published:Nov 14, 2007
Reserve Bank governor, Tito Mboweni.
Reserve Bank governor, Tito Mboweni, gave a very strong signal that another interest hike is on the way when he told members of parliament that in his view rates should go up.
Speaking to the finance portfolio committee, Mboweni said: "If I was the only member of the Monetary Policy Committee, I would definitely increase rates in December."
The bank staff’s forecast for inflation in the coming months shows inflation increasing above the 6% target for part of 2008 before dropping back into the target range before the end of the year.
He told the committee: "The inflation picture for South Africa is that pressures are on the upside, whether from electricity or vegetables. When the forecasts indicate that inflation is likely to stay above the target, the task of the central bank is to tighten monetary policy."
He said that there was a period recently when the Monetary Policy Committee should have tightened rates, but did not do so. "It was an error," he said.
But he also reminded members that he was not the only member of the committee, and it was not certain that they would take his advice.
He joked with the members that Trevor Manuel, the finance minister, would complain that he would ruin people’s Christmas, but he said it was not up to him. He did not fix the target range, he said.

And GOD Said ---" I will take all the welth they have stolen away from them( BEE deals )"

Kunene shooting: attempted murder case opened

2007-11-14T08:06:00.000-08:00

Kunene shooting: attempted murder case opened
Sapa
Published:Nov 14, 2007
Police are investigating a case of attempted murder after Muziwendoda Kunene, the man caught up in the "hoax email" saga, was shot in Pretoria today.
National spokeswoman Director Sally de Beer said Kunene sustained a flesh wound when he was shot in the hand at around 8am in Lynwood Road.
Kunene received medical attention on the scene and was taken to a local hospital for further treatment.
A full investigation would be conducted by experienced detectives and anyone with information is urged to contact Crime Stop on 086-001-0111.
702 Talk Radio said it was understood that two men came up to Kunene and accused him of fraternising with the media. He then ran away and was shot in the hand.
The incident comes hours after Kunene claimed that senior members of the African National Congress (ANC) were plotting to assassinate him.
The ruling party today dismissed his claims as a "conjured up story".
"It is a completely conjured up story... the ANC has nothing to do with him, he has nothing to do with the ANC and he is not a member of the ANC and he is not part of any ANC structures," said the party’s head of the presidency, Smuts Ngonyama.
Kunene told 702 that while working for the National Intelligence Agency, he came across information linking senior politicians to corruption and bribery - which is why they wanted to kill or frame him.
He said he was under constant surveillance and that his recent hijacking was proof that he was being targeted.
Kunene stands accused under the Intelligence Services Oversight Act of withholding information from the Inspector General of Intelligence by failing or refusing to provide a response on questions put to him.
The saga involves fake e-mails between ANC leaders, discrediting ANC deputy president Jacob Zuma.
The e-mails allegedly implicated senior ANC members in a conspiracy against ANC deputy president Jacob Zuma and ANC secretary general Kgalema Motlanthe.

http://www.thetimes.co.za/News/Article.aspx?id=612817

Eish , this 2009 election just aint gona hjappen without some blood on the wall's and in the streets of capetown and pretoria

THE POPULATION CHALLENGE

2007-11-14T07:59:00.001-08:00

Paradise for Saleby Carl N. McDaniel and John M. Gowdy, University of California Press, 2000."The number of people who can live sustainably on the planet is an open question. The rate of growth of the population accelerated for a long time. For example, it took about 180 years to double from half a billion (1650) to one billion (1830), while to go from two billion (1930) to four billion (1975) took only 45 years. Although the future is uncertain, the growth rate is no longer accelerating; that is, the time it takes for the human population to double is lengthening. If the trend continues, the population will eventually stop growing. While this is good news in the long term, over 80 million additional humans are still being added to the population each year, and similar increases are projected for many years.Although most people accept that there is a limit to the number of people the earth can support, that limit cannot be precisely determined. Why? Because the variables are so many and, to make matters worse, because unknown variables always lurk in the background. When Antoni van Leeuwenhoek predicted in 1679 that maximum human population was about 13 billion, he did not know that human activities were causing a mass biodiversity extinction, that cutting down tropical forests could change local and global climates, or that tractors would allow one person to till hundreds of acres. Despite these many variables, scientists and others have made numerous predictions; 65 factually based calculations have a low median of 8 billion people and a high median of 16 billion, with a mean of about 12 billion. These values are of immediate concern because many demographers have calculated that the population will plateau around 12 billion sometime in the second half of the twenty-first century.However, none of these calculations takes sustainability into account; that is, the calculations are essentially for a population size at a certain time, not for one that could be maintained for thousands of years. If we cannot do the calculation precisely for a point in time, we have no hope of performing a dynamic calculation that would be valid for hundreds or thousands of years. Both types of calculations are worthwhile, however, because the results give us a sense of reality -- the threshold of monumental disaster. The maximum population size numbers tell us that as the world population reaches 6 billion we are approaching disaster, because this population size is most likely not sustainable for very many generations.The number of organisms in an ecosystem is the result of interaction between the species' biological growth potential and the environmental resistance that prevents all organisms from realizing their potential. Under ideal conditions, for instance, one bacterium could increase to 2.2 x 10 to the 43 bacteria in 48 hours with a mass roughly a thousand times that of the earth. Environmental resistance-climate, abiotic resources like water and nutrients, toxic waste buildup, and biological factors like parasites, predators, and competition for resources -- prevent every population of organisms from realizing its growth potential.An animal species may have several long-term stable population sizes, each depending on unique environmental resistance factors. And each of these stable populations, or carrying capacities, represents the number of individuals of a species that the ecosystem can support under the specified conditions. If the environmental resistance factors do not change, the ecosystem does not change and the population size remains stable. Things never stay the same, of course. Over time major factors in the environmental resistance will vary and the population size will change.The carrying capacity concept has predictive value in managing wildlife and in determining the sizes of populations in natural ecosystems. You might ask, if carrying capacity applies to pheasants, deer, and grizzly bears, why doesn't it apply to humans? It does. Like all organisms, humans are subject to the laws of ecology, but we can't calculate the carrying capacity for humans with any precision because we can manipulate our ecosystems in profound ways. We have become extremely adept at tapping stored-up natural resources, especially energy, water, and soil fertility; and in doing so we establish what appears to be a higher carrying capacity. With the domestication of animals and plants and the emergence of agriculture 10,000 years ago, stored-up resources were used first within local ecosystems. Over the last two centuries, however, the earth's resource stockpiles have been used globally. This worldwide exchange of resources, as well as exceedingly clever technologies, have increased a region's carrying capacity by overcoming local constraints.Life on earth is possible because energy flows from the sun; despite exceptions, essentially all the energy that runs the earth's biotic enterprise is captured in photosynthesis by plants, algae, and cyanobacteria. We have been able to increase our numbers by coopting about 40 percent of the net land photosynthesis and a smaller fraction from aquatic environments -- 10,000 years ago the estimated world population of four million humans used less than 0.005 percent of net land photosynthesis. Consider again, for example, the great plains of North America where, prior to European habitation, 40 million bison and thousands of humans and smaller animals lived off the energy supplied by the grasses and other plants. We now farm and ranch that land, and in doing so we probably support an even larger biomass of animals -- primarily chickens, pigs, and cows, as well as millions of humans -- by employing industrial agriculture.It may sound good that we have improved the ecosystem's productivity by relying on industrial agriculture. Closer analysis, though, indicates that this may be a short-term phenomenon. When microorganisms, invertebrates, grasses, bison, deer, antelope, and native Americans were the prime players in the ecosystem, the whole system ran on sunshine and was biologically stabler. The ecological "books" were in balance, and some items like topsoil usually were improving. Industrial agriculture has increased the apparent carrying capacity by using vast amounts of fossil fuels to make fertilizers, insecticides, and herbicides, in addition to the fuels used to raise seeds and to run the machinery that works the soil and disperses seeds and chemicals. For each calorie of food produced, close to three calories of fossil fuel energy are consumed on the farm -- energy that did not come from this year's sunshine. In addition, water is pumped from the ground for irrigation; some of this water comes from aquifers that are drained faster than they are filled. These farming methods have led to a massive loss of topsoil through water, wind, and splash erosion. Over the past 150 years Iowa has lost 50 percent of its fertile topsoil to erosion, while the current rate of loss is 30 tons per hectare per year compared to a formation rate of 1 ton per hectare per year. In contrast, undisturbed grasslands and forests have erosion rates of .02 and .07 tons per hectare per year, respectively. In the long run this kind of agriculture reduces the carrying capacity of ecosystems, as it has done already in many areas around the world, primarily in ecosystems less resilient than parts of the Great Plains. The apparent success of current industrial agriculture has led people to believe that the earth's long-term human carrying capacity is far greater than it really is.Biologists also have indirect evidence that puts the size of our current population in an ecological category of its own. How many individuals exist in a population within a certain area depends on the organism's size. Bacteria are small and billions of many species exist in 1 square meter of forest soil. Field mice are much larger than bacteria and only thousands exist in 1 square kilometer of grass land. Deer are about the size of humans and 4 deer per square kilometer is a normal distribution in a forest-meadow habitat. Primates like howler monkeys and mountain gorillas are rare, and their density of habitation is a fraction of an individual for many square kilometers. A human is a large primate weighing about 50 kilograms, so we would predict human densities similar to those of primates or at least similar to those of other large animals like deer, wolves, or bears. When we compare the current human population with that of 50-kilogram or larger nondomesticated land vertebrates, however, the global human population density is now 100 times greater than that of any other similar-sized animal, past or present. Our global population size is an ecological aberration. The reason is simply explained: First, directly or indirectly, humans use huge amounts of the energy acquired by plants at the expense of other species; second, intelligence and communication have enabled huge human populations to exist almost everywhere on the planet by cleverly employing technologies to increase present-day carrying capacities.Not only is the human population enormous, but our local densities are gigantic, too. In cities like New York City or Hong Kong humans have densities of tens of thousands per square kilometer. In an entire country like Holland, an average of 440 people live in each square kilometer -- a phenomenal density when compared with other large animals. The current Dutch population could not maintain its lifestyle, or most likely any lifestyle, if it was limited to subsisting on resources from Holland alone. The Dutch would need at least fifteen times more area to obtain the resources they currently use. Such densities are possible in cities and most countries because people are taking resources from elsewhere.In 1798 Thomas Malthus, a British political economist, warned western industrial society that human population growth would be halted by natural processes unless we controlled our numbers. Humans have failed, however, to establish a stable population because beliefs and economic incentives support contrary behavior and because our technologies enable us to overcome local limits in the present. The export of Western culture and economies eliminated constraints on population growth in many places around the planet. The result? A world population that has doubled in just over forty years.Over the past hundred years, though, the patterns of change experienced by populations around the globe have exhibited enormous variability. In the early twentieth century, the populations in western European countries were growing rapidly, but by the early 1980s some had completed a demographic transition to zero population growth. Over a one-hundred year period birth rates had dropped to equal death rates because of availability of contraceptive technologies, widespread education, lower child mortality, higher living standards, and the depletion of places to export excess population.For most of the twentieth century nonindustrialized countries have witnessed tremendous jumps in their populations, but in the last several decades fertility rates in many have fallen even faster than were experienced during the demographic transition in European countries. This is not because living standards have risen; contraceptives, greater education and economic opportunities primarily for women, and media information on population and family planning have paved the way. Other situations, like economic and social deterioration in the former Soviet Union, have resulted in dramatic fertility declines. Although trends can be identified, the world is composed of myriad cultures, with each expressing a dynamic pattern of population change."While the foregoing makes it clear that calculating a precise human carrying capacity for earth will not be accomplished, it is absolutely certain that growth of the human population will stop. Simple mathematics tells us at recent annual increases of about 1.6% (a doubing time of 45 years) that in less than 1,000 years each person will have only one square meter of land and that in less than 2,000 years the human population will equal the mass of the earth -- both impossible. The tragic consequence of humans occuppying and using ever larger percentages of the earth's ecological space is that all of the rest of life -- except those weedy species that do well in human created habitats -- has no where to go except extinct. As a result, we humans are causing the sixth mass biological diversity extinction episode of the last 600 million years. Realizing biological diversity is what makes earth habitable and supportive of human civilization in the first place, this current extinction episode takes on overwhelming significance in human affairs.

FURTHER READINGJoel E. Cohen: HOW MANY PEOPLE CAN THE EARTH SUPPORT? New York: Norton. 1995. Joel E. Cohen: POPULATION GROWTH AND EARTH'S HUMAN CARRYING CAPACITY. 1995. Science 269:341-346.Clive Ponting: A GREEN HISTORY OF THE WORLD: THE ENVIRONMENT AND THE COLLAPSE OF GREAT CIVILIZATIONS. New York: Penguin Books. 1991.David Quammen: PLANET OF WEEDS. Harper's Magazine, October 1998, pp 57-69.Mathis Wackernagel and William Rees: OUR ECOLOGICAL FOOTPRINT: RELIEVING HUMAN IMPACT ON THE EARTH. Philadelphia: New Society Publishers. 1996.Peter Ward: THE END OF EVOLUTION. New York: Bantam Books. 1994.Edward O. Wilson: THE DIVERISTY OF LIFE. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. 1992.Edward O. Wilson: THE DIVERSITY OF LIFE (Book Excerpt). Discover, September 1992, pp 45-68.

ANC Gauteng Branches Opt for Zuma

2007-11-14T00:09:00.001-08:00

ANC Gauteng Branches Opt for Zuma

Geskryf deur Business Day
Dinsdag, 13 November 2007
THE majority of African National Congress (ANC) Gauteng branches have come out in support of Jacob Zuma in the party's leadership race set to come to a head at its conference in 34 days.In Johannesburg, Gauteng's most influential region, not a single branch voted in favour of President Thabo Mbeki's bid for a third term. More than half of Johannesburg's branches have completed their nomination processes. The region produces a quarter of ANC's Gauteng delegates going to the elective national conference in Polokwane.Meanwhile, nothing has come of reports of Mbeki's imminent nomination by the ANC's Sandton branch.An insider said yesterday the Sunday afternoon branch general meeting "did not materialise" as delegates "failed" to pitch.Commentators are looking to the ANC's nomination process, which closes on November 26, for an early indication of the state of the Zuma-Mbeki race.To add to Mbeki's re-election woes in Gauteng, businessman Cyril Ramaphosa has secured more presidential nominations than Mbeki has in the province. Ramaphosa has five nominations, while Mbeki and another presidential hopeful, Tokyo Sexwale, have three each.With just more than a quarter of the 354 branches in Gauteng having finalised their preferences for the ANC's top posts, Zuma has already secured 57 presidential nominations.Gauteng is the ANC's fourth- largest voting bloc at the national conference, after Eastern Cape, KwaZulu-Natal and Limpopo.Steven Friedman, senior research associate at policy think-tank Idasa, said the Gauteng picture was a bigger problem for Mbeki than the news for Zuma that he was losing the nomination race in Eastern Cape."This must weigh heavily for Mbeki, and surely will make him pause for thought. The question of how important it is for him to beat Zuma has to arise. What happens to his legacy? What if he ends up losing, what if he ends up winning but only by 52% or 54 % of the vote ?" Friedman asked.Another insider said that the ANC Youth League in Gauteng had been "instrumental" in ensuring the upsurge of support for Zuma in the province.The league remains Zuma's key backer, while KwaZulu-Natal is regarded as his strongest constituency.Mbeki's main support base is Eastern Cape, while his lobbyists are also pursuing the ANC Women's League's nomination .

Food crisis begins to bite

2007-11-13T23:55:00.000-08:00

Food crisis begins to bite
John Vidal
12 November 2007 11:59

A farmer dries the corn in Shenyang, China. The country is tightening controls on the use of corn for industrial purposes, including biofuel processing, in an effort to control surging food prices.

Empty shelves in Caracas. Food riots in West Bengal and Mexico. Warnings of hunger in Jamaica, Nepal, the Philippines and sub-Saharan Africa. Soaring prices for basic foods are beginning to lead to political instability, with governments being forced to step in to artificially control the cost of bread, maize, rice and dairy products.Record world prices for most staple foods have led to 18% food price inflation in China, 13% in Indonesia and Pakistan, and 10% or more in Latin America, Russia and India, according to the United Nations Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO). Wheat has doubled in price, maize is nearly 50% higher than a year ago and rice is 20% more expensive, says the UN. Last week the Kremlin forced Russian companies to freeze the price of milk, bread and other foods until January 31, for fear of a public backlash with a parliamentary election looming. “The price of goods has risen sharply and that has hit the poor particularly hard,” said Oleg Savelyev, of the Levada Centre polling institute.India, Yemen, Mexico, Burkina Faso and several other countries have had, or been close to, food riots in the past year, something not seen in decades of low global food commodity prices. Meanwhile, there are shortages of beef, chicken and milk in Venezuela and other countries as governments try to keep a lid on food price inflation.Boycotts have become commonplace. Argentinians shunned tomatoes during the recent presidential election campaign when they became more expensive than meat. Italians organised a one-day boycott of pasta in protest at rising prices. German left-wing politicians have called for an increase in welfare benefits so that people can cope with price rises.“If you combine the increase of the oil prices and the increase of food prices then you have the elements of a very serious [social] crisis in the future,” said Jacques Diouf, head of the FAO, in London last week.The price rises are a result of record oil prices, US farmers switching out of cereals to grow biofuel crops, extreme weather and growing demand from countries like India and China, the UN said last week.“There is no one cause but a lot of things are coming together to lead to this. It’s hard to separate out the factors,” said Ali Gurkan, head of the FAO’s Food Outlook programme on Monday.He said cereal stocks had been declining for more than a decade but now stood at around 57 days, which made global food supplies vulnerable to an international crisis or big natural disaster such as a drought or flood.“Any unforeseen flood or crisis can make prices rise very quickly. I do not think we should panic but we should be very careful about what may happen,” he warned.Lester Brown, president of the Washington-based Worldwatch Institute think-tank, said: “The competition for grain between the world’s 800-million motorists, who want to maintain their mobility, and its two billion poorest people, who are simply trying to survive, is emerging as an epic issue.”Last year, he said, US farmers distorted the world market for cereals by growing 14-million tonnes, or 20% of the whole maize crop, for ethanol for vehicles. This took millions of hectares of land out of food production and nearly doubled the price of maize. US President George W Bush this year called for steep rises in ethanol production as part of plans to reduce petrol demand by 20% by 2017.Maize is a staple food in many countries that import from the US, including Japan, Egypt and Mexico. US exports are 70% of the world total, and are used widely for animal feed. The shortages have disrupted livestock and poultry industries worldwide.“The use of food as a source of fuel may have serious implications for the demand for food if the expansion of biofuels continues,” said a spokesman for the International Monetary Fund last week.The outlook is widely expected to worsen as agro-industries prepare to switch to highly profitable biofuels, according to Grain, a Barcelona-based food resources group. Its research suggests that the Indian government is committed to planting 14-million hectares (35-million acres) of land with jatropha, an exotic bush from which biodiesel can be manufactured. Brazil intends to grow 120-million hectares for biofuels, and Africa as much as 400-million hectares in the next few years. Much of the growth, the countries say, would be on unproductive land, but many millions of people are expected to be forced off that land.This week Oxfam warned the European Union that its policy of substituting 10% of all car fuel with biofuels threatened to displace poor farmers.The food crisis is being compounded by growing populations, extreme weather and ecological stress, according to a number of recent reports.This week the UN Environment Programme said the planet’s water, land, air, plants, animals and fish stocks were all in “inexorable decline”. According to the UN’s World Food Programme 57 countries, including 29 in Africa, 19 in Asia and nine in Latin America, have been hit by catastrophic floods. Harvests have been affected by drought and heatwaves in south Asia, Europe, China, Sudan, Mozambique and Uruguay.According to Josette Sheeran, director of the World Food Programme:

“There are 854-million hungry people in the world and four million more join their ranks every year. We are facing the tightest food supplies in recent history. For the world’s most vulnerable, food is simply being priced out of their reach.”

-- © Guardian News & Media Ltd 2007

http://www.mg.co.za/articlePage.aspx?articleid=324663&area=/insight/monitor/

S. Africa puts TB patients behind fences

2007-11-12T01:08:00.000-08:00

S. Africa puts TB patients behind fences
Posted on Sun, Nov. 11, 2007
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By CLARE NULLIS
Associated Press Writer
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/world/AP/story/304151.html

Karin Schermbrucker / AP Photo

A doctor examines chest X-rays at a tuberculosis clinic in Gugulethu, Cape Town, South Africa, Friday, Nov. 9, 2007. South Africa reported 343,000 TB cases in 2006, of which an estimated 6,000 were multi-drug-resistant. The government says that there have been about 400 cases of XDR-TB (extremely-drug-resistant tuberculosis), but groups like Medecins Sans Frontieres say this is a big underestimate.
» More Photos
CAPE TOWN, South Africa -- Behind high fences patrolled by guards to prevent escape, a drab building once used for smallpox victims houses patients with a new, virtually uncurable strain of tuberculosis.
Patients sleep or sit listlessly in the 12-bed women's ward, which is equipped with a TV, a fridge and a table with a couple of loaves of bread. It's a similar scenario in the men's ward, home to a minibus taxi driver who reluctantly agreed to be admitted after exposing hundreds of people every day to his potentially lethal germs.
Critics say enforced quarantine is a violation of medical ethics and individual human rights. Health authorities - who earlier this year resorted to the courts to compel four patients to stay at the hospital - say they have no choice.
"We are dealing with very depressed people. They feel like they are in prison, but it's the only way," said senior nurse Joan Blackburn.
Andrew Speaker, an Atlanta attorney with drug-resistant tuberculosis, was held under a federal isolation order in May after he went on a European wedding trip and refused health officials' directives that he not take any commercial jets back to the U.S.
"At least our patients won't be able to get on a plane and fly around the world," said Simon Moeti, medical superintendent of the Brooklyn Chest Hospital.
South Africa's AIDS epidemic has brought a related upsurge in TB cases, including multi-drug-resistant and extremely drug-resistant strains.
South Africa reported 343,000 TB cases in 2006, of which an estimated 6,000 were multi-drug-resistant. South Africa's first official case of extremely drug-resistant tuberculosis, or XDR-TB, was reported last year. The government says that there have been about 400 cases, but groups like Doctors Without Borders say this is a big underestimate.
Testing methods are hopelessly slow and out of date - and it is particularly difficult to diagnose TB in HIV-positive people. Nearly 60 percent of South African TB patients have the AIDS virus. Many people with drug-resistant TB die before they are tested and treated - having probably infected other people in the meantime.
"There are challenges without answers," Moeti said. "There are people who are refusing treatment, people who want to abscond," he told journalists visiting the 308-bed clinic on the sidelines of an international TB conference that ends Monday.
Treatments are also woefully outdated and inadequate. The Global Alliance for TB Drug Development told the conference that trials of two possible drugs were promising. One of them, antibiotic moxifloxacin, could shorten treatment time and the other, PA-824, had potential for drug-resistant strains. But even if clinical trials are successful, it may take years for the drugs to reach the market.
"We can't wait that long. We need new drugs now," said Winston Zulu, a Zambian AIDS and TB activist who lost four brothers to TB.
Experts worry that the drug-resistant strains will continue to spread - largely the result of people not sticking to the six-month course of treatment for normal TB.
In the Western Cape province that includes Cape Town, 64 cases of XDR-TB have been identified this year, according to local health officials. Twenty of the patients have died and 39 of the survivors are currently being treated at Brooklyn - 24 in the fenced-off ward and others elsewhere in the hospital.
They will be there for at least six months. If they are declared clear of the disease they will be free to leave. But, with treatment of XDR-TB still in its infancy in South Africa, their longer-term prospects are unclear.
The youngest patient is just a year old. Her mother died last year, before local authorities started testing for XDR-TB, although that was most likely the cause, Moeti said.
"But she's doing OK," he added, picking up the child, who was sitting with other infants. He refused to divulge identities because of confidentiality, and journalists were not allowed to speak to patients in the clinic.
The scattered collection of small buildings was purchased from a farmer in 1872 because of its isolation. It was initially used for smallpox, then for the big influenza epidemic and now for TB. Structurally there have been few changes in the past century. Although the clinic is in dire need of a coat of paint, Moeti says its design allows for good ventilation - TB thrives in closed spaces.
Hospital authorities reluctantly decided to erect the fence around the XDR-TB unit after four patients absconded. Two guards, both wearing protective face masks, stand by the fence. Any patient wanting to go to another part of the hospital has to be accompanied. Family visits are allowed but are strictly controlled.
Patients hate going there - because of the stigma of TB and its association with AIDS. The hospital constantly struggles to get staff. It was bad enough before, but the arrival of XDR-TB has made it even worse, said Moeti.
The minibus taxi driver initially refused to be admitted, saying he couldn't afford the loss in earnings. But he eventually accepted Moeti's arguments that he was endangering the lives of countless passengers.

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Crime scares French workers

2007-11-02T01:55:00.001-07:00

Crime scares French workers02/11/2007 10:02 - (SA)

http://www.news24.com/News24/South_Africa/News/0,,2-7-1442_2213702,00.html
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Pretoria - Big French companies planning to invest in South Africa are considering whether workers should leave their families behind in France, due to the growing number of attacks on French citizens in the country.
Christian Bader, the French Consul-General said this on Thursday, following a criminal attack on French Military attaché Naval Captain Denis Fabré and his family.
They were held up by robbers at their house in Sandton on Monday morning.
Fabré, his wife and their children, aged seven and nine, were overpowered in the house, shoved around and tied up.
The robbers looted their house of its domestic appliances, packed everything into the family's car and sped off.
Bader said no-one had been injured, but the family of four had been badly traumatised.
'It is quite terrible'
"One expects of your senior diplomats to continue undisturbed with their work as representatives of France, but one can't tell a woman and children that they're not supposed to be upset. It is quite terrible," he said.
Bader said he fully understood the misgivings of French companies.
Preventive measures are usually considered in countries where there is a civil war or conflict - such as the Democratic Republic of the Congo a few years ago, or Iraq.
Bader said the families of employees were particularly vulnerable when the families were left at home alone during business trips.
Some embassies are considering housing their employees in closed security complexes, he added

US to set up permanent base in Botswana

2007-10-24T12:08:00.000-07:00

US to set up permanent base in Botswana Sunday Standard Reporter 23 October 2007More than 1 500 American soldiers may be permanently based in Botswana from next year, should government go ahead with alleged plans to host America's recently created Africa Command (Africom).The Office of the President and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs this week could not confirm reports by Democracy and Governance that Botswana is alleged to have indicated interest to host Africom.Africom is aimed at stemming the assumed threat posed by swathes of Africa's “ungoverned” spaces, feared to be potential hide-outs and training fields for terrorists. According to the controversial 2007 “Failed States Index” recently released by the US-based Foreign Policy, Africa tops the list of failed states.The US budget for the Trans-Saharan Counter-terrorism partnership for 2007 is some $115 million (P1, 5 billion), while non military assistance has increased by 60 percent. Admiral Moeller, head of the Africom planning team hinted that the command will cost in the region of $50 million in the 2007 financial year. The super power's military investment is also expected to create a lot of jobs for locals.Despite the economic lures of Africom, a number of African countries, even America's strategic partners like South Africa, have indicated that they are not willing to host the command, citing concerns with the long term impact it would have on their sovereignty.According to the report by Democracy and Governance, “it is Washington's unilateral invasion of Iraq in 2003 and the Bush administration's strategy of pre-emptive strikes against its perceived threats which present liabilities which some African states are shy to bear. Countries considered by the US and its allies as pariahs such as Sudan and Zimbabwe shudder at the possibility of Africom being used to coordinate strikes against them ala Iraq.”Since Al Qaeda blew up American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998, killing 225 people, America has trained its heavy guns on the organization and its suspected local allies in the region. Some 1,5 00 US military and civilian personnel attached to the combined Joint Task Force-Horn of Africa (CJTF-HOA) have maintained a presence at Camp Lemonier, Djibouti. The command of the CJTF-HOA, currently under CENTCOM, will be transferred to Africom in Botswana in 2008, should Botswana agree to host the command.Deputy Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, Moostaq Moorad, would not confirm reports that Botswana has indicated that they are willing to host Africom, saying “This is more of a military cooperation issue than an international cooperation issue.” He referred all enquiries to the Office of the President.Presidential Affairs spokesperson, Dr Jeff Ramsay, also said he could not confirm the reports. He promised to come back to us next week.The Sunday Standard can, however, reveal that logistical difficulties that would come with Botswana hosting Africom were cleared in 2003 when the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation agreed to sign a non surrender pact with America under controversial circumstances.According to the write up by the Director of Democracy and Governance, Dr Peter Kagwanja, “ locating American soldiers permanently on foreign soil will depend on the host country's approval of a Status-of-Force Agreement (SOFA) - a legal document that the State Department negotiated to define the legal standing of American soldiers abroad.”Botswana has already signed this bilateral pact binding them not to surrender American military personnel to international tribunals, commonly known as Article 98. The agreement was signed on June 30, 2003 in Gaborone and entered into force on 28th September 2003.In its carrot and stick campaign, Washington withdrew military aid to all American allies that refused to sign the agreement, among them SADC countries like South Africa, Lesotho, Zambia , Malawi, Tanzania and Namibia.The Bush administration also issued a waiver, exempting Botswana from the military sanctions.The Botswana government was, however, under pressure from the local media and opposition political parties which felt that the country had sold out to America. In an attempt to stem the groundswell of hostile public opinion, Foreign Affairs Minister, Lt Gen Mompati Merafhe, issued a statement in July 2003 trying to justify Botswana's position.http://www.praag.org/mambo/index.php...050&Itemid=107
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Fury at DNA pioneer's theory: Africans are less intelligent than Westerners

2007-10-24T12:06:00.000-07:00

Fury at DNA pioneer's theory: Africans are less intelligent than Westerners
Celebrated scientist attacked for race comments: "All our social policies are based on the fact that their intelligence is the same as ours - whereas all the testing says not really"
By Cahal Milmo
Published: 17 October 2007
One of the world's most eminent scientists was embroiled in an extraordinary row last night after he claimed that black people were less intelligent than white people and the idea that "equal powers of reason" were shared across racial groups was a delusion.
James Watson, a Nobel Prize winner for his part in the unravelling of DNA who now runs one of America's leading scientific research institutions, drew widespread condemnation for comments he made ahead of his arrival in Britain today for a speaking tour at venues including the Science Museum in London.
The 79-year-old geneticist reopened the explosive debate about race and science in a newspaper interview in which he said Western policies towards African countries were wrongly based on an assumption that black people were as clever as their white counterparts when "testing" suggested the contrary. He claimed genes responsible for creating differences in human intelligence could be found within a decade.
The newly formed Equality and Human Rights Commission, successor to the Commission for Racial Equality, said it was studying Dr Watson's remarks " in full". Dr Watson told The Sunday Times that he was "inherently gloomy about the prospect of Africa" because "all our social policies are based on the fact that their intelligence is the same as ours – whereas all the testing says not really". He said there was a natural desire that all human beings should be equal but "people who have to deal with black employees find this not true".
His views are also reflected in a book published next week, in which he writes: "There is no firm reason to anticipate that the intellectual capacities of peoples geographically separated in their evolution should prove to have evolved identically. Our wanting to reserve equal powers of reason as some universal heritage of humanity will not be enough to make it so."
The furore echoes the controversy created in the 1990s by The Bell Curve, a book co-authored by the American political scientist Charles Murray, which suggested differences in IQ were genetic and discussed the implications of a racial divide in intelligence. The work was heavily criticised across the world, in particular by leading scientists who described it as a work of " scientific racism".
Dr Watson arrives in Britain today for a speaking tour to publicise his latest book, Avoid Boring People: Lessons from a Life in Science. Among his first engagements is a speech to an audience at the Science Museum organised by the Dana Centre, which held a discussion last night on the history of scientific racism.
Critics of Dr Watson said there should be a robust response to his views across the spheres of politics and science. Keith Vaz, the Labour chairman of the Home Affairs Select Committee, said: "It is sad to see a scientist of such achievement making such baseless, unscientific and extremely offensive comments. I am sure the scientific community will roundly reject what appear to be Dr Watson's personal prejudices.
"These comments serve as a reminder of the attitudes which can still exists at the highest professional levels."
The American scientist earned a place in the history of great scientific breakthroughs of the 20th century when he worked at the University of Cambridge in the 1950s and 1960s and formed part of the team which discovered the structure of DNA. He shared the 1962 Nobel Prize for medicine with his British colleague Francis Crick and New Zealand-born Maurice Wilkins.
But despite serving for 50 years as a director of the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory on Long Island, considered a world leader in research into cancer and genetics, Dr Watson has frequently courted controversy with some of his views on politics, sexuality and race. The respected journal Science wrote in 1990: "To many in the scientific community, Watson has long been something of a wild man, and his colleagues tend to hold their collective breath whenever he veers from the script."
In 1997, he told a British newspaper that a woman should have the right to abort her unborn child if tests could determine it would be homosexual. He later insisted he was talking about a "hypothetical" choice which could never be applied. He has also suggested a link between skin colour and sex drive, positing the theory that black people have higher libidos, and argued in favour of genetic screening and engineering on the basis that " stupidity" could one day be cured. He has claimed that beauty could be genetically manufactured, saying: "People say it would be terrible if we made all girls pretty. I think it would great."
The Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory said yesterday that Dr Watson could not be contacted to comment on his remarks.
Steven Rose, a professor of biological sciences at the Open University and a founder member of the Society for Social Responsibility in Science, said: " This is Watson at his most scandalous. He has said similar things about women before but I have never heard him get into this racist terrain. If he knew the literature in the subject he would know he was out of his depth scientifically, quite apart from socially and politically."
Anti-racism campaigners called for Dr Watson's remarks to be looked at in the context of racial hatred laws. A spokesman for the 1990 Trust, a black human rights group, said: "It is astonishing that a man of such distinction should make comments that seem to perpetuate racism in this way. It amounts to fuelling bigotry and we would like it to be looked at for grounds of legal complaint."
Interesting? Click here to explore further

http://news.independent.co.uk/sci_tech/article3067222.ece

Selebi was probed, says NPA

2007-10-02T12:17:00.000-07:00

http://www.mg.co.za/articlePage.aspx?articleid=320875&area=/breaking_news/breaking_news__national/

Mail & Guardian Online reporter and Sapa Johannesburg, South Africa
02 October 2007 05:49
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Police National Commissioner Jackie Selebi has been investigated but no decision has been made on prosecuting him, the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) said on Tuesday.It said there has been "considerable confusion" about the status of a probe involving Selebi."The NPA would like to clarify aspects relating to this issue," it said in a statement."An investigation relating to this matter has been conducted by the Directorate of Special Operations [the Scorpions]. In terms of the NPA Act, the national director of public prosecutions [NDPP] may review a decision to prosecute or not to prosecute."The acting NDPP [Mokotedi Mpshe] has decided to conduct a review of this matter."NPA spokesperson Tlali Tlali declined to indicate when this review will be completed. The statement said Mpshe would continue to be briefed regularly on all "significant matters" that were being investigated or prosecuted by the NPA. Responding to media reports of other cases under review, the NPA said: "In relation to other high profile matters which are the subject of media speculation today [Tuesday], the NPA would like to state that there is no such review under way."Decisions about prosecutions in outstanding matters will be taken in due course and in accordance with the law." There has been much speculation in the media around the reason for the suspension last week of National Director of Public Prosecutions Vusi Pikoli -- due to an "irretrievable breakdown" in the relationship between him and Justice and Constitutional Development Minister Brigitte Mabandla, according to the government.Some reports have suggested that Pikoli was dismissed after issuing an arrest warrant for Selebi based on the police chief's alleged ties to criminal syndicates.The Mail & Guardian has reported that Pikoli's failure to give his political superiors full details of the investigation into Selebi -- and possibly of Selebi's planned arrest -- led to his suspension, according to a range of official sources.The M&G first revealed Selebi's links to organised crime figures, and the Scorpions' investigation into these links, in May last year.The Democratic Alliance has said it will ask President Thabo Mbeki questions in Parliament relating to Pikoli's suspension.Question timeMbeki was caught off guard on Tuesday when asked questions at a media photo opportunity at the Union Buildings in Pretoria about the possible arrest of Selebi.Responding to questions from journalists by asking more questions, Mbeki queried whether it was a president's job to issue warrants of arrest, at which the journalist asking the question responded: "No.""So why do you ask it of this one?" Mbeki inquired.The short but lively impromptu question-and-answer session started with Mbeki being asked whether he had seen a warrant of arrest for Selebi. "You cannot be serious. Have you ever heard of a president issuing a warrant?" a bemused Mbeki asked.When he was pushed for an answer, he said the questions should be asked of prosecutors.Shortly afterwards, Minister in the Presidency Essop Pahad intervened and journalists were ushered out of a room where he was meeting the presidential working group on trade unions."You are out of order, stop it, you are out of order," Pahad said as officials escorted journalists out of the room.After being taken out of the room, journalists were told that a media briefing on the outcome of Mbeki's interaction with union leaders was cancelled. Selebi, in an interview with Talk Radio 702 this week, said there was a problem "when someone makes an allegation in order to investigate his own allegations".He told the radio station and was quoted in the Star as saying: "I am certain that I, Jackie Selebi, have never been involved in that kind of wrongdoing. I have never been involved in any kind of criminal activity. If I was I would have resigned a long time ago." -- Sapa
Related articles
Selebi probe under way
Rumours swirl over suspension
Pikoli: The Selebi connection

Werktoestande by Unisa het haglik geword

2007-09-23T05:29:00.001-07:00

Werktoestande by Unisa het haglik gewordSep 20 2007 06:52:22:790PM - (SA)
Druk artikel
E-pos storie aan 'n vriend
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Unisa-personeellid, Pretoria
Die werkomstandighede by Unisa is haglik. Die personeel weet nie wat hulle verdien nie, weet nie wat die kantoorure is nie, het nog nie vanjaar ’n verhoging gekry nie, en sal dit glo eers einde Oktober terugwerkend kry.
Tientalle vakante poste is beskikbaar, maar in my departement kon ons vanjaar nie een aanstelling bewerkstellig nie.
Die infrastruktuur kan nie die getalle hanteer nie. Studiemateriaal gaan laat uit en die bestaande personeel kan nie oor alles toesig hou nie, dus is daar foute (die swart werknemers kan nie Afrikaans praat nie).
Dit is absoluut onmoontlik om regtig kennis te verwerf deur ’n moeilike vak wat altyd ’n jaarkursus was in ’n semester onder die knie te kry (15 weke). Die druk is aanhoudend, al wat bestuur wil sien, is registrasies, want dit is geld.
Unisa se leuse is “Service to humanity”, maar daar is nie diens nie, dit is geldmaak wat saak maak. Ek was eergisteraand by ’n gradeplegtigheid en uit die 298 graduandi in die program was 15 wit mense.
Dit is weens bestuur se beheptheid met transformasie.
’n Ruk gelede het die rektor die personeel toegespreek. Hy het in ’n diktatorstyl gesê: “If you don’t like the new service conditions, there’s the door and if you want to resign, bring me your resignation, but make sure it is in good English so that I also can understand it.”
Animal Farm, George Orwell se boek, speel hier af en ek kan sê: “All animals are equal but black animals are more equal than white animals.”
’n Mens moet mooi dink as jy ’n universiteit kies, hier gaan jy nie slim word nie – jy gaan mal word

http://www.news24.com/Beeld/Opinie/Briewe/0,,3-2085-73_2187673,00.html

No fertile land means no food

2007-09-13T11:11:00.000-07:00

No fertile land means no food
Ian Sample
12 September 2007 11:59
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Climate change and an increasing population could trigger a global food crisis in the next half century as countries struggle for fertile land to grow crops and rear animals, scientists warned recently.To keep up with the growth in human population, more food will have to be produced worldwide over the next 50 years than has been during the past 10 000 years combined, the experts said.But in many countries a combination of poor farming practices and deforestation will be exacerbated by climate change to steadily degrade soil fertility, leaving vast areas unsuitable for crops or grazing.Competition over sparse resources may lead to conflicts and environmental destruction, the scientists fear.The warnings came as researchers from around the world convened at a United Nations-backed forum in Iceland on sustainable development to address the organisation’s millennium development goals to halve hunger and extreme poverty by 2015.The researchers will use the meeting to call on countries to impose strict farming guidelines to ensure that soils are not degraded so badly they cannot recover.“Policy changes that result in improved conservation of soil and vegetation, and restoration of degraded land, are fundamental to humanity’s future livelihood,” said Zafar Adeel, director of the international network on water, environment and health at the United Nations University in Toronto and co-organiser of the meeting.“This is an urgent task as the quality of land for food production, as well as water storage, is fundamental to future peace. Securing food and reducing poverty ... can have a strong impact on efforts to curb the flow of people, environmental refugees, inside countries as well as across national borders,” he added.The UN millennium ecosystem assessment ranked land degradation among the world’s greatest environmental challenges, claiming it risked destabilising societies, endangering food security and increasing poverty.Some 40% of the world’s agricultural land is seriously degraded. Among the worst affected regions are Central America, where 75% of land is infertile, Africa, where a fifth of soil is degraded and Asia, where 11% is unsuitable for farming.The majority of soil erosion is caused by water, either through flooding or poor irrigation, with the rest lost to winds. “You can sum it up as need, greed and ignorance,” said Andrew Campbell, an Australian environmental consultant. “Some pressures on soil resources come from simple human needs, where people don’t have any option but to grow crops or farm animals. But in other instances world markets demand produce, so farmers try to meet those markets. And sometimes, there will be land that’s cleared that should not have been, or grazed when it shouldn’t have been. All these place great pressures on soil resources.”He warned that increased competition over depleted resources would lead to conflict -- “and the losers will inevitably be the environment and poor people”.The global population has risen substantially in recent decades. Between 1980 and 2000 it rose from 4,4-billion to 6,1-billion and food production increased 50%. By 2050 the population is expected to reach nine-billion.The threat of a food crisis is exacerbated by fears over energy security, with many countries opting to plant biofuel crops in place of traditional food crops. India, for example, has pledged to meet 10% of its vehicle fuel needs with biofuels.Andres Arnalds, of the Icelandic soil conservation service, said the pressures on food production would have knock-on effects all over the world because of the international links in food supply. -- © Guardian News & Media Ltd 2007

http://www.mg.co.za/articlePage.aspx?articleid=318879&area=/insight/monitor/

SA se nuwe tydvak van verdrukking

2007-09-13T09:06:00.001-07:00

SA se nuwe tydvak van verdrukking

Geskryf deur Vlad du Plessis
Woensdag, 12 September 2007
Dit is moontlik dat Suid Afrika tans ’n nuwe tydvak van politieke verdrukking betree. Reeds sedert die onderhandelde oorname het die ANC-regime geleidelik begin om die voorheen opgestelde prosesse en strukture van demokrasie te beskadig. Wydverspreide korrupsie, wanbestuur, nepotisme en verskeie ander vorme van partydige bedrywigheid en staatswanfunksionering het oor die afgelope 14 jaar ’n enorme tol geëis.
Sg. onpartydige waghonde en instellings soos die NV, die howe, OKASA, die Menseregtekommisie, die Taalregtekommissie en ander is bykans deurgaans deur die ANC gekaap. Daar is dus nie kans dat enige van hierdie strukture op die lang duur demokrasie sou bevorder nie.
Twee dinge het egter oor die afgelope enkele dae gewys dat ons waarskynlik ’n nuwe fase van demokratiese aftakeling binnegaan. Die een is die skorsing van mnr. Mike Waters verlede week oor sy ‚“ongemaklike" vrae rakende die onbekwame minister van Gesondheid (Me. Manto-Msimang) in die parlement. Laat ons net vir ’n oomblik by hierdie aangeleentheid stilstaan.
Ten eerste is die Speaker (me. Mbete) ’n lid van die ANC. Dit bring ons terug by die problematiek wat reeds vroeër in hierdie stuk aangeroer is, naamlik dat sg. “onpartydige” posisies deur ANC lede gevul word. Selfs ten beste, wannneer die opposisie betreklik min druk op die ANC plaas, sou dit onmoontlik vir me. Mbete wees om objektiwiteit te handhaaf. Ideaal moet ’n Speaker los staan van enige party. Dat partylojaliteit in die Afrika-konteks soveel te meer ’n rol speel en dat daar dan boonop ’n element van rassevooroordeel is, hoef mens nie eers te noem nie. Ten spyte daarvan dat haar inherente partydigheid haar rol as Speaker kon teenwerk, het dit tot ’n paar dae gelede geen ernstige probleme opgelewer nie. Die toets lê egter daarin as dinge moeilik raak.
Te midde van die huidige magstryd om die ANC-leierskap (en dus die presidentskap van die RSA) het die Nosizwe-Routledge-Manto-Msisimang debakel tot groot mate verpolitiseerd geraak. Die hele aangeleentheid het die onbevoegdheid van Mbeki se keuses rondom sake soos kabinetslede na die oppervlak gebring. Boonop is Nosizwe-Routledge oornag tot ’n soort ’nMessiaanse martelaar verpopuliseer. Sy is immers die een wat die “sterwende massas probeer red” het en toe met haar kabinetspos daarvoor moes “betaal”. Christus het die Romeine en Jode gehad, Ghandi het die Britse Ryk gehad, Dawid het vir Goliat gehad en Nosizwe-Routledge het Thabo en Manto. Nou ja, nie dat Nosizwe-Routledge werklik die leiding van ’n Christus, die opoffering van ’n Ghandi of die oorwinning van ’n Dawid beleef nie, maar in die NSA is ’n adjunk-minister van Gesondheid wat haar werk doen amper ’n heilige (veral as sy daarvoor bestraf word). Nietemin, dit is die skynbaar onskuldige weerlose teenoor die ooglopende magtige.
Teenoor die populêre protagonis, Nosizwe-Routledge, staan die antagonis, Manto-Msimang (Mbeki se keuse). Nosizwe-Routledge se nuutverworwe “Messiaanse” status gee vir haar selfs meer mag as wat sy ten tye van haar adjunk-ministerskap gehad het. Enige faksie binne die ANC met wie sy haarself sou assosieer sal onmiddelik tot die morele hoégrond verhef word, of so sou sulkes altans kon hoop. Daarenteen is Manto-Msisimang se morele status soos ’n stuk lood in dryfsand. Haar onbevoegdheid en skandes sal enige een wat aan haar gebind is die verdoemende dieptes intrek.
Dit kom al meer na vore dat die Mbeki-faksie ’n verbete stryd om oorwinning binne die ANC voer. Behalwe die Zuma-probleem (en dis ’n groot probleem) blyk daar nog verskeie ander faksies en magte aan die werk te wees.
Onder “normale” omstandighede sou Mike Waters se ongerieflike vraag dalk met ’n mate van irritasie verduur word. Normaalweg is die DA soos die kefferbrak op die stoep. Basies irriteer die brakkie almal binne die huis, maar tog kan die bure sien dat jy ook ’n “diereliefhebber” is. As daar egter onmin en rusie in die huis is, dan is ’n lastige brak net te veel, veral as die gekef gaan om ’n waarheid wat jou skade kan berokken. Wat normaal weg net ’n irritasie is, word skielik ’n bedreiging.
Die Nuwe Suid-Afrika was nog nooit ’n demokrasie nie. Dit was van die begin af ’n Bantoe-diktatuur oor ’n blanke minderheid. Daar was geen manier hoe die blankes d.m.v. die stembus die regime omver sou kon werp nie. Nogtans het die ANC se verdraagsaamheid teenoor die parlementêre stelsel en die minderhede se samewerking die wanindruk van demokrasie geskep. Eintlik was dit net een groot verneukspul en die een wat die meeste ingeboet het, was die blanke kieser. Valslik is hy onder die indruk gebring dat ’n stem vir die DA ’n verskil sal maak.
Die DA en die ander partytjies was uitlaatkleppe vir blanke frustrasies. Dit het voorkom dat blanke frustrasie omsit in woede wat die deksel sou afblaas. Dit het sodoende ’n disfunksionele en verdrukkende sisteem help legitimeer. Hierdie partye het dus inherent ’n aandeel aan die Afrikaner se onderdrukking. Hulle speel dieselfde gekoöpteerde rol as wat die Kleurling- en Indiërpartye in die ou Driekamerparlement gespeel het.
Onder die sg. “normale” omstandighede waarin ons oor die afgelope 14 jaar woon, is die opposisie se kritiek bloot afgemaak as wit rassisme. Hierdie effektiewe verweer is keer op keer aangevoer en sekerlik ook tot groot mate geglo, deur beide die ANC en hul ondersteuners. Die “rassisme”-aanklag was bykans elke keer effektief genoeg om opposisie-aanvalle te neutraliseer. In werklikheid was daar nooit ’n kans dat swart kiesers vir enige blanke party, selfs die mees liberale, sou stem nie. Nogtans, as daar die geringste vertwyfeling by die swart kieser sou ontstaan, sou die „wit rassisme”-aanklag meebring dat hy die opposisie geen oorweging skenk nie.
Maar wat as dit nie om die swart kieser gaan nie? Hoe gemaak as dit nie gaan oor keuse tussen wit of swart nie, maar wel oor ’n keuse tussen swart en swart? Ook, as die keuse nie deur die massa uitgevoer word nie maar wel deur partylede wat self beroepspoliteke ideale het? Sulke kaders soek immers ’n leier wat hul goedgesind is en wat polities sal oorleef. Gemeet aan sulke standaarde lyk Mbeki se saak sleg; immers moet hy ’n derde termyn bewerkstellig en boonop ’n swak baanrekord as president oorkom. Wanneer die ANC as verenigde front teenoor die wit opposisie staan, is dit maklik maar as die eenheid verbrokkel, is dit ’n ander saak. Dit gaan om die regerende (Mbeki-)faksie binne die ANC se politieke oorlewing. Dat die aanklag (‚rassisme”) wat normaalweg voldoende verweer sou wees, nie nou alleen die ding kan doen nie, dui vir mens presies hoe netelig en broos die regerende faksie se posisie is. Dit dui ook hoe intens onstabiel die ANC geword het.
Om weer terug te gaan na die sg. “normale omstandighede” (wat glad nie gesond is nie) sou nóg Mike Waters, nóg die DA enige skade kon berokken. Klaarblyklik is die tektoniese fout(e) wat tans deur die ANC loop so onstabiel dat geen bykomende “versteurings” geduld kan word nie. Eintlik hoef die ANC nooit die opposisie enigsens geduldig gewees het nie. Waar dit dus om die regerende faksie se politieke oorlewing gaan, is die las van ’n demokratiese masker een wat dalk net te veel is.
Die DA het altyd die idee van ’n kritiese opposie volgens die liberaal-demokratiese ideaal nagestreef. Die klem het daarop geval om die regering onbevoeg te bewys en die indiwidu daarvan te oortuig dat die DA ’n beter opsie is. Helen Zille het hierdie beginsel ’n trappie verder gevoer deur te onderneem om sulke goeie diens in die bestuur van Kaapstad te lewer dat dit swart kiesers sou oorreed om vir die DA te stem. Nie Helen Zille, Tony Leon, die DA, DP, PFP of hul voorganger het ooit die rassewerklikheid van SA verstaan nie. Helen Zille se verspotte idee het nie net haarself mislei nie maar ook die blanke kieser. Daar is drie realitiete wat hulle (die liberaliste) nie kán of wíl begryp nie.
Die ANC sal nooit die mag vrywillig afstaan nie. Dit het R.W. Johnson, wat ’n liberale kritikus van die vorige bewind was, ook onomwonde gestel.
In die Afrika-konteks ontvang die bevydingsbeweging vir dekades lank ongekende lojaliteit.
Oor die algemeen stem mense volgens rasverdelings. Ghandi se woorde geld: „enige volk verkies sy eie swak regering bo ’n ander volk se goeie regering.” Dit is die rassewerklikheid.
Met die verjaging van Waters en die inhegtenisname van Zille het die masker finaal afgekom. Uiteindelik het die ANC homself ontbloot vir wat dit werklik is: ’n Eenpartydiktator.
Dat Waters geskors is, het gedui daarop dat die ANC nie meer kritiek gaan duld nie. Met Zille se inhegtenisname kom ons by die tweede belangrike gebeurtenis van die afgelope dae. Streng volgens die wet is sy oor ’n onbenulligheid (sy het ’n tegniese aspek van die wet oortree tydens ’n anti-dwelmprotesoptog) in hegtenis geneem. Dit lyk meer asof die regime gewag het vir die geleentheid om haar agter tralies te kry, al was dit net vir ’n paar uur. En, dit is belangrik, want dit laat mens onwillkeurig wonder/besef dat die Waters-insident nie ’n geisoleerde gebeurtenis is nie en dat ons ten minste hier te make het met ’n nuwe styl in die hantering van die opposisie. My persoonlike gevoel is egter dat dit baie meer as ’n stylverskuiwing verteenwoordig en meer waarskynlik ’n geheel nuwe doktrine behels, nl. ’n verskuiwing van geïrriteerde verdraagsaamheid (met ’n aansienlike mate van verskuilde verdrukking), na ’n toestand van openlike onderdrukking.
Die boodskap aan Zille (en alle opposisielede) is baie duidelik: “Kritiek gaan nie meer geduld word nie.” Zille se inhegtenisname is niks minder as die intimidasie van die leier van die amptelike opposisie om hierdie punt tuis te bring nie. Soos wat Zille self oor die gebeurde in die polisiekantoor sê: „Die vertoon van mag was duidelik.”
Boodskap versend, boodskap ontvang…
Of Zille haar aan die boodskap gaan steur of nie is waarskynlik onbelangrik, aangesien Zille se rol in elk geval futiel is. Wat wel belangrik is, is hoe die politieke kultuur gaan ontwikkel met die pylvak na die ANC-presidentskap en veral daarna. In hierdie periode sal dit duidelik word of ons wel ’n tydvak van die absolute onderdrukking van opposisiepolitiek binnegaan. Myns insiens is daar drie moontlike scenario’s wat kan uitspeel. Meer daaroor volgende week.

http://www.praag.org/mambo/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=918&Itemid=37

How the CIA defeated Apartheid & placed the ANC

2007-09-09T02:59:00.000-07:00

http://www.africanc risis.co. za/Article. php?ID=11102&Original Article:

Thursday 08-Mar-2007[This is the most important article I found on the web in my more than 5 years on the web. The original discovery was by a military friend of mine overseas. He found the book, and then later, I found this article.An alert reader in the UK found this. This article is the follow on by Dr Cummings to his book, "The Pied Piper" (1985). Dr Cummings was a CIA agent in the Middle East. This is an extremely important article and it explains what went on behind the scenes in this country. Jan]From International Journal of Intelligence and Counterintelligence , Summer 1995:A Diamond Is Forever: Mandela Triumphs, Butheleziand de Klerk Survive, and ANC on the U.S. Payrollby Richard CummingsNelson Mandela is the president of South Africa, an event ofmonumental significance in world history. This great personaltriumph is for him a vindication of his struggle. But now that theSouth African elections are long past, the record must be setstraight about what really happened and why. The press hasconcealed as much as it reported; ideologues of all stripes haverushed around to rationalize their hypocrisies, and Americanpoliticians have been spreading around largesse as if the moneywere their own. That the results were so perfect, historically sosymmetrical, is rather remarkable.But, those with power, or who are connected to it, do not want thefacts about the funding of the election to be known because itwould reveal a pattern of deception and control, both to influencethe outcome and to moderate the African National Congress. Andthose on the radical left don't want it known that the ANC hascompromised itself by joining the list of organizations takingmoney from the United States, because they think it will hurt thecause of revolution. Everyone involved, across the ideologicalspectrum, has therefore joined in a kind of game to cloud the mindsof outside observers.Most hypocritical perhaps was the attempt to make a devil out ofChief Mangosuthu Buthelezi by characterizing him as the tool of theoppressors and an obstructionist in the transition to democracy.His anomalous situation in post-apartheid South Africa led tosuggestions that he was an enemy of democracy, and the cause ofdissension that led to violence in an attempt to disrupt theelectoral process that black South Africans struggled for decadesto achieve. Chairman of the Inkatha Freedom Party and chiefminister of KwaZulu, this prince and descendant of Shaka Zulu wasthen cast in the role of villain and reactionary. But it was notalways so.ANC and the CPThe triumph of Nelson Mandela and the African National Congress inSouth Africa was, for many years, viewed in certain circles as anextremely undesirable result. During the Cold War, the power of theSouth African Communist Party in the ANC made the ANC unacceptableas a holder of power in a post-apartheid South Africa. Yet, becauseapartheid and the white supremacist Nationalist Party were anathemato the rest of Africa, and because white racism fueled thesentiments for communism among the black majority in South Africa,a reliable black alternative to the ANC became essential. As HarryRositzke, the Central Intelligence Agency station chief in NewDelhi from 1957 to 1962, and coordinator of operations againstCommunist parties abroad from 1962 until his retirement from theCIA in 1970, wrote in 1977: "In Africa, an area ofprimitive, unstable states, Soviet influence is substantial inSomalia, Guinea, Nigeria, and Angola. The support of blackindependence movements against the Rhodesian and South Africangovernments may extend that influence. The training of fivethousand African students each year in the Soviet and East Europeanuniversities is a direct investment in the future leadership of alargely illiterate continent."1Noting the "Chinese competition the Soviets face in ... the SouthAfrica liberation movements," Rositzke argued candidly for covertaction in the Third World: "Do we try to make a deal withThe leftists -- covertly at least to start? Do we take any covertpolitical action to ensure the continued supply of chrome from ablack Rhodesia that threatens to boycott its sale to the UnitedStates if we do not withdraw our investments in South Africa?However unlikely these scenarios, we cannot forecast whatwill happen in the economic world to threaten ourprosperity." 2These concerns led to a policy that did not distinguish betweenanti-communism and opposition to apartheid. Indeed, they becamesynonymous in South Africa as that policy came to a head in theReagan administration. As Gregory Treverton has observed:"For the Reagan administration, the intended signal wasanti-communism. For it, there was nothing incompatible aboutsupporting anti-communism in Angola and anti-apartheid in SouthAfrica."3United States anti-apartheid policy was always primarily a tool ofits anti-communist policy. And that anti-communist policy wasdirectly related to the preservation of American "prosperity" andeconomic self-interest, as Rositzke explained. To this end, the CIAfunneled money into Africa Bureau, a London-based anti-apartheidgroup headed by the Rev. Michael Scott, an Anglican priestdedicated to ameliorating the harsh apartheid policies of SouthAfrica in South West Africa. Dan Schecter, Michael Ansara, andDavid Kolodney wrote in 1970, "The United States remains involvedin channeling money to various factions within southern-Africanliberation movements, hoping, of course, to mold them inpro-Western directions." 4Long before the Reagan administration, white liberals in the UnitedStates and South Africa understood the threat of communism in SouthAfrica and took action, in concert with the CIA, to undermine thatthreat, even if this delayed, by necessity, the end of apartheid.And ultimately, Buthelezi became a key figure in that effort.The leading American liberal politician to first become activelyinvolved in the anti-apartheid movement was then United StatesSenator Hubert Humphrey (D., Minnesota). In 1960, a press agency,International Features Service, was established, largely todisseminate the thoughts of Senator Humphrey to the people of theThird World, including Africa. International Features was quicklyreorganized as a not-for-profit organization, Peace for Freedom,liberally supported with CIA funds through the InternationalDevelopment Foundation and the Price Fund.5 Another organization launched with CIA assistance was the United States-South Africa Leadership Exchange Program (USSALEP) when the African-American Institute, a CIA conduit, agreed to add USSALEP to its existing projects.6 A key functional area of USSALEP was, and is, "flexible independent exchanges, providing opportunities for leaders in any variety of fields to confer with colleagues." 7 In 1983, HarrisWofford, later a U.S. Senator from Pennsylvania, and then, as now,a member of the management committee of USSALEP, stated thatButhelezi deserved support because he had stayed in South Africa,unlike leaders of the ANC, and had not engaged in violence.8 Wofford made it very clear that he was speaking not only for himself, but for his organization.Wofford served as President Kennedy's special representative to Africafrom 1962 to 1964 before he became associate director of the PeaceCorps. The implication was clear: Buthelezi was with the West,but Mandela, who often espoused pro-South African Communist Partysentiments, was not. And a major non-governmental backer ofUSSALEP was AMAX, the American mining giant, on whose board haveserved former Presidents Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter.The Lowenstein InterventionIn 1959, Allard Lowenstein, then a foreign policy aide to SenatorHumphrey, traveled to South Africa and South West Africa to gatherdata on the effects of apartheid in both territories. During thecourse of this trip, Lowenstein was approached by the CIA in SouthAfrica and requested to smuggle out of South Africa a "Capecolored" student, Hans Beukes, a member of the anti-SWAPO Hererotribe from Rehoboth, South West Africa.9 Beukes would later be accused of subverting SWAPO when it expelled him in 1976.10 Lowenstein would later writeBrutal Mandate, a book on his South African experience. A leadingAmerican liberal who had served as president of the National StudentsAssociation and civil rights activist, Lowenstein was recruited tothe CIA in 1962 as an expert on southernAfrica.11 From 1962 to 1967, Lowensteintraveled to that part of the continent and had contacts with varioussouthern African personalities, both in Africa and the UnitedStates, providing the agency with his assessment of their politicalleanings, and their reliability.The ANC had taken up armed struggle on 16 December 1961 with thefounding by Nelson Mandela of Umkhonot We Sizwe, "Spear of theNation," and with its Communist support, was becoming a threat.Mandela was a cult figure of the Left who had enormous appeal.Until his capture, his ability to elude the police had made him afolk hero. In the spring of 1962, Lowenstein was contacted by boththe American Committee on Africa and the CIA-supported AmericanSociety for African Culture, which were joining forces for ademonstration and protest march on behalf of Nelson Mandela, WalterSisulu, and the seven others who had been arrested by the SouthAfrican police when the ANC underground headquarters wasdiscovered. While the United States did not want Mandela in power,neither did it want him martyred. The arrested leaders were ontrial and faced the possibility of the death penalty, which inSouth Africa was administered by hanging. Because of the organizedpressure, Mandela and Sisulu were not executed but sentenced tolife in prison, with Mandela remaining on Robben Island as thepreeminent figure in the African National Congress. After the dayto day operations of the ANC passed to Mandela's far lesscharismatic law partner, Oliver Tambo, who had fled to Zambia, theANC was seemingly neutralized without the United States to blame.Other ChoicesThe CIA was looking for alternatives to the ANC. To the ANC's left,the CIA directed money to the ultra-black nationalist PanAfricanist Congress (PAC) which had organized the demonstration,from which the ANC abstained, that led to the Sharpeville massacrein the spring of 1960.12 As early as1961, Mandela had discounted the Pan Africanist Congress because,he asserted, "there is no doubt in my mind that they preached anextreme form of racialism."13Mandela believed the abandonment of non-violence and theintroduction of the use of force to be justified because, "[N]oleader is going out to say we want peaceful discussions because thegovernment is making that kind of talk senseless. Instead ofgetting a favorable response, the government is more arrogant. TheAfrican reaction can only be a show of force." Notes of the secretinterview given by Mandela to Patrick O'Donovan were provided toAllard Lowenstein in London by Mary Benson, an anti-apartheidactivist.14To rival Spear of the Nation, which had begun a campaign ofsabotage against "the symbols of apartheid" by staging rocketattacks against police stations, the PAC launched Poqo, a massmovement modeled on the Mau Mau in Kenya. Claiming a membership of150,000, it engaged in acts of terrorism. Although it neverachieved the strength of the ANC, it did come back to haunt SouthAfrican politics by initially refusing to take part in the firstone-person, one-vote non-racial elections in the country's history.Having become the CIA's Frankenstein' s monster, the Pan AfricanistCongress ceased to be an acceptable alternative to Mandela and theANC, but it continued to pose a sufficient threat to possiblydisrupt the electoral process.Throughout the 1960s, Lowenstein made considerable use of hisexpertise on revolutionary movements in southern Africa in waysthat would have an important impact on U.S. policy. From hisvantage point in the intelligence community, he argued for ananti-Communist alternative on the Left, becoming a key figure, inthe parlance of the agency, of the "good wing" of the CIA. As a CIAoperative once described this element in the agency to HarrisWofford, "If you only knew what we're really doing, the liberalsand the leftists, the democratic leftists, what we're supportingaround the world, you'd see that we represented the 'good wing' inthe CIA."15 And in his pursuit of ananti-Communist left alternative in South Africa, while heacknowledged that the blacks had ample reason to resort toviolence, Lowenstein faulted the ANC, as did the agency, on thegrounds that it was engaging in armed struggle with support fromthe Soviet Union and the People's Republic of China, not to mentionits alliance with the South African CommunistParty.16 In his 1966 swing throughsouthern Africa, Lowenstein conferred with representatives of theANC in Dar es Salaam, whose headquarters in which they met featureda large portrait of Mao Zedong. When Lowenstein asked them how hecould be of help, the black South Africans told him that what theyneeded was money for arms. They were engaged in armed struggle andwanted weapons, not the limited support Lowenstein had provided inthe past, and which China had eclipsed. At this point, Lowensteinconcluded that the ANC was unreliable and uncontrollable andtherefore totally unacceptable. 17But as the entire Cold War liberal structure began to come apartduring the Vietnam war, Lowenstein turned his efforts to gettingrid of President Lyndon Johnson and to replacing him with SenatorRobert F. Kennedy (D., New York) and to his own political career,winning election to Congress as a Democrat from New York in 1968.He would not return to the South African scene until the late1970s, when, following a stint as one of President Carter'sambassadors to the United Nations, he traveled extensively insouthern Africa at the behest of the CIA and Harry Oppenheimer,scion of the South African DeBeers and Anglo-American gold miningand diamond empire. In the interim, the fruitless search for analternative political group to the ANC continued as violenceescalated in South Africa, and it become increasingly threatened bythe possibility of a revolution led by the South African CommunistParty and the ANC.Zulu RisingDuring this period the fortunes of Buthelezi began to rise.Although in the pay of the South African government as chiefminister of the KwaZulu government, Buthelezi steadfastly refusedto permit KwaZulu to be turned into a "homeland." To do so wouldhave constituted an acceptance of the government's apartheidpolicies. This posture of at least nominal independence, as well ashis identification with the mythic Zulu people led Buthelezi to beable to play both sides with consummate skill. He was never asycophant to the National Party, which had formalized a system oftotal racial segregation, and which had controlled South Africasince 1948, when the old United Party of Jan Smuts had beendefeated. Buthelezi appealed to those who never had any use forwhite liberals like Helen Suzman, whose Liberal party had beenoutlawed, and who maintained a life of luxury in the midst of asystem she purported to detest. As the cast of "Wait A Minim," theSouth African musical comedy mocked, "the only thing the liberalshate more than apartheid is the blacks."Buthelezi, highly intelligent and articulate, played the role ofthe radical conservative, to the increasing attention of the UnitedStates. Capable of appearing fiercely traditional in tribal dressone minute, and handsome and immaculate in a Saville Row suit thenext, Buthelezi began to capture the imagination of the powerbrokers. He not only spoke all the languages of South Africa, heseemed to speak to the economic and political needs of the country,with its astonishing diversity, as well. There was a vacuum and heappeared to be the only player capable of filling it. WithButhelezi and his ideas for a federal republic of South Africa,investment would be safe, and whites and blacks could be placated.Even his appeal to royalty, his professed loyalty to the King ofthe Zulus, Goodwill Zwelethini (also his nephew), impressed whiteswho sought modest change in the context of stability, and blacks,for whom royalty had always held a certain attraction as adimension of African pride. If a black African leader for SouthAfrica could have been created by the Reagan administration, itwould have been Buthelezi. With Ronald Reagan in the White Houseand William Casey at CIA, the "good wing" would be out and the hardline in. There was no such thing as a Left alternative to communismin this ideology, only a Right alternative that was indeed "right."Under Reagan, Buthelezi would fit the mold, as Jonas Savimbi did inAngola, where South Africa and the CIA together aided his effortsagainst the leftist government, with its pro-Soviet sympathies.Indeed, conservatives worldwide began to support Buthelezi, withparticular support coming, according to a former U.S. "Africahand," from Germany through such conservative semi-politicalfoundations as the Adenauer Schiftung and the Ebert Schiftung, muchin the manner that DCI Casey was able to get other countries suchas Saudi Arabia to aid the contras inNicaragua.18 According to thissource, Buthelezi had been promised a "Greater Natal" by hard-lineapartheid Prime Minister P.W. Botha, who offered him thepossibility of having white areas such as Durban in his power base.With such an increase in his domain, were an election to happen, hewould be able to command at least the five percent that wasultimately established as a basis for a seat in the cabinet. Alongwith white representation in the cabinet, he would be a sufficientforce to moderate the polices of a leftist government underMandela, and block either nationalizations or confiscatory taxpolicies.19 But before this scenariobegan to take hold, the liberals gave it one more shot to find analternative to Mandela and the ANC who would not be so conservativeas to alienate the majority of blacks, who might still turn to thefar left. At this point in the 1970s, Allard Lowenstein once againentered the scene, with Buthelezi playing to both liberal andconservative factions.According to South Africa expert Professor William Foltz of YaleUniversity, Buthelezi was being "courted by South African bigbusiness and some American corporations" during the1970s.20 He mentioned AMAX, the mininggiant with extensive South African holdings that was also a USSALEPbacker through its AMAX Foundation, as one of these. The effort toapproach Buthelezi, Foltz explains, was led not by Americanbusiness interests, but by the liberal part of South Africanindustry, particularly Harry Oppenheimer, whose Ernest OppenheimerMemorial Trust, the charitable arm of Anglo-American, was alsobacking USSALEP; Helen Suzman; and Clive Menell, chair of AnglovaalHoldings, Ltd., a mining giant. Menell lives across the street fromOppenheimer in South Africa, and entertained Buthelezi in his homein the presence of Professor Foltz. Foltz explains that Buthelezi'srefusal to let KwaZulu be a homeland made him attractive to theOppenheimer crowd, as he could not be seen as a tool of apartheid.Although highly ambitious and sensitive to slights, real orapparent, Buthelezi was regarded by his advocates as a "reasonableand interesting alternative, at least a serious player." So Woffordwas right. USSALEP, launched with the CIA's help and passed alongto power South African and American corporate interests, couldproclaim by 1980 that it "receives no funding, direct or indirect,from the United States, South Africa, or any other government," wasnow behind Buthelezi, seeing nowhere else to go.Lowenstein ReduxBy the mid 1970s, the exploitation of uranium in South West Africahad made South Africa's role there a major international issue. Thelarge block of nonwhite Third World countries pressed for SouthWest Africa's independence. In April 1975, Allard Lowensteinattended a key symposium on "The Outlook for Southern Africa,"which was backed by the Johnson Foundation. Funded by USSALEP andthe Johnson and Johnson pharmaceutical company, the meeting washeld at the Johnson Wingspread conference facility in Wisconsin.The symposium explored ways to prevent the worst from happeningfrom the point of view of the American, South Africa, and Britishcompanies that invested heavily there. South Africa was describedas "the Saudi Arabia of minerals," and South West Africa had onceagain become vitally important to the West because of Britain'sdependence upon it for uranium.21Rio Tinto Zinc, a multinational mining company based in Britain,was exploiting the Rossing mine, the world's largest single sourceof uranium.Lowenstein's presentation at the Wingspread symposium was aclassic "good wing" analysis. Will we identify with the oppressedpeople, including those of South Africa? Because Africans werefinding that the only way to produce change was through violence,this was playing "into the hands of the Soviet Union and China,"who were providing money and training which were, in fact,producing results. Lowenstein asked the rhetorical question andtried to answer it: "Can we influence Africans toaccommodate their demands in less violent ways? Only if we pressurefor the necessary reforms at an acceptable pace. This means findingways for South Africa to get out of Namibia and Rhodesia, to permitBlack regimes to develop in both states. Instead of 'buffer states'there might emerge on the border of South Africa the appearance ofprivileged sanctuaries so that the pressure for change within SouthAfrica would be stepped up. As the international dimensionsproceed, they are the priority; the domestic ones should follow.Eventually, changes within South Africa will have to occur. If theydo not come nonviolently and in a rapid, evolutionary way, theywill be forced with sabotage, violence andwarfare."22At the United Nations, he clashed with U.S. Ambassador Andrew Youngover U.S. policy in Zimbabwe/Rhodesia. Lowenstein was stronglyopposed to Robert Mugabe and wanted a role for white liberals. Healso visited South Africa where he held lengthy meetings with youngAfrikaner Nationalists. After his U.N. service, Lowenstein cameback in from the cold. His involvement with the powerful whiteliberals of South Africa and his relationship with Frank Carlucci,appointed deputy director of the CIA by President Carter (and whohad been stationed in South Africa when Lowenstein traveled therein 1959), enabled him to continue his work in southern Africa inthe summer of 1979.This vitally important trip was financed by Anglo-American, whichpaid Lowenstein $7,000 for his services, $1,000 to his aide, MarkChildress, and $1,000 to Lowenstein' s secretary. Provided for thesummer's expedition were a comfortable house in Johannesburg, withrecreational facilities and domestic servants, and fulltransportation, including return air fares on the Concorde forLowenstein, Lowenstein's three children and Childress. All of thiswas arranged by Hank Slack, the American Director of Anglo-Americanand the former son-in-law of HarryOppenheimer. 23 Lowenstein wasworking closely with Deputy CIA Director Carlucci, who statedcategorically that "Lowenstein would report tome."24 And there was much to report.Lowenstein first consulted with Theo-Ben Gurirab of SWAPO, at SWAPOheadquarters in New York City, then departed for South Africa.There he held meetings with Buthelezi, Harry Oppenheimer, HelenSuzman, South African Foreign Minister Pik Botha, and P.W. Botha,the South African Prime Minister. He also met with Mandela, stillincarcerated on Robben Island.25Richard Moose, Carter's Assistant Secretary of State for Africa,told Sam Adams, formerly of CIA, that Lowenstein was talking to "alot of opposition groups."26 WhatLowenstein was doing was laying the groundwork for a flexibleAmerican policy in South Africa, in alliance with the wealthy SouthAfrican white liberals and the "verlicht" Afrikaner Nationalists,to dismantle the structure of apartheid without Marxistrevolution. Lowenstein's role in this venture was cut short when hewas shot to death in 1980 by Dennis Sweeney, a former recruit inthe civil rights movement in Mississippi, but the legacy of hisinvolvement remained a potent one. Carlucci, who admired Lowensteinand was greatly influenced by him, shared Lowenstein's assessmentthat the problems of South Africa could be "workedout."27 And Buthelezi had goodreason to believe that he was, at the very least, part of thesolution and not the problem.U.S. AidWith the election of Ronald Reagan to the presidency in 1980,United States and South African intelligence (BOSS, the SouthAfrican CIA) increased cooperation on behalf of Jonas Savimbi inAngola. The CIA authorized $15 million for Savimbi'sUNITA.28 In South Africa, withGerman money coming to him, Buthelezi was fast becoming the darlingof American conservatives, including Jeane Kirkpatrick, Reagan'sAmbassador to the United Nations, as a "sound anti-Communistalternative. "29 The Washington Timesand the Wall Street Journal took up his cause. But, according toProfessor Foltz, there was a significant split in the Reaganadministration. Reagan's Assistant Secretary of State for Africa,Chester Crocker, was "opposed to Buthelezi" and "playing a muchmore complicated game."30 Foltzexplains that Crocker thought it wise "not to see any single personas the answer."31 Foltz also creditsthe British Ambassador to South Africa at that time, Sir RobinRenwick, as being "highly skillful" in his efforts to preventviolence and bring about a peaceful solution in South Africa.(Renwick is generally acknowledged with having obtained Mandela'srelease from prison, a task made easier by the fact that hisgovernment had not imposed sanctions on South Africa, therebygiving it some leverage with the white regime in Pretoria.) But heargues that the "whole situation was sliding rapidly" and that the"logic" of the Reagan administration' s policy was "comingapart."32The support of American industrial interests for Buthelezi began todiminish when it appeared that he might not be able to deliver inthe face of enormous public support for Mandela. The final push,Foltz explains, was the 1986 U.S. sanctions legislation, whichaltered the situation irrevocably. Now a legend among Americanblacks as a symbol of the triumph through struggle over apartheid,Nelson Mandela could no longer be shunted aside. The ANC had becomethe ultimate force in South Africa, and Buthelezi, with his baselimited to the Zulus, was without a national organization capableof overcoming it. But, with financial support still coming to himfrom Germany, Buthelezi was, according to Foltz, able to retain theservices of the powerful Washington public relations firm, Black,Manafort. Buthelezi and his people continued to use the rhetoricof the Cold War, "not about the ANC but the ANC and theCommunists." 33 But the miningcompanies were no longer interested and Buthelezi's support waslimited to "the fast buck people inNatal."34 And while Buthelezi might,at one point, have been able to get the 5 percent needed for acabinet position, the "old Africa hand" argued (incorrectly, itturned out) that Buthelezi would be "hard pressed" to carry theZulu vote. Because the young Zulus are now more urban than rural,and identify increasingly with the ANC, he maintained, Buthelezi' spower base was substantially eroded, notwithstanding continuedGerman support and support from private American conservativegroups.35 Foltz puts it moreforcefully: "He [Buthelezi] is playing a destructive andscandalous role now."36 But who wasactually paying for that role and, in effect, funding the bloodbaththat lasted until Inkatha reentered the elections?Reenter the United States-South Africa Leadership Exchange Program(USSALEP), by now no longer stating that it does not receive fundsfrom any government directly or indirectly, but indicating overtlythat it is funded, in part, by the United States Agency forInternational Development (AID) and the National Endowment forDemocracy (NED). In its 1992 Program Update, in a short noteentitled "Transition to Democracy Project," USSALEP proclaims:The $8,000,000 cooperative agreement, under which subgrants of $4.8million for the African National Congress (ANC) and $2.6 millionfor the Inkatha Freedom Party was to be disbursed by September 30,1992, was extended for an additional 15 months in order to utilizethe full amount obligated by USAID. The purpose of the project isto build administration capacity within the ANC and the IFPorganizations to enable them to participate more effectively in thenegotiations leading to a new constitution and democraticgovernment. Due to the very stringent disbursement conditions(which, for example, eliminated the category of salaries as apermissible expenditure category under the original budgets),coupled with administrative/ absorptive capacity limitations of thesub-grantees, only approximately 45 percent of the $7.4 millioncould be expended during the originally scheduled, 13-month projectlife.The monies disbursed to date have been used to: (i)acquire or rent office space to house central and regional staff,(ii) purchase and install computer hardware and software and trainpersonnel needed to establish effective management informationsystems, and (iii) pay for sundry travel, consulting and workshopexpenses relating to the above and to the formulation of policyoptions and negotiation positions.USAID and USSALEP are presently in discussion with the subgranteesto identify new areas of expenditure not previously included intheir budget proposals. Among those being considered is thecritical one encompassing peace initiatives. 37Hired as project manager of the Transition to Democracy Project wasStanley Kahn, a South African sociology professor on the faculty ofboth the universities of Witwatersrand and Cape Town. Kahn hadserved as executive director of the Funda Centre in Diepkloof,Soweto and was the recipient of a USSALEP Alan Pifer Fellowship tovisit the United States to "survey the contribution of communitycolleges to adult education."38 Kahnwas later promoted to Director of USSALEP South Africa.Kahn may be a fine fellow, but it still sounds a lot like "walkingaround money." And if salaries were being paid to ANC and Inkatha,who was getting the money? Mandela? Buthelezi? And if these groupswere getting the money, who decided that more than twice as muchshould go to the ANC as to Inkatha? Notably, Harris Woffordcontinued to serve on the Board and Council of USSALEP, whichdispensed the funds from the AID budget that Wofford voted for as asenator. His past legal practice has involved major clients inAfrica. Apart from this seeming conflict of interest, Americantaxpayers should be concerned that their money was being used toinfluence the outcome of an election in a foreign country, howeverovert this funding might now be. Most of the old players are stillthere: Harry Oppenheimer, who funds USSALEP through theAnglo-American & DeBeers Chairman's Fund; Clive Menell, chairman ofAnglovaal Holdings, Ltd. (contributor and Board and Councilmember), and an old Buthelezi backer; and Hank Slack, now presidentand CEO of MINORCO in London (contributor and Board and Councilmember), as well as all the major industrial concerns, American,international and South African, that control the vast mining'interests of South Africa and the rest of its economy. The resultof all of this funding of the competing parties? R.W. Johnson, anative of South Africa and a fellow in politics at MagdalenCollege, Oxford, on leave from Oxford to write about current SouthAfrica and also to serve as national co-director of the LaunchingDemocracy project, a public information service for all SouthAfrican political parties, sponsored by the Institute forMulti-Party Democracy (one wonders about the source of itsfunding), observed:Some of the killing is political: currently the largest setof victims are Inkatha officials killed by the ANC, though the mostpublicized recent killing was that of Chris Hani, the SACP(Communist) leader, by the white Right. The Azanian People'sLiberation Army, the armed wing of the Pan Africanist Congress,carries out anti-white atrocities from time to time, and, ofcourse, Inkatha takes its vengeance on the ANC with fairregularity.39As the whites were panicking, a state of emergency was declared inKwaZulu because of the inability of Mandela, Buthelezi, KingGoodwill Zwelethini, and de Klerk to come to an agreement on how toresolve the impasse and get Inkatha back into the electionprocess.40 Buthelezi denounced whathe described as "a lengthy Machiavellian manipulation commenced,right at the start of our negotiations, with attempts tomarginalize our Inkatha FreedomParty."41 If he was referring to theinequitable distribution of the U.S. AID money between the ANC andInkatha, he certainly made up the difference from the Germans. Andhow effective giving money to the ANC will be in wooing it from itsSouth African Communist Party ally remains to be seen. Mandelainsists the ANC is not Communist, but that it remains loyal to itsoldest ally and friend.42 Moreover,the relisting as a USSALEP sponsor of the African AmericanInstitute, a CIA conduit in the past that helped launch USSALEP,also means that CIA money still, in all probability, flows covertlyto certain organizations in South Africa. The most likely candidatefor U.S. assistance was the CIA's old client, the Pan AfricanistCongress (whose overt support the ANC would never accept), to keepit in the electoral process and then accept the results. But theamount of money given to the Pan Africanist Congress has surelybeen miniscule, given its lack of a function at this point ofhistory. The purpose was not to get it votes, but to keep it quiet.Educating VotersAfter the supposed failure of former Secretary of State Henry A.Kissinger (now an international business consultant) and formerBritish Foreign Minister Lord Carrington (who has served on theboard of Rio Tinto Zinc, which controls the Rossing uranium mine inNamibia) to bring Buthelezi into the elections, all seemed to belost.43 But an amazing last minutereprieve was finally achieved, and the elections went forward inthe midst of bombings by white extremists. Helping the IndependentElection Commission to supervise them to make sure they were "fair"was the South African Fair Elections Fund (SAFE), funded largely byAmerican interests and headed up by the liberal Kennedy loyalist,Theodore Sorensen, who had $7 million at his disposal for "votereducation." According to Ian Williams of the New York Observer,"many of those involved in SAFE haven't concealed their hopes foran ANC landslide."44 And whileWilliams reported AID's funding of both the ANC and Inkatha, heneglected to mention USSALEP, the éminence grise of the wholesordid business. But even with AID funding much of the election,and SAFE providing additional assistance to assure the right kindof acceptable "left" victory, Ronald Brown, President BillClinton's man at the Department of Commerce, announced $140 millionin aid to South Africa.A good portion of this will find its way into the pockets of NorthCarolina academics and their institutions, Duke, Chapel Hill, andNorth Carolina State. They are participating in the $350 millionSouth African research and manufacturing center to be built inMuizenberg, a suburb of Cape Town. The project has the backing ofthe ANC.45 This may help explain whyconservative, anti-Communist Senator Jesse Helms (Rep., NorthCarolina) has failed to denounce the U.S. AID funding of theCommunist-backed ANC -- he makes an unlikely pair with HarrisWofford. Actually, the only institution that should cry fraud isNorth Carolina's predominantly black university, Northern CarolinaA&T, Jesse Jackson's alma mater, which has mysteriously beenexcluded from the AID boondoggle.The ANC and Buthelezi both shouted "fraud" as the election came toa close. The one party that began to pick up surprising support inthe election's final hours was the old bastion of white supremacy,the National Party. It appealed to the "colored" vote, those ofmixed race who tend to be better educated and own property, and toconservative blacks. F.W. de Klerk, holding black babies, managedto remind South Africans of every color that "majority rule" on theAfrican continent can be less than paradise. Rwanda, Somalia,Angola, Zaire, and the Sudan are shattering reminders of the chaosso often associated with post-colonial "liberation. " He managed todo the impossible: prevent the ANC from getting the twothirds seats in parliament it needed to ram through an economicagenda that is supported by the South African Communist Party. Infour years, de Klerk's party will be in a position to form acoalition with Inkatha, not unlike the Democratic TurnhalleAlliance in Namibia (formed with Allard Lowenstein's support andassistance), which also managed to prevent the prevailingrevolutionary group, SWAPO, from getting the two thirds it neededto nationalize the mineral wealth.Once again, white American liberals have failed to appreciate theinnate conservatism of some black Africans, and their willingnessto work with whites, even their former oppressors, out of fear thatthey might lose their property to a "revolutionary" regime, evenone financed by the U.S. government and supported by Jesse Helmsand Harris Wofford, the "Odd Couple" of American politics. If apost-Mandela ANC splits apart, as some South Africans havepredicted, and with the South African Communist Party marginalized,a National/Inkatha Party could well become a real force in SouthAfrica. There is a certain logic to this; the Boers and the Zulushave always had a common enemy: the British and theirEnglish-speaking South African allies in the mining industries.But the Boers and Zulus, both pro-business, pose no threat to thegreat companies and families that have controlled the South Africaneconomy since the Boer war.Mandela's Democratic MovesMeanwhile, Nelson Mandela has made all the right noises, from thepoint of view of his American supporters. He pledged not toconfiscate the property of whites and not to tax in a way that willdiscourage foreign investment and profit. He also made it clearthat he will not tolerate disorder; after the election he urgedeveryone to go back to work and back to school. Mandela did notspend all those years in prison to preside over a country in chaosand anarchy. Like Buthelezi, who is actually a close friend of his,Mandela is a descendant of African royalty. If the ANC and Inkathahave accepted U.S. dollars, as they have, from the Americans whocaused the perpetuation of apartheid for Cold War reasons, there ismore than enough irony in this to justify their actions. Mandelahas started to resemble his predecessor in African liberation, JomoKenyatta. Kenyatta had been jailed for a very long time on chargesof being a Mau Mau terrorist, and then was released in time to stopa violent revolution. Kenyatta suppressed his opposition andallowed the whites to keep control over the Kenyan economy. ButAlec Erwin, a white Communist ANC candidate, declared that there"was nothing sacrosanct" about limiting the budget deficit to 6percent of the GNP, as the IMF had required the ANC to pledge priorto granting a loan. If the ANC could stop mentioning this IMFrequirement as part of the ANC's program, clearly more wasnecessary to make sure the worst did nothappen.46The Voters' ChoiceThe election results, which all the parties long ago accepted as"free and fair," produced some surprises, with the ANC polling 62.5percent, less than the 67 percent required for control over theconstitution, but more than enough to control patronage and 12cabinet seats. De Klerk and the National Party (NP), which woncontrol of the Western Cape, got over 20 percent, enough votes toallow de Klerk to be one of the two executive vice presidents andto gain four cabinet seats. The NP probably got a higher percentageof the black vote than did the Pan Africanist Congress, a relic ofCold War history, which received scant support in the election.Also disappearing into oblivion was the Democratic Party (DP),which was nothing more than the reconstituted old Liberal Partythat Allard Lowenstein had backed. Once banned by the primitivewhite racist South African government, and later reinvented as theProgressive Party with the help of Harry Oppenheimer, the DP wasbasically the personal vehicle of Helen Suzman, who spent as mucheffort fighting the ANC as she did apartheid.Mandela indicated that he would consider offering cabinet posts torepresentatives of parties which polled less than the required 5percent, a carrot to the Pan Africanist Congress if they agreed tobehave themselves. Inkatha received over 10 percent, enough to putButhelezi in the cabinet and give Inkatha a total of four cabinetseats -- a result his critics said was impossible. His total wasaugmented, and de Klerk's reduced, by the fact that some whiteAfrikaners voted for Buthelezi on the national level and the NP onthe provincial level to bolster black opposition to the ANC. Thewhite separatist Freedom Front ended up with about 3 percent,indicating that the white racist call for a boycott of theelections was only marginally successful. Together, these threeprovided an opposition bloc of over one-third of the voters, notcounting those who boycotted theelection.47 Buthelezi, whose Inkathaalso carried KwaZulu/Natal, which his critics claimed he wouldnever be able to do, summed up: "I'm grateful that up tonow, in spite of all the skullduggery and the cheating, so far ithas not flared up into any conflict orviolence."48And it is not likely to. Buthelezi is now the Home Minister, whichputs him in charge of internal affairs and makes him the boss ofSidney Mufamadi, the black chief of police who is also a member ofthe central committee of the South African Communist Party. Thelate Joe Slovo, South African Communist Party chairman, was head ofHousing and Welfare before his death. Joe Modise, the blackcommander of Spear of the Nation, is Minister of Defense (albeitassisted by the existing chief of staff, General Georg Meyring, awhite Afrikaner, who remained in his post); after the change ingovernment Derek Keyes, de Klerk's white Afrikaner Minister ofFinance continued to run the economy from the same position.Mandela's selection of the ANC's Thabo Mbeki as the other executivevice president left the able Cyril Ramaphosa out of the cabinet andthe government entirely, although he remains as the chairman of theANC, in which capacity he is in charge of drafting the newconstitution. Mandela's incredible balancing act made it possible,overall, for there to be something for almost everyone, at whichthe CIA probably heaved a considerable sigh ofrelief.49 With the Cold War over,the view seems to be who cares if a couple of Communists clankaround in the South African government as long as things arebasically under control?A Carat a Day...The Goldsmith Commission, which had investigated the role of thepolice in the violence prior to the elections, subsequently lookedahead to 1999, when the "real" elections will take place. Therewill be a need for new leaders who comprehend the serious economicproblems of the country, as perceived by the International MonetaryFund. USSALEP no doubt stands ready to provide these leaders. Theonly question is whether the United States government will continueto finance their campaigns.But while the pundits debate the first year of the Mandela era,DeBeers continues to control 80 percent of the world's diamond trade,"with 50 percent of these diamonds by value coming from thecompany's own mines in South Africa, Botswana, andNamibia."50 Jonathan M.E.Oppenheimer, Harry Oppenheimer' s grandson, the son of Nicholas F.Oppenheimer of Johannesburg, deputy chairman of the great mininggiants, the Anglo-American Group and DeBeers Consolidated Mines,Ltd., the latter founded by Cecil Rhodes with the backing of theRothschilds, represents the next generation of Oppenheimers as hecontinues his work as a management trainee at N.M. Rothschild &Sons in London.51 Politicians maycome and go, but as the DeBeers ad claims on television, "adiamond is forever."Funny Peculiar PostscriptSubsequently, reports came of widespread election fraud in KwaZuluNatal where Inkatha won its "victory." In some areas, more voteswere counted than the census recorded people living there.Nevertheless, the ANC did not seriously challenge the results. KeyANC candidates who were not elected on the national or provinciallevels were rewarded with big jobs in either Mandela's governmentin Pretoria or in the Inkatha-dominated government ofKwaZulu/Natal. Reporting for Newsday from South Africa in May 1994,Dele Olojede wrote:[T]he great South African political settlement is fait accompli.Mandela is in Pretoria, where Buthelezi will serve as his homeaffairs minister in charge of federal relations with provinces. Inthe Natal provincial capital of Pietermaritzburg Friday night,Inkatha Chairman Frank Mdlalose was duly sworn in as premier at theinaugural session of the provincial legislature. His candidacy wasunopposed. The ANC accepted three of 10 positions in Mdlalose'sCabinet. And when Zulu King Goodwill Zwelethini swept into thechambers, the ANC bench jumped up along with everyone else toshout, in salute, "Wena ndlovu!" ("You're the elephant.")Or the donkey.Richard Daley, the legendary major of Chicago, would have approvedtotally. That AID money wasn't wasted at all. King Goodwillexpressed confidence that, now, peace would surely reign in "mykingdom."52References1. Rositzke, Harry, The CIA's SecretOperations -- Espionage, Counterespionage and Covert Action(New York, Readers Digest Press), 1977, p. 254.2. Rositzke, supra, at 256, 266.3. Treverton, Gregory F., Covert Action: TheLimits of Intervention in the Postwar World (New York, BasicBooks), 1987, p. 220.4. Schecter, Dan., Ansara, Michael, and Kolodney,David, (African Research Group), "The CIA as an Equal OpportunityEmployer," in Dirty Work 2, The CIA in Africa, Ellen Ray,William Schaap, Karl Van Meter, Louis Wolf., eds. (Secaucus, NJ, LyleStuart, 2nd printing, 1980), p. 51; first published in Rampartsin 1970 and referring to The Politics of Unity by I. Wallerstein.5. Schecter, Ansara, and Kolodney, supra.6. Schecter, Ansara, and Kolodney, supra.7. "The USSALEP Story 1958-1980."8. Interview with Harris Wofford, 18 May 1983.9. My sources for this were: Tom Gervasi, whoserved as a counterintelligence officer assigned to the ArmySecurity Agency and the author of Arsenal of Democracy I (New York,Grove, 1978), and Arsenal of Democracy II (New York, Grove, 1981),and who was writing a history of the CIA at the time of his death,allegedly from lead poisoning from handling toy soldiers hecollected; Sam Adams, who served with the CIA in the SouthernAfrica Branch, DDI, at the time Allard Lowenstein worked for it,and then switched to the Southeast Asia Branch, and who was writinga history of the role of the CIA in Vietnam at the time of hisuntimely death from an alleged heart attack. Gervasi's book wasnever published, while Adams's unfinished manuscript was finallypublished in 1994, years after his death denied him the opportunityto both complete it and defend it against his critics. The book hasso far attracted little attention, but it was reviewed in thisjournal by Richard R. Valcourt: see "Vietnam's CuriousNumbers," International Journal of Intelligence andCounterintelligence , Vol. 7, No. 2, Summer, 1994, pp. 235-240.Adams was at my house in Bridgehampton for dinner not long beforehis death. He was in excellent health. See Sam Adams, War ofNumbers (Steerforth Press, South Royalton, VT, 1994). See alsoWilliam Chafe, Never Stop Running: Allard Lowenstein and theStruggle to Save American Liberalism (New York, Basic Books, 1993),note 13, p. 494: "It is noteworthy that the NSA'sinternational vice-president, who was working for the CIA, onceagain asked Lowenstein to do some student government chores whilein South Africa." Chafe does not elaborate further, but becauseLowenstein attended the Congress of the National Union of SouthAfrican Students while in South Africa during the trip and had keptup his ties to the CIA-backed U.S. National Student Association,the smuggling out of Beukes would constitute such a "chore."10. Interview with then SWAPO Representative to theUnited Nations, Theo-Ben Gurirab, 5 May 1983. Curiously, Gurirab,whom I interviewed at SWAPO's headquarters in New York and a closeadvisor to Sam Nujoma, the SWAPO leader and currently Namibia'shead of government, referred to William F. Buckley Jr. as one ofhis closest friends in New York. Buckley has acknowledged servingin the CIA.11. Gervasi and Adams, note 9, supra, were my sourcesfor this. This is confirmed by a document in Lowenstein's CIA filewhich I obtained via the Freedom of Information Act. Document No.10, dated 19 February 1962, a memorandum addressed to the Chief ofPersonnel, Security Division, OS, from the Chief of the ContactDivision, OO, states: "It is requested that prioritysecurity checks be procured on Subject as described in theattachment. Our deadline is 23 February 1962 for approval tocontact Subject on an ad hoc basis. Subject reportedly has statedthat he had done some work for CIA. If he were used in a [whitedout] capacity, then this is an indiscretion regarding which ourfield representative would like to know something about thebackground before contact is made." Other portions of the documentare whited out. This document has been confirmed to me by twoformer CIA station chiefs (Moscow and Saigon) as a "recruitmentdocument." The "work" for the CIA to which Lowenstein was referringis clearly the smuggling of Hans Beukes out of South Africa. As theformer Moscow station chief explained to me, Lowenstein was not aCIA "agent," which is a term of art referring usually to foreignersunder contract with the agency for specific periods of time and forspecific purposes, but rather a "consultant" to be used on an "adhoc" basis. Such people, I was told by the former Moscow stationchief, are generally older than the normal recruits to the agency.Lowenstein's situation at the time of his recruitment was that hewas in his thirties, an academic who taught courses on the politicsof southern Africa. Academics in such situations have beenroutinely recruited to the CIA. While such persons can be used asanalysts, the former Moscow station chief explained, they can alsoperform "operations, " as Lowenstein did, including the providing offunds to political organizations. Ironically, while the CIA wasrecruiting Lowenstein, the FBI, on 29 March 1962, concluded thatLowenstein had never been connected to the CIA, noting that as lateas 9 January 1961, the CIA had advised the FBI that Lowensteinnever had a relationship with the intelligence agency. Evidently,the FBI checked no further after that date, as Chafe indicates whenhe concludes, "None of this evidence is definitive." Chafe, supra.Further, in a letter dated 23 January 1985 to Bancroft Littlefield,a former Lowenstein aide who had married Lowenstein' s ex-wifeafter she had divorced Lowenstein, Lee Hamilton, chairman of theHouse Intelligence Committee said: "Based on representationsmade to me, I can say that Mr. Lowenstein was never an agent(italics added) of the CIA." Chafe, supra, note 20, p. 509. ToChafe, this is also not conclusive.As explained, Lowenstein was not a CIA agent and was not recruitedas one. He was recruited as an expert consultant. When I requesteda copy of the letter from the CIA to Hamilton, Thomas K. Latimer,Staff Director of the U.S. House of Representatives PermanentSelect Committee on Intelligence, wrote on 5 August 1985:"Mr. Hamilton has asked that I respond to your letter of 30 July1985 regarding certain correspondence to this committee from Mr.Briggs of the Central Intelligence Agency. The correspondence youreferred to is classified and therefore cannot be released. Iregret that we cannot be of assistance to you in this matter." Theyare clearly hiding something. Further, the exchange between the CIAand the FBI is an example of the ongoing war between those twoagencies over turf and budget.12. The International Confederation of Free TradeUnions (ICFTU), whose executive board was taken over by theAFL-CIO, gave the money for the establishment of The Federation ofFree African Trade Unions (FOFA-TUSA) in 1959, which was intimatelyconnected with the PAC. Barry Cohen, "The CIA and the African TradeUnions," AFRICA magazine, September 1976, Dirty Work 2,supra, p. 77. Jay Lovestone, who served as the Director of the Departmentof International Affairs for the AFL-CIO, "was one of the CentralIntelligence Agency's most important men." Ioan Davies, AfricanTrade Unions (Harmondsworth, Penguin, 1966), p. 201. A formermember of the Communist Party, U.S.A., Lovestone, who was actuallyexpelled from the Party, waged the Cold War from his vantage pointin the American labor movement. In "Fight U.S. Subversion of TradeUnion Movement in Africa!" B.S. Nyameko directly accused the CIAof creating the Pan Africanist Congress to undermine theCommunist-backed African National Congress. He wrote:"Throughout Africa labour organizations are infiltrated by CIAagents posing as private individuals or under nonofficial cover, asemployees in private companies or as U.S. Embassy staff in theInformation Department and Labour Attaché men succeeded inestablishing the PAC in 1959 to disrupt our ANC." The AfricanCommunist, No. 87, Fourth Quarter, 1981, pp. 56-57.13. O'Donovan, Patrick, secret interview with NelsonMandela, 30 May 1961. It is widely believed that the CIA fingeredMandela to the South African police, which would have been aninside job, almost certainly one of the white liberals pretendingto be a supporter. Lowenstein was privy to the secret interviewand may well have participated in the fingering of Mandela.14. Cummings, Richard, The Pied Piper: AllardK. Lowenstein and the Liberal Dream (New York, Grove, 1985), p. 136.15. Interview with Harris Wofford, supra. Other CIA"good wingers" of that generation included the Rev. William SloaneCoffin, Jr. (See Coffin, Once To Every Man (New York, Atheneum,1977); author and naturalist Peter Matthiessen, for whom the ParisReview was his cover and who, according to James Linville, theManaging Editor of The Paris Review, is "haunted by the CIA."Conversation with James Linville, Oxford, MS, April 1993, at the40th anniversary celebration of The Paris Review (The New YorkTimes first reported Matthiessen' s CIA employment); GloriaSteinem, who worked for three years for the Independent ResearchService, an organization totally supported by the CIA and whosepurpose was to disrupt Communist youth festivals. This was firstdisclosed by Ramparts and later reported in The New York Timesin 1967. See Press Release, 9 May 1975, Redstockings of the Women'sLiberation Movement; letter from Jane Barry of Redstockings, 19February 1987, and ultra liberal author/activist Robert Sam Anson(Interview with Robert Sam Anson, May 1985). The theoreticalintellect behind "good wing" ideology in the CIA was HarryRositzke, who argued that democracy and capitalism were notnecessarily synonymous and that the United States should supportprogressive social democratic or democratic socialist approaches incritical countries. See Rositzke, supra, p. 268.16. See Allard Lowenstein and John Marcum,"Force: Its Thrust and Prognosis," in South Africa inTransition, (New York, Praeger, 1966): "In the absence ofinternal collapse in Portugal and of external intervention in SouthAfrica and Southern Rhodesia, the period of violent upheaval may beprolonged. Neither collapse nor intervention now appears likely,and the legacy of European settlement in southern Africa mayconsequently be hatred and destruction of catastrophic proportions.This prospect will not dissuade Africans from force. It will berecalled that Americans fought an extended War for Independencethat was prompted by grievances that look paltry compared to thosenow present in southern Africa." Praeger, the publisher of thepaper, which was given at a conference at Howard University in 1963sponsored by the American Society of African Culture, a CIA front,was later revealed by Ramparts, to have had a CIA affiliation.17. Interview with Hal Minus, Lowenstein aide on 1966trip, March 1981.18. Telephone interview, 5 April 1994.19. Paul Taylor of The Washington Post has providedan excellent overview of the South African scene prior to theelections in "Outlook," Washington Post, 3 April 1994.20. Telephone interview with Professor William Foltz,4 April 1994.21. "South Africa: Policy Alternatives for theUnited States," Report of a Wingspread Conference convened by theJohnson Foundation, April 1975, Racine, Wisconsin. Others inattendance were George Hauser of the American Committee on Africa;Africanist Gwendolen Carter; and Donald F. McHenry of the CarnegieEndowment for Peace and later Andrew Young's deputy and thenreplacement at the United Nations in the Carter administration. Seealso Alun Robert, The Rossing File (London, Namibia SupportCommittee, CANUC, 1980).22. Wingspread Report, supra.23. Letter to Hank Slack from Ernest Wentzel, 12 June1979; telephone interview with Ernest Wentzel, Johannesburg, 9August 1983.24. Interview with Frank Carlucci, 19 July 1983.25. Memo by Mark Childress, undated.26. Moose quoted by Adams, telephone conversationwith Adams, 1982.27. Interview with Carlucci.28. See Treverton, Covert Action, supra, atpp. 220-221.29. Interview with Professor William Foltz, supra.30. Foltz, supra31. Foltz, supra. See, generally, Chester Crocker'smemoir, High Noon In Southern Africa (New York, W.W.Norton, 1992).32. Foltz, supra33. Foltz, supra.34. Foltz, supra.35. Interview, supra.36. Foltz, supra.37. USSALEP 1992 Program Update, Vol. 1, No. 1,__._,_.___
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From the News Archives of: WWW.AfricanCrisis.Org

2007-09-08T09:03:00.001-07:00

From the News Archives of: WWW.AfricanCrisis.OrgDate & Time Posted: 9/7/2007
SA: As we PREDICTED, much HARSHER Affirmative Action coming soon...
[Manyani refers to these blacks in companies as "House Niggers". But this is an ANC creation. This is what THEY CREATED! They forced big businesses at gunpoint to get black shareholders and blacks in senior positions or face a lot of discrimination. So companies took in any blacks they could find. Most were unprepared for these senior positions. But, GOVT LAWS forced them to be there. So these blacks then, with nothing else to do, put a "black face on a white company". And yes, they are useless. Black owned companies were started up all over, many failed, but white companies used them as TAX WRITE OFFS! A friend of mine worked for such a black owned oil company. It later failed, and it was bought out by Shell Oil, which used it as a tax write-off!! The company I work in is part of a large group, and sometimes in my work I sit in on meetings in lovely boardrooms (a new experience for me). I sit there with anything from 20 to 70 people from all over the group. EVERY TIME I sit in on these big meetings, the first thing I do is count the racial mix of the participants. Some time back I sat in on a very high level NCA (National Credit Act) meeting, and senior business experts from all over the group were there. Of the 45, there were probably less than 4 blacks. During the meeting which lasted a whole day, the blacks sat and listened and said NOTHING. The majority of the representatives were white, followed by Indians. Whites make up 14% or less of the population and Indians make up 3%! But in these high-level meetings, I see White, Indians and Coloureds - in that order - dominating proceedings. Let it be said, in all the technical meetings I attend, the blacks, 95% of the time are nothing more than "House Niggers". They sit there, they listen, and the matters being discussed are way over their heads. They haven't got a CLUE what is going on. In this country, in business, 90%, probably 95%, of the Business Decisions are being made by: Whites, Indians and Coloureds. Blacks who make up 74% of the population don't make the decisions. But before you think you can just chuck the blacks in there... I would *LOVE* to see them throwing the blacks in willy nilly. I'd love to see it. Why? Because BUSINESS IS COMPLEX - VERY COMPLEX. We have sophisticated computer and manual systems in place. If the Blacks had to just take over overnight... you'd see CHAOS. CHAOS! I sit in on meetings and planning sessions. I know what I'm talking about. But then again, I like CHAOS! I warned a time back that that AA will get worse! The Mass Media was full of reports that it will be EASED! In YOUR DREAMS!Here are some past articles:-S Africa: The Naked Emperor - why affirmative action failed S Africa: Gender affirmative action questionedHere is where I said Alec Erwin and others were lying about AA going away:-[3 Pics] S.Africa: Black Hitler - Affirmative Action needs MUSCLE!!Note: Affirmative Action only applies to WHITE MALES. Yes, the WHITE MAN - not the WHITE WOMAN - the WHITE MALE, GETS IT IN THE NECK and has done since 1994. The White Male is the *ONLY* member of this society who is CONSTANTLY being discriminated against and attacked. The White MAN! But its making the white man TOUGHER. Its good. The White man is a fighter, and he's learning to fight against even more incredible and unbelievable odds. Jan]By Deon de LangeOutspoken Employment Equity commissioner Jimmy Manyi has slammed corporate "house niggers" who act as "ambassadors of unfair discrimination" for their white counterparts."It is alleged that some black economic empowerment partners and some non-executive directors have become 'house niggers' who are ever ready to defend the malpractices of their (white) partners, all in the name of 'good business sense'," he told members of the National Assembly's labour committee on Wednesday.Manyi was representing the Commission for Employment Equity (CEE) during the second day of public hearings into workplace discrimination.He also repeated a call for white women to be removed from the category of previously disadvantaged employees and suggested much tougher enforcement provisions be added to the Employment Equity Act (EEA).Manyi told the committee he would be presenting Labour Minister Membathisi Mdladlana with recommendations this week on how to speed up employment equity in corporate South Africa.These recommendations are expected to include a major review of the EEA, including harsher penalties for non-compliance, strengthened monitoring capacity for the CEE and more effective mechanisms to deal with companies who do not submit their equity reports to the CEE on time.He also wants the jurisdiction of the Commission for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration (CCMA) to expand to include adjudication and final judgment on matters involving workplace discrimination.Currently, such cases are conciliated by the CCMA but referred to the Labour Court for final judgment, adding a costly legal step that discourages employees from reporting discrimination.Committee members with the notable exception of the DA's Anchen Dreyer voiced support for these ideas and several ANC MPs echoed Manyi's much publicised view that the country's skills shortage is exaggerated by big business as a means of sidestepping employment equity targets."There are blacks … that can enter these (corporate management) positions if only they were given the opportunity," complained ANC MP Monontsi Mzondeki.Tempers flared when Dreyer criticised Manyi's presentation as "divisive" and "racially inflaming", suggesting it added no reliable or useful information to the debate.In reply, Manyi launched a verbal attack on the MP, questioning her motives, her capabilities as an MP and her knowledge of the subject at hand until Dreyer called for protection from chairperson Rebecca Kasienyane, who appeared to comply reluctantly.But it was the Jimmy Manyi show as the Black Management Forum (BMF) of which he is president followed the CEE with its own presentation in which many of his complaints and recommendations were repeated.The BMF also repeated its previous calls for President Thabo Mbeki to appoint a commission of inquiry with powers of subpoena to look into the state of racial transformation in the workplace.Kasienyane praised both organisations for their contributions and took the unusual step of calling on Manyi to assist the committee with drawing up recommendations once the public hearings end.
URL: http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=13&art_id=vn20070906113049401C288520

http://www.africancrisis.org/default2.asp

From the News Archives of: WWW.AfricanCrisis.Org

2007-09-08T09:01:00.001-07:00

From the News Archives of: WWW.AfricanCrisis.OrgDate & Time Posted: 9/8/2007
Brilliant: Explanation of Robert Mugabe, Mbeki & the CIA
[This letter to the editor on News24.com is brilliant. The writer explains succinctly and clearly what the Grand Strategic Logic of ALL the major players are. He explains why America helped end Apartheid and what the game is in South Africa and Zimbabwe. I do not know who the author is. He clearly supports Mugabe. I do not. But, I agree 100% with his logic and description of the world and the local political situation. He is DEAD ON. Whoever the writer is, he knows a lot. It is worth revisiting what Dr Richard Cummings, ex-CIA wrote, and which I have drawn attention to:-Original Article: How the CIA defeated Apartheid & placed the ANC in powerSource: From International Journal of Intelligence and Counterintelligence, Summer 1995This letter in News24, coincides clearly with Dr Cummings' explanation in the International Journal of Intelligence and Counterintelligence.I am so glad to see that someone else in S.Africa has seen the light and clicked on what exactly is going on. The writer obviously spurns Mbeki for shooting at the blacks to keep them in place, in order to continue "Western Economic Policies". I spurn Mbeki for another reason. There are key things in that article, such as the writer's admission that the ANC's "struggle heroes" did not get rid of Apartheid as much as the Western world did. It was the WESTERN WORLD which dismantled Apartheid. In another excellent recent analysis, the CATO Institute also mentions the "ANC Mythology" wherein it over-emphasises its victory over Apartheid without giving credit to the Western Liberals. (It actually pees off Western Liberals that the ANC gave them no credit for ending Apartheid. When I spoke to PW Botha personally, I asked him about the "Total Onslaught" which they foresaw. He told me that it was not just Military. They also understood that normal Western nations were involved. The attacks might not have been military, but South African Intelligence knew that all those nations were working together with the aim of bringing white rule to an end here.So as you can see, now that the dust has settled - we've seen all the different sides of the story and now all the stories are coming together. Some people laughed at PW Botha when he spoke of the "Total Onslaught". But it was not just attacks by Communists he was referring to - it was also "political and diplomatic and economic attacks" - if you will - from the Western world. To me, this represents the most succinct, and accurate description of the game as everyone played it. I might therefore as well include the discussions of FW De Klerk, about the strategy of LIBERALISM, as adopted by FW De Klerk, in an attempt at getting the Western World's Liberals off our backs - and the short and long-term consequences of such a strategy:-What if Apartheid had carried on? That should give everybody a good basis for understanding all the players and *ALL* the games going on over the last 40 years. Now... to figure out where it takes us in the future. You do realise of course, that if Mbeki betrays the Liberal Western World's faith in him, that the USA and the West will look FOR A NEW BULWARK AGAINST "Black African Freedom" as defined by Mugabe! Think about that. Jan]'Mugabe is the guiding light'07/09/2007 12:01 - (SA) Dear Editor, Mondli Makanhya is trying to draw a parallel between the struggle against apartheid and the current struggle in Zimbabwe against the "freely elected" government in that country. There is however no comparison if one views the two struggles at a higher global political platform. In 1981 I came to South Africa and was informed by the locals that apartheid was on its way out. In 1986 I wrote to a friend in Holland that Apartheid would not end until the Berlin wall had fallen. There lies the significant difference between what is happening in the current Zimbabwe and the then "apartheid government". If one cares to look at the events in SA following the fall of the Berlin wall, one can see the direct connection between the two events. After the collapse of the old Soviet Union, there was no need for the West to prop up the apartheid regime any longer. It had served its purpose as custodian of a strategic sea route in this part of the world. It had served its purpose to contain the Russian expansion in Africa. Apartheid had been a mere by-product of this strategy.The time had now come for the West to show its humanitarian face and make sure that South Africa would not fall in the hands of some reactionary group who would show the West the finger. They could well do without another Lumumba, Idi amin or Ghadaffi in Africa. Western economic policies The African National Congress won the first general elections and Mr Mandela became the President of a benevolent government. Uprisings with an unpredictable outcome had been prevented and all were happy. As in Europe in 1945, it was not the underground movements that liberated Europe from the Germans. How heroic they might have been. It was the allied forces and the Americans who did not want Europe to fall under Russia and communism for their own benefit. Similarly, it was not the ANC in SA or the struggle heroes that liberated South Africa; it was the West that did not allow apartheid to continue and handed SA over to the ANC under conditions that they would stick to western dictated economic policies. Trevor Manual did just that. Zimbabwe is of little interest to the West. Zimbabwe is landlocked, has a relatively small population and does not play a major political role in Africa in support of the West. Its mineral resources are not unique; it does not have oil. At 80, Mr Mugabe is on his way out sooner or later measured in the global political time frames of decades. Quiet diplomacy works well for SA. It supports the one without upsetting the other. Fruits of the West The long-term goals of any African government should be to strive for independence from the West. Robert Mugabe is the guiding light for what lies ahead for African countries if they want to free themselves. One day, African leaders might have the guts to do so but it will come at the kind of price that Zimbabweans are currently paying and worse. Freedom is expensive and demands sacrifices as the history of many European countries can teach you. It will get a lot worse before it gets better. The majority of African countries are - for all intents and purposes - still economically and culturally colonised. Despite our President's statement, name changes will never make South Africa an African country. For the time being, African leaders prefer to enjoy the fruits of the West at the price of paying lip service to their demands and a little unhappiness amongst the poor. Nothing a rubber bullet cannot control. Benzo,Pretoria http://www.news24.com/News24/MyNews24/Letters/0,,2-2127-2129_2176915,00.html

http://www.africancrisis.org/default2.asp

SA pupils burn 'witches' to death

2007-09-07T11:57:00.000-07:00

burn witch, burn...............eish sounds like America in the 1500
SA pupils burn 'witches' to death
Two South African women have been burned to death after a group of students accused them of bewitching their high school with evil spirits.
Msaba Zungu and Thabitha Thusi, both 60, were seized from their homes near Manguzi in KwaZulu-Natal province.
Students and adults dragged them to a sports field where they were doused with petrol and set alight on Sunday.
Manhlenga High School pupils accused the women of being witches after they began to suffer strange crying fits.
Investigators said Ms Zungu died at the scene and Ms Thusi succumbed to her burns injuries on Monday.
Police captain Jabulani Mdletshe told the BBC News website: "On 17 August, the students at the mixed high school began to cry randomly and they did not know why.
"The students held a couple of meetings and allegedly decided the problem was these two women were witches who had cast a bad muthi (spell) on the school.
"At 8pm on Sunday, some students and community members allegedly took the women from their homes to a football field and set them on fire."
No arrests have been made but police are following a positive line of inquiry, said Capt Mdletshe.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/6980439.stm

Witchcraft to be made law in South Africa

2007-09-07T11:56:00.000-07:00

World: AfricaWitchcraft to be made law in South Africa
Eish, devil worship now ..................law!!!

A parliamentary committee in South Africa has recommended that the work of traditional healers should be made legitimate and enshrined in law.
It wants the estimated three hundred thousand healers in the country to join a national council; it also wants employers to recognise sick notes from the healers, who include herbalists, diviners and circumcision specialists.
Organisations representing the healers say the government may be trying to exploit their skills because the existing health service is short of qualified doctors.
Some healers are also concerned that they may lose their intellectual copyright to herbal potions and diagnostic techniques.
From the newsroom of the BBC World Service

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/145266.stm

Raad soek nou nét swart kleinsake

2007-09-06T12:39:00.001-07:00

Raad soek nou nét swart kleinsakeSep 04 2007 11:58:21:987PM - (SA)
Druk artikel
E-pos storie aan 'n vriend
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Cobus Claassen
Die Tshwane-metroraad gaan voortaan géén kleinsake-transaksies met wit ondernemings doen nie.
Dít is die interne opdrag wat die raad se aankope-afdeling verlede week uit die bloute gekry het.
Mnr. Kiba Kekana, munisipale bestuurder van die raad, het verlede maand ’n verslag goedgekeur wat behels dat geen wit ondernemings voortaan in ag geneem sal word wanneer die raad goedere van minder as R30 000 aankoop nie.
Dieselfde geld ook aanvaarding van tenders.
Beeld het ’n afskrif bekom van die verslag wat Kekana op 6 Augustus goedgekeur het (uittreksel hiernaas).
Die veranderinge wat goedgekeur is, het al op 1 September in werking getree.
Luidens die verslag sal slegs klein- en middelslagondernemings (KMO’s) “wat in uitsluitlik swart besit is” en op die raad se databasis is, oorweeg word.
Kwotasies moet bekom word van ten minste drie verskillende diensverskaffers.
In die verslag word onder meer voorgestel dat alle delegasie van magte met die aankoop van goedere herroep moet word nadat die raad se nuwe alternatiewe diensleweringstruktuur op 1 Julie in werking getree het.
’n Amptenaar van die raad wat nie sy naam genoem wil hê nie uit vrees dat hy sy werk kan verloor, sê wit ondernemings het in die verlede die jawoord gekry as hul kwotasies goedkoper was.
“Ons het verlede week opdrag gekry dat daar nou nét by swart ondernemings aankope gedoen mag word. Ek het vanoggend (gister) tussen R6 000 en R7 000 méér betaal vir goedere om aan die nuwe vereiste te voldoen.
“Dit gaan nog ’n duur opdrag word,” voorspel hy.
In die verslag word aangedui dat ’n “afwykingsverslag” deur mnr. Hamilton Hhlom, die uitvoerende direkteur van verkrygingsdienste, goedgekeur moet word wanneer daar nie drie sulke kwotasies bekom kan word nie en daar noodgedwonge van ’n wit onderneming se dienste gebruik gemaak moet word.
’n Eienaar van ’n onderneming wat die afgelope 15 jaar sake doen met verskeie departemente van die raad, het gister gesê hy sal sy onderneming se deure onmiddellik moet sluit.
“Ek het eers gedink dis ’n grap toe ek die gerugte hoor. Dit is egter alles behalwe ’n grap as jy weet dit is die einde van jou onderneming. Hoe vertel ek dit vir my werkers?”
Me. Natasha Michael, DA-hoofsweep, sê die DA het gister met skok kennis geneem van die verslag.
“Die raad doen tans sake met verskeie swart ekonomiese bemagtigingsondernemings (SEB). Jare se ervaring gaan egter nou net geïgnoreer word.”
Volgens Michael is dit nie nasionale wetgewing se “bedoeling” om sekere individue te isoleer op grond van ras nie.
“Dit is bloot daar om vorige wanbalanse reg te stel. Die verslag gaan egter daartoe lei dat nuwe wanbalanse geskep gaan word.”
Mnr. Conrad Beyers, VF+-raadslid, het die besluit gister as skandalige ANC-rassisme bestempel.
“Die ANC steek nou alle grense van billikheid oor. Dit gaan alles oor ideologie en selfs mense wat hul brood en botter verdien, bly bloot op grond van ras in die slag.”
Mnr. Louis McLaren, nasionale verteenwoordiger vir SEB van die Afrikaanse Handelsinstituut, het gesê dit lyk of die raad begin voorberei vir die bemagtigingstelkaart waarvolgens hy aanstaande jaar oor SEB en transformasie verantwoording sal moet doen.
Die raad het nie gister op Beeld se navrae reageer nie.
http://www.news24.com/Beeld/Suid-Afrika/0,,3-975_2177255,00.html

Jets intercept Russian fighters

2007-09-06T11:34:00.000-07:00

and more:

Jets intercept Russian fighters06/09/2007 19:10 - (SA)

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Russian bomber near UK skies
RAF fighter jets scrambled
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Oslo - Norwegian and British fighter jets scrambled to intercept Russian bombers over the north Atlantic, Norway's military command said on Thursday, the latest in a series of such incidents.
Eight Russian Tupolev-95s were detected in international air space over the Barents Sea early on Thursday, said Wing Commander Jon Inge Oegland, a spokesperson for Norway's general staff in Stavanger.
"Following the established routines, we sent up two F-16s (fighters) to mark out Norwegian air space. The Russian planes were close to Norwegian air space but they did not enter," he said.
According to information obtained by AFP, British interceptors were also sent to the zone to shadow the Russian aircraft.
"Russia had announced an aerial military exercise in the coming days," said Oegland. "These latest flights are certainly linked to that."
Russia's airforce announced on Monday that 12 of its strategic bombers would be taking part in strategic exercises in the region, but they were meant to run on Monday and Tuesday.
Nuclear payload
Russia's TU-95s are long-range strategic bombers that date back to the Soviet era. They can be equipped with a nuclear payload.
The Barents Sea lies north of Russia and north-east of Norway.
Thursday's encounter was just the latest in a series of such incidents in recent weeks.
Russia President Vladimir Putin announced the resumption of long-range flights in international air space while he attended military exercises on August 17.
Even in the weeks before his statement, Britain and Norway had to scramble jets to intercept Russian planes near their airspace. Russian bombers had also been making increasingly frequent flights near US territory.
Such flights were standard during the Cold War standoff with the United States and its western European allies, but were abandoned in 1992 amid financial difficulties that followed the Soviet collapse.
Last week, Russia's head of strategic aviation General Pavel Androsov said the aircraft were not carrying nuclear weapons and that the main aim of the flight was to improve training for pilots.
But the flights come against a background of increasing tension between Russia and some western powers.
Growing security ties
Some observers also see it as a sign of renewed self-confidence on the international stage.
Russia has objected strongly to US plans to place anti-missile defence facilities in the Czech Republic and Poland, countries that were ruled from Moscow during the Cold War but are now members of Nato.
Earlier this week, Russian and Chinese special forces began a joint counter-terrorism exercise dubbed "Friendship 2007" in Moscow on Tuesday, underlining the two neighbours' growing security ties.

http://www.news24.com/News24/World/News/0,,2-10-1462_2178364,00.html

Versigtig nou!

2007-09-03T09:50:00.000-07:00

Versigtig nou!28 08 2007
Wees versigtig waarvoor jy wens, want jou wens mag dalk net waar word…
Dit is met groeiende ongemak wat ek koerante, nuusberigte en die elektroniese media die laaste paar dae dophou. Vrydag se uitgawe van ANC Today het die spreekwoordelike cherry op die koek gesit. In ‘n skrywe getiteld “A Fundamental Revolutionary Lesson: The Enemy Manouevres But It Remains The Enemy: Part 1” maak die skrywer, wie se naam nie genoem word nie, ‘n paar klomp stellings wat kommerwekkend is, en my met die volgende indrukke gelaat het:
Die ANC beskou die HELE Blanke bevolking van Suid-Afrika as die vyand;
Die ANC glo die Blanke bevolking is gekant teen die demokratiese stelsel;
Die ANC glo die Blanke bevolking is besig met ‘n grootskaalse en georkestreerde poging om sy demokratiese bewind omver te werp;
Die ANC glo die 1994-uitkoms was grotendeels te danke aan sy (die ANC s’n) militêre vermoëns en optrede; en
Die ANC sal nie huiwer om sy nuutgevonde militêre vermoëns aan te wend om hierdie nuwe/ou bedreiging te onderdruk en te vernietig nie.
Sou jy hierdie hele uitgawe van ANC Today lees, sal jy sien dat daar deurgaans verwys word na die regerende party se bestaande militêre kapasiteit, die militêre steun waarop hulle reken hulle kan reken, sowel as hulle bereidwilligheid om die somtotaal daarvan aan te wend.
Ek is nie ‘n “war monger” nie - die blote gedagte aan oorlog steek my dwars in die krop - maar ek wil op my eie beskeie wyse die volgende uitlig:
Die gevaarlikste opponent in enige geveg is hy wat niks meer het om te verloor nie, en veg vir selfbehoud. Geen ideologie is sterker as die primêre strewe om selfbehoud nie, en die ANC het die Blanke bevolking al baie goed in daai hoek vasgeverf;
Die Weermag, soos hy tans daar uitsien, beskik nie oor die vermoë om ‘n konvensionele oorlog te voer nie, en ook nie ‘n guerilla-oorlog nie. Behalwe dat die Weermag fisies siek en oud is, is die gevegsoldate swak opgelei en ongedissiplineerd;
Die Weermag se toerusting is verouderd en glad nie diensbaar nie. Ek weet persoonlik van ‘n gemeganiseerde bataljon wat op ‘n sekere tydstip vanjaar net ses diensbare gevegsvoertuie gehad het. SES, uit ‘n totaal van meer as eenhonderd;
Die toerusting wat wel diensbaar is, het uiters beperkte bronne van opgeleide personeel wat dit kan beman. Die tegnologie is net té gevorderd vir die deursnee hedendaagse SA soldaat;
Die deursnee weerbare Blanke man in Suid-Afrika beskik oor die opleiding en motivering (sou dit nodig raak) om deel te word van ‘n hoogs georganiseerde en doeltreffende guerilla-poging. Hul geografiese verspreiding en konsentrasie sal die nodigheid om “op kommando te gaan”, soos tydens die Anglo-Boere-oorlog, verminder, wat guerilla-optrede sal bevorder sonder dat hy te ver van sy gesin af hoef te gaan, en hulle sodoende onbeskermd hoef te laat; en
Laaste maar nie die minste nie - die ANC oorskat sy militêre vermoëns liederlik. Hulle het glad nie ons huidige demokrasie met hulle militêre vernuf gewen nie. Inteendeel, die politieke skikking en hulle gepaardgaande oorwinning by die stembus verdoesel hulle militêre vernedering.
Die grootste probleem met die regerende party is dat hy hierdie onwrikbare geloof het dat net hy reg kan wees. Die res word gesien as vyande, en dus altyd verkeerd. Verder glo hulle dat hulle persepsie van ‘n demokrasie die enigste “regte” persepsie is, en verloor uit die oog dat ‘n demokrasie op sy sterkste is wanneer die regerende party nie toegelaat word om in ‘n gemaksone verval nie, maar voortdurend deur ‘n sterk opposisie op sy tone gehou word. Die ANC sien egter enige opposisie as vyande van die demokratiese bestel - ‘n bestel wat hy homself onregmatig as sy eie toe-eien.
Ek hoop van harte die stuk in ANC Today is net nog goedkoop propaganda om die massas se aandag weg te lok van hulle leiers se onvermoë om effektief te regeer. Die regerende party is teen hierdie tyd bekend vir die rookskerms wat hy skep om die aandag af te lei van die dinge wat werklik saak maak, en hopelik is hierdie net weer “business as usual”.
As dit nie is nie… God behoed ons.

http://www.gestorwesoldaat.iblog.co.za/2007/08/28/versigtig-nou/

Moscow Lashes Out at European Energy 'Hysteria'

2007-09-03T09:45:00.000-07:00

Moscow Lashes Out at European Energy 'Hysteria'
The European Union is looking at measures to prevent foreign investors from snatching up European energy companies. Gazprom has accused Europe of "economic nationalism" and the Kremlin warns it will fight any discrimination against Russian companies.

REUTERS
The EU energy market is facing a shake-up but Brussels doesn't want foreign investors to swoop in. Russia claims Europe is being "hysterical." European Union moves to restrict foreign investors' access to its energy industry have not gone down well in Moscow. The Kremlin described the Europeans as "near hysterical," while Russian energy monopolist Gazprom lashed out at what they called "economic nationalism."
The Russian wrath is aimed at EU measures to split up its energy giants, which Brussels now says should apply to non-European firms too, in order to prevent foreign energy giants from snatching up European firms.
Dmitri Peskov, the Kremlin's deputy press secretary, told the Financial Times that "measures to discriminate against Russian companies would be totally unfair," and warned that Moscow would use "any legal means possible in accordance with international law to ensure equal access to markets for its companies."
He said that European reaction to Russian energy expansion verged on the "near hysterical" and insisted Russia was a reliable energy supplier. "Even at the height of the Cold War, Russia did not once cut off energy supplies," he said.
Russia's state energy monopoly Gazprom echoed the Kremlin's fury. "Unfortunately we see a tendency towards economic nationalism in many European countries," the company's deputy director Alexander Medvedev told the newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung on Thursday. He said that it was "short-sighted" for any country to erect barriers to protect its own companies when there was "no danger to its economic interests." Medvedev confirmed that Gazprom was interested in investing in Europe. "We have the products that they need. And we have the capacity to bring these products to where they are needed," he said, adding: "A strong Russia and a strong Gazprom are good for Europe."
The ruffled feathers in Russia come after the EU confirmed that it was looking at a range of measures to protect European energy companies from being taken over by foreign investors. The protective measures will form part of a package of energy legislation to be presented in Brussels on Sept. 19. The most controversial proposal is one that would force EU companies to separate energy production from distribution (more...) in an effort to increase competition and reduce prices.
A number of former state-owned energy companies currently dominate the sector, making it next to impossible for new competitors to enter the market. But many EU countries have voiced fears that any "unbundling" could leave the companies wide open to the attentions of unwanted suitors, particularly Gazprom. Brussels now wants to alleviate these fears. On Thursday EU spokesman Ferran Tarradellas Espuny told reporters: "If there's unbundling, there is going to be unbundling for everyone."
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The EU is still mulling over how best to prevent foreign companies from taking advantage of market liberalization. One possibility is a reciprocity clause, which would hit countries that place any limits on European investment. Alternatively, Brussels could declare the energy sector a "strategic industry," thereby protecting it from non-EU bidders.
Concerns about the reliability of Russian energy supply have done little to endear Gazprom to European hearts, particularly after supplies to Europe were affected by disputes between Moscow and governments in Ukraine and Belarus. Europe is heavily reliant on Russia for its energy supplies -- Gazprom already supplies a quarter of the EU's gas and oil and this is set to increase to up to 70 percent by 2030.
This has made the prospect of Europe's own energy industry falling into the clutches of a Kremlin-controlled Gazprom all the more worrying for some. EU spokesman Tarradellas Espuny told SPIEGEL ONLINE that Brussels didn't want to see energy companies "ending up in the hands of investors whose political goals were more important than their economic ones."
smd/ap

Wheat prices reach record level

2007-08-27T10:06:00.000-07:00

Eish........Toast or Caviaaar, same diffrence soon..............................

Poor weather - from droughts to floods have cut harvest forecastsWheat prices have hit record highs on global commodity markets, bringing the threat of rising bread prices.
Bad weather in key grain growing areas such as Canada and parts of Europe has limited supplies as demand has risen, sparking fears of a supply shortfall.
Surging prices are also expected to have widespread fallout for consumers.
While it will mean higher bread prices, it could also trigger an increase in meat and dairy prices as farmers battle to pass on rising feed costs.
Global wheat stockpiles will slip to their lowest levels in 26 years as a result, official US figures predicted earlier this month.
Output fall
The dire forecast came as Canadian officials said the country expected its harvest to be slashed by a fifth as a result of drought.
Meanwhile, its rival Australia - the world's third-largest wheat exporter and a key supplier to Asian regions and South America - has also warned harvests may be reduced by warmer-than-expected temperatures experienced in the spring.
Crops in the Black Sea area of Europe, however, have been ruined by bad weather, while Chinese production is expected to fall by 10% as a result of both flooding and droughts.
And as supplies fall, demand from emerging economies such as India is increasing - factors which helped push prices to record highs of $7.44 a bushel on the benchmark Chicago Board of Trade market in the US on Thursday.
In the UK, prices have also soared, with bread-making wheat now fetching about £200 per tonne - double last year's level.
While surging prices are beneficial to wheat growers, they do bring further problems.
A World Food Programme spokesman said the increases could mean its budget would not stretch far enough to help those affected by natural disasters.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/6962211.stm

http://crimexposouthafrica.net/crimexp/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=2451&Itemid=2

2007-08-26T08:12:00.001-07:00

'GATVOL' -- hardhitting criticism of Mbeki-regime in top Dutch publication
August 10 2007 -- THE HAGUE, The Netherlands. One of the most critical articles of the Mbeki-regime yet published in the Netherlands was issued this week in the Haagse Post/De Tijd, a widely-read opinion weekly in the Dutch capital city.
Its headline reads: "Gatvol - the ANC's South Africa: racism, corruption, violence, unemployment"...
It starts off with the sentence: ' life under the ANC in South Africa is no joke, and many of its top-educated people are leaving. However, as long as the ANC can capitalise on its 'freedom fighting glories' of the past, it can stay in power.'The article is not yet made available its archives on the internet.
http://www.hpdetijd.nl
The no-holds-barred article by Dutch journalist Willem Talis pulls no punches. I quote just a few paragraphs from it to illustrate the point: He wrote for instance:
Racism: "In the Netherlands, preferential treatment over one specific population group over another, is totally illegal. "In South Africa it has been raised to a standard to strive for." No other country country on earth places such an over-emphasis on race.
"Indeed the ANC-government knowns within the decimal point exactly how the racial balances are situated in every facet of their society.
"As far as that particular subject is concerned therefore, nothing has changed at all under black-majority rule'. (since apartheid).
"And whenever his regime is criticised, the president makes it a habit of pulling out the 'race card'."
The comrades become overnight multi-million-dollar millionaires
The article also describes detailed examples of why and how all the old struggle-era ANC-comrade-executives are turning themselves into dollar-millionaires practically overnight, and how they will always publicly hail and support each other as heroes even when they have been caught in criminal acts
"The first signs of (this) moral corruption started becoming visible in 1997 - the ANC had been in power about three years when reverend Allan Boesak was accused of stealing money which had been collected to help apartheid-victims.
"Upon Boesak's return from the USA, he was awaited at Johannesburg airport by the then-minister of Justice - not to personally clap him into handcuffs, but to pay homage and honour to this former leader in the anti-apartheid struggle."
"When Boesak was tried and imprisoned for fraud, he was accompanied there by supporters raising him high onto their shoulders; he was released from jail early and President Thabo Mbeki gave him amnesty personally."Soon it became clearly evident: the comrades from the freedom-struggle could do no wrong".
"After the takeover of SA's governance by the ANC-government, they also launched a massive social-engineering scheme, during which qualified, experienced white officials were dumped at a huge scale. The downside of this campaign was that huge numbers of these open posts were filled with inexperienced blacks, also in the judiciary, and that the new managers gave themselves lavish salaries often hundreds of times more than the minimum-wage scale".
"The ANC also enriched its election funds with donations from a mining magnate who has since then been conveniently murdered, and stubbornly refused to refund these illegal donations. Earlier, the ANC had also earned 1,5-million Euros from illegal oil-deals with the Saddam Hussein-regime.'
"Companies are only given government or private-company tenders such as from banks if they have black partners. An annual 6,000 new 'dollar-millionaires' are being created in South Africa now. (...) the ANC's official spokesman Smuts Ngonyama summed up this new order in a most meaningful way, saying: "We (the freedom fighters) did not fight to remain poor."
The article continues:
"ANC-fat cats are only there for one reason: to enrich themselves, and they measure their status by owning expensive BMW's, imposing homes, extravagant lifestyles and the number of security guards they surround themselves with. (...)
"Meanwhile more people now live in hovels than ever did a decennium ago (during apartheid) and the gap between rich and poor has grown even more.
"The ANC is the government and vice-versa. The division which is supposed to exist between politics and big differences is disappearing more each day."
The article concludes: "nearly everybody here in South Africa now feels that it's time to end all those nice words about improvements, and an end with a president who claims that he knew nobody who had died of Aids; and who announces that the crime-epidemic mainly is a queston of 'perception'.
"A president who has for years maintained the myth that 'quiet diplomacy' with neighbouring Zimbabwe was the only way to solve the chaos caused by dictator Mugabe.'
"In short, many people are 'gatvol' - to use a flexible Afrikaans term..."

What has happened to Mbeki?

2007-08-26T05:39:00.000-07:00

http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=13&art_id=vn20070826091039682C631913
Christelle Terreblanche
August 26 2007 at 09:37AM

A year before he became president, Thabo Mbeki told parliament in 1998 that South Africa faced the challenge of "allowing a thousand flowers to bloom".Quoting the Chinese slogan from the Mao years - "Let a hundred flowers bloom! Let a hundred schools of thought contend!" - Mbeki said that the need was underpinned by the complexity of issues facing the country."Let none of us pretend that the debate about change will be capable of being handled in the manner of a cozy chat around a bountiful dinner table. Because of the nature of what we have to do, it will be rough and painful and drive many of us to shout at one another, to curse and use misunderstood and hurtful words that were only meant to soothe, if only they were understood," he said.

Nine years later and with only 18 months of the Mbeki presidency remaining, those words ring both prophetic and futile. Many a harsh word has been spoken and many who have criticised his presidency believe that the thousand flowers are being crushed, just as they were in Mao's regime. Those who knew the jovial and generous Mbeki who returned from exile in the early 1990s have been shocked by the vindictive and authoritarian tone of his attacks during the past month over the Frere Hospital saga. The maliciousness has been directed particularly at Nozizwe Madlala-Routledge, his axed deputy health minister, who described the baby deaths at Frere a "national emergency" - seen in the context of the country's declining human development index (HDI), a measure of poverty and life expectancy. The government has consistently denied the United Nation's HDI for the country. Mbeki in 2006 called its calculations that poverty had deepened "obviously wrong" and "illogical".Referring to Frere, he said that the "mini-skirt" data on baby deaths were wrong and the truth misconstrued - intensifying a perception of a president in an ivory tower of denial. Madlala-Routledge was called a "lone ranger" acting outside the "collective" for putting the spotlight on a systemic problem. This has raised questions over what Mbeki really sees as "the collective" and whether party interests and allegiances have superseded government accountability. There are signs that he will leave a legacy of rampant state corruption. Civil society and the media bit back harshly, something that probably took Mbeki by surprise. The attacks from both sides have become increasingly personal and demeaning, notably the media expose of health minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang's alleged thieving and drinking. Some have called the public outcry a "seismic shift" in the nation's body politic.More serious are fears that the hardline tone is fuelling a climate of fear, loathing and repression and will mark Mbeki's last months as hegemony by stealth. There are signs that the ugly saga is developing into a full-blown crisis as the acrimonious succession battle approaches a climax at the ANC's national congress in December. What has happened to the man who wanted a thousand flowers to bloom? Is he already a lame duck, unable to exert his authority? Is the authoritarian tone a sign that his administration's legitimacy and hegemony are already disintegrating? Or is the realisation dawning that his legacy will be one of denial - over Aids, Zimbabwe, poverty and unemployment? Most commentators believe that Mbeki has become increasingly intolerant of criticism and incapable of self-criticism.A former member of his government remarked this week on the contradictions that mark a brilliant man who increasingly relies on struggle rhetoric to win the perception war and now won't allow anyone to contradict his "collective". Helen Zille, the opposition leader, ascribes Mbeki's attack on Madlala-Routledge as evidence that, in Mbeki's ANC, the leadership is increasingly acting as the "vanguard", "endowed with special insights to determine what is right for everyone else". Adam Habib, a political analyst, says, like most of his peers, that the president's over-reaction to Madlala-Routledge was not warranted. "The central need at this historical juncture is for a plurality of different views to exist in the centralised apparatus It is absolutely crucial that they are canvassed. If we don't we are in trouble at a later stage."Another commentator quotes Antonio Gramsci, the Italian strategist: "The old is dying and the new cannot be born; in this interregnum there arises a great diversity of morbid symptoms". These words are often used in the context of an incomplete democracy or a country at a crossroads.The "morbid" atmosphere revealed by the health "wars" can also be attributed to the past two years of succession battles - the more aggressive tone from Cosatu and the South African Communist Party, Jacob Zuma's mobilisation for the ANC presidency, and the "succession" coalitions forming behind the scenes.Those who fell foul of Mbeki in his earlier years, particularly over his macro-economic austerity programme, Gear, insist that the vicious tenor he has adopted in the health wars is not an aberration. They claim a long history of Mbeki acting in intemperate ways against those who contradict him, labelling them and hanging them out to dry.Then there are those in the Zuma camp who, for years, have accused him of using his increasingly centralised state power for witch-hunts among his detractors. Some of the acrimony has been a long time in the making. More recently it has unleashed the type of anger that saw a nearly month-long public-service wage strike across traditional race and class lines, and a spate of protests has been blazing across the country over perceived local government corruption and non-delivery. HIV and Aids, which claims 900 lives a day, and the government's perceived luke-warm response to it, has become a critical issue, according to which many in politics define themselves.It was precisely the president's lack of recognition of the graveness of the arms-deal allegations and his failure to act decisively that brought on the ugly succession battle - the single biggest dividing line in the tripartite alliance - fuelled by his axing of Zuma over allegations of arms-deal corruption.Mbeki has said he will stand for a third term as party president despite the fact that this has divided his party. This split is likely to deepen should Mbeki carry out his veiled threat to pursue a disciplinary agenda against Madlala-Routledge in the ANC. Now the stand-off over the health ministry is likely to exacerbate this divide and provide yet another platform for the alliance partners and Zuma to mobilise as the leadership battle heats up in advance of the conference. But Mbeki's most urgent dilemma is whether to act on the allegations already in the public domain against the health minister. He has never acted on the basis of media allegations but, uncharacteristically, he has promised to do so now if proof is provided. If he does not act, Mbeki runs the risk of his hurtful words having been "misunderstood", as he himself warned nine years ago. Worse, he might find himself hoisted with his own petard, becoming the victim his own vicious attempts to stave off his critics.

Hoeveel mense voel hulle drome het uiteindelik waar geword in die Nuwe Suid-Afrika?

2007-08-26T03:42:00.000-07:00

Blou Makou
2007-08-24

Druk dit/Print it

E-pos hierdie skakel/E-mail this link Dis die vraag wat Naomi vra op Vrydag, 24 Augustus 2007. Ek weet nie of mense noodwendig drome, eerder as verwagtinge, oor die NSA gehad het nie. Maar kom ons praat dan van drome of verwagtinge.My verwagtinge van die NSA was geskoei op logika en konklusies oor die res van Afrika. Ek is dus nie verras deur wat sedert 1994 gebeur het nie. Die NSA het die pad (lees: afdraand) geloop wat ek verwag het. Niks verrassings daar nie en sover nie. Alles sedert 1994 verloop nog volgens die Afrika-bloudruk. Ek dink egter vele ander mense het die valse beloftes en opportunisme van die politici geglo en is intussen erg teleurgesteld. (Die yskaste en stowe het nie uit die lug geval soos beloof nie). So het die NP (later NNP) geleer tel, nadat hulle opportunisties orals loop en vertel het hoe hulle die verkiesing in 1994 gaan wen. Nadat hulle weer hulle agterente sonder spieël gesien het in 1999, het hulle finaal geleer om te tel en besef 'n wit minderheid kan nie kompeteer met 'n oormag van getalle nie.Die ANC se stoutste verwagtinge en drome is oortref, volgens hulle leiers se eie erkenning. Hulle het alles en meer gekry as waarvan hulle gedroom het. Die ster van Afrika op 'n skinkbord, vir 30 sikkels silwer ...Net so ook het die 10+ miljoen onwettige immigrante en grenssluipers veel meer gekry as waarvan hulle gedroom het, naamlik die ANC wat 'n houding inneem dat dit goedkoper is om hulle RSA burgerskap te gee as om hulle te repatrieer. En nou kan hulle al die voordele geniet van die sogenaamde apartheidstaat, waar hulle veel beter af is as hulle eie lande van herkoms, waar dinge veel slegter is, want daar was nooit die voorspoed wat apartheid gebring het nie ... As die emosies en propaganda eers afgekoel het, besef jy: mens kan stemreg nie eet nie, al het die spul Kommuniste jou voorheen so laat glo of gemáák so glo.Die klomp verstokte, wit liberales se naïewe daggadroom oor utopia en grondwet en regstaat, het egter in 'n nagmerrie ontaard. Die Helen Suzman's, Alan Paton's, Max du Preez's en Koos Kombuise is wreed ontnugter. Hulle kom toe agter dat die Afrikaner toe al die tyd nie so boos en sleg was nie, veral toe die NSA se boosheid en slegtigheid selfs die hardste kriminele se stoutste verwagtinge oortref. 'n Plek waar jou lewe nie 'n spreekwoordelike tiekie werd is nie, maar jy wel die reg op lewe het - teoreties. Van al die gewaande wigte en teenwigte het niks gekom nie, en slegs die booswigte het die laaste sê.Die minderheidsvolke soos die Kleurlinge is niks beter af nie, want soos hulle self sê: "Voorheen was ons nie wit genoeg nie, nou is ons weer nie swart genoeg nie." Al wat van die Khoi en San mense in die NSA oorgebly het, is basies 'n paar onuitspreekbare woorde in die leuse van die landswapen.Die Afrikaners is ook in twee kampe verdeel: diegene wat die verlies van hul vryheid en hul vaderland intens voel en diegene wat, soos destyds tydens die Anglo-Boere Oorlog, doodgelukkig is om deur vreemdes regeer te word en na hulle nuwe meesters se pype te dans.Die swart volkere van die NSA is tevrede dat aan al hul verwagtinge en drome voldoen is, want hulle stem nog elke verkiesing vir die ANC. Verder het hulle swart meerderheidsregering gekry en het hulle in kort tyd die NSA van 'n eerstewêreld staat na 'n derdewêreld staat verander. En hulle is nou die nuwe base en kan die blankes domineer, nie deur voortreflikheid nie, maar deur getalle-oormag.En aldus steier die hutspot van volkere voort. Waar dit alles sal eindig, kan ek nie voorspel nie, maar ek kan wel logika gebruik en die volgende sê ... Oeps, daar gaan die son onder - tyd vir my whiskey en ys. Eishhh!

Blou Makou

Martin Pabst: ANC moet praat en Weste het ’n rol

2007-08-26T01:02:00.001-07:00

Martin Pabst: ANC moet praat en Weste het ’n rol
http://www.news24.com/Rapport/Rubrieke/0,,752-801_2171160,00.html
Druk artikel
E-pos storie aan 'n vriend
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Berlyn
In Duitsland is daar al hoe meer berigte oor die verwering van die openbare orde in Suid-Afrika.
Dié berigte maak my en baron Klaus von der Ropp baie bekommerd.Von der Ropp was lid van dr. Frederik Van Zyl Slabbert se afvaardiging wat in Julie 1987 in Dakar met die verbode ANC gaan praat het. Hy was ook teenwoordig toe Thabo Mbeki en genl. Constand Viljoen die Akkoord oor Afrikaner-selfbeskikking op 23 April 1994 onderteken het.
Ek (Martin Pabst) was ’n jaar later raadgewer in ’n gesprek in Interlaken, Switserland, tussen die ANC, die Vryheidsfront en ander. Hier is besin oor minderheidsregte in ’n demokratiese grondwet .
In Dakar het Slabbert aan die ANC gesê: “As julle apartheid wil oorwin, moet julle die wit mense, veral die Afrikaners, oortuig daar is ’n lewe ná apartheid.” Die ANC het dit aanvaar en ingestem tot art. 235 in die Grondwet van 1996.
Dié klousule erken “die reg van enige gemeenskap wat ’n gemeenskaplike kultuur- en taalerfenis deel, op selfbeskikking binne ’n territoriale entiteit in die Republiek of op enige ander wyse”.
Ongelukkig is dié klousule en verwante grondwetlike klousules nog nie verwerklik nie, met fatale gevolge vir alle Suid-Afrikaners. Vandag kort die land die stabiliteit waarsonder die transformasie van apartheid tot ’n regstaat en demokrasie nie kan slaag nie.
Suid-Afrikaners moet ag slaan op die voorstelle oor Kosovo wat mnr. Marti Ahtisaari, bemiddelaar van die Verenigde Nasies, in Februarie 2007 aan die Veiligheidsraad gedoen het. Dié voorstelle was gerig op Kosovo se toekomstige politieke ordening. ’n Kernaspek van Ahtisaari se voorstel is die beskerming van Serwiërs en ander etniese minderheidsgroepe se regte. Só kan hulle hul kulturele indentiteit bewaar en ontwikkel.
Onderwys op alle vlakke moet in die minderhede se moedertale aangebied word. Minderhede het ook die reg op hul eie private en openbare media. Die fisieke grense van gemeenskappe sal volgens Ahtisaari se plan só getrek word dat homogene taalgemeenskappe waar moontlik tot stand kom.
Só sal minderhede oorverteenwoordig word in Kosovo se sentrale wetgewende en uitvoerende organe. In 2001 het die Masedoniese parlement besluit op soortgelyke reëlings vir die land se verskillende etniese groepe. Só is ’n burgeroorlog beeïndig.
Westerse moondhede word aangeraai om weer as diplomatieke bemiddelaars op te tree in nuwe onderhandelinge tussen die ANC en Afrikaners oor so ’n bestel in Suid-Afrika. Amerika en Brittanje het immers ’n wesenlike rol gespeel in die akkoord tussen Viljoen en die ANC-leierskap.
Wanneer Afrikaners nie langer soos vreemdelinge in hul land voel nie, sal hulle hul nie meer deur uitwaartse of inwaartse migrasie aan Suid-Afrika onttrek nie.
As die voorgestelde hervormings in Suid-Afrika misluk, is ons bevrees Suid-Afrika se aanbieding van 2010 sal gekanselleer word. Die land sal dieselfde weg inslaan as sê maar Nigerië. En sal die Europese Unie 1,5 miljoen van sy lidstate se burgers uit ’n inploffende Suid-Afrika móét verwyder.
Dr. Martin Pabst is ’n politieke navorser en konsultant in Duitsland.

British forces useless

2007-08-20T07:26:00.001-07:00

British forces useless

Geskryf deur The Telegraph
Maandag, 20 Augustus 2007

Under attackWhen America's top commanders in Iraq held a conference with their British counterparts recently, Major General Jonathan Shaw - Britain's senior officer in Basra - was quick to share his views on how best to conduct counter-insurgency operations.For much of the last four years, the Americans in the room would have listened carefully, used to deferring to their British colleagues' long experience in Northern Ireland. This time, however, eyes that would once have been attentive simply rolled. Few were in the mood for a lecture about British superiority, when they fear that Downing Street's planned pull-out from Basra will squander any progress from their own hard-fought "troop surge" strategy elsewhere."It's insufferable for Christ's sake," said one senior figure closely involved in US military planning. "He comes on and he lectures everybody in the room about how to do a counter-insurgency. The guys were just rolling their eyeballs. The notorious Northern Ireland came up again. It's pretty frustrating. It would be okay if he was best in class, but now he's worst in class. Everybody else's area is getting better and his is getting worse."The meeting, called by General David Petraeus, the senior US officer who has the task of managing the surge, is emblematic of what is fast becoming a minor crisis in Anglo-American military relations.In Britain, Gordon Brown's government has tried to depict a quiet process of handover to Iraqi troops in Basra, which will see the remaining forces in the city withdraw to the airport in November.What US generals see, however, is a close ally preparing to "cut and run", leaving behind a city in the grip of a power struggle between Shia militias that could determine the fate of the Iraqi government and the country as a whole. With signs of the surge yielding tentative progress in Baghdad, but at the cost of many American lives, there could scarcely be a worse time for a parting of the ways. Yet the US military has no doubt, despite what Gordon Brown claims, that the pullout is being driven by "the political situation at home in the UK".A senior US officer familiar with Gen Petraeus's thinking said: "The short version is that the Brits have lost Basra, if indeed they ever had it. Britain is in a difficult spot because of the lack of political support at home, but for a long time - more than a year - they have not been engaged in Basra and have tried to avoid casualties."They did not have enough troops there even before they started cutting back. The situation is beyond their control."Quite frankly what they're doing right now is not any value-added. They're just sitting there. They're not involved. The situation there gets worse by the day. Americans are disappointed because, in their minds, this thing is still winnable. They don't intend to cut and run."The officer predicted that the affair could have long-lasting implications. "There will be a stink about this that will hang around the British military," he said.It is a view echoed by General Jack Keane, the architect of the surge strategy, who has just returned from Baghdad.Gen Keane, who has the ear of Vice President Dick Cheney and Stephen Hadley, President George W Bush's national security adviser, told The Sunday Telegraph: "It is disappointing and frustrating to see a situation in Basra that was once working pretty well, now coming apart. The situation there has been getting worse for some time."The depth of concern has grown since Gordon Brown's first prime ministerial visit to the US earlier this month, when he delivered a blunt message to Mr Bush that he would stick to plans which could see most of Britain's 5,500 troops gone from Iraq next year.The next political drama will come in four weeks when Gen Petraeus reports on the status of the surge strategy, which has successfully quelled violence in some areas but has failed to put an end to calls from Congress to bring the troops home.Britain's uncertain legacy in Basra will then be used as a political battering ram in Washington, as Mr Bush tries to win support on Capitol Hill.One US official said that recent US military intelligence reports sent to the White House had concluded that Britain had "lost" Basra, and that Pentagon war games were predicting a virtual civil war in the South once British troops left.He said: "When the White House makes the case for continuing the surge on the Hill they will say: 'Look what happened in Basra when the Brits went back to their barracks. We can't pull out now. Give us more time to get it right'."He added that White House officials had expected Mr Brown to strike a different tone on Iraq to that of Tony Blair, but that they were disappointed not to win a firmer agreement to keep British troops in place."They don't mind a change in rhetoric, but the bottom line for the president was to keep Basra as a British responsibility. He didn't get as much as he wanted. There was a whiff of double dealing about it all."As The Sunday Telegraph revealed last week, plans have been drawn up to send thousands of American troops into southern Iraq to take over the supervision of the vital supply route north from Kuwait, a task the British will bequeath when they leave.But the senior US officer warned that combat troops may also have to go into Basra itself to "protect the population" from violence between its numerous warring Shia militias - an extra burden as perilous as any in Baghdad.US Marine Colonel Gary Anderson, who has conducted recent Iraq war games for the Pentagon, said the situation Britain would leave behind in Basra "could be the most bloody part of the transition".He said: "The primary issue in Basra will be a struggle between various Shia factions for control of the region, and frankly the regular government in Baghdad as well. It will be between pro-Iranian factions and those that are more nationalistic. It's going to be nasty."Col Anderson said British troops "did the best they could", but added: "I'm not sure they did as good a job as they did traditionally. This isn't Northern Ireland. They thought they had a pretty good model but Iraq is a different culture."Michael O'Hanlon, of the Brookings Institution, a Washington think tank, added: "Basra is a mess, and the exit strategy attempted there has failed. It is, for the purposes of future Iraq policymaking, an example of what not to do."Basra has gone far towards revising the common American image of British soldiers as perhaps the world's best at counter-insurgency."
Laatste opdatering ( Maandag, 20 Augustus 2007 )
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ANC - Terrorists or Freedom Fighters?

2007-08-20T07:18:00.000-07:00

ANC - Terrorists or Freedom Fighters?
http://southafricasucks.blogspot.com/
ANC - Terrorists or Freedom Fighters? By Uncle CrackerOne often hears the cliché nowadays that, "One man’s 'Terrorist', is another man's 'Freedom Fighter'."The ANC/communist alliance want to convince the public at large that umKhonto we Sizwe were “Freedom Fighters” when in actual fact they were just common terrorists. What is the difference you ask?It was at the Kabwe conference in Zambia, 16-23 June 1985, when the ANC took the shocking decision that "The distinction between 'hard' and 'soft' targets should disappear. In other words, the onslaught against civilians was approved. In 1981 the ANC/Communist alliance's choice of targets were 81% 'hard' and '12% 'soft' targets. In 1986 it was 10.3% 'hard' and 80.7% soft targets.This Kabwe decision was in contravention of Protocol one of 1977 of the Geneva Convention, that the ANC in 1949 undertook to follow. In 1949, the ANC undertook to only attack 'hard' targets or the SA security forces. Article 1.52(1) and 57 of this undertaking is relevant here.Up until1977, the Geneva Convention had clear guidelines as to what the differences between soldiers, guerrillas and terrorists were. The Umkhonto we Siswe members did not wear their weapons openly and did not wear a uniform that could be recognised at a distance, for instance.In his book, 'Terrorism: How the West can win' (1986), Benjamin Netanyahu defines terrorism as such;"It chooses innocent victims precisely, because they are innocent. What distinguishes terrorism is the willful, calculated choice of innocents as targets...Terrorism is the deliberate and systematic murder, maiming and menacing of the innocent to inspire fear for political ends"He describes the difference between Freedom Fighters and terrorists as such."Terrorists habitually describe themselves as guerillas. Guerillas are not terrorists. They are irregular soldiers who wage war on regular military forces - not on civilians. Actually, guerillas are the very opposite of terrorists. While they put themselves against far superior combatants, terrorists choose to attack weak and defenseless civilians - old men, woman, children - anyone in fact, except soldiers if they can avoid it. Civilians then, are the key to the terrorists' strategy. They kill civilians and more often than not they hide behind them, hoping that the prospect of more innocent deaths will help them escape retribution."Douglas Pike writes about terrorism as such:"Even in warfare certain acts are illegal and may properly be named terror.. this latter point rests in the belief that in all things there are limits, and a limit in warefareis reached at the systematic use of death, pain, fear and anxiety amongst the population for the deliberate purpose of coercing, manipulating, intimidating, punishing or simply frightening into helpless submission. Certain acts, even in war, are beyond the pale and can only be labeled as terror."Mahmood Mamdani writes in 2004;"Despite important differences, genocide and terrorism share one important feature; both target civilian populations."The Western world expected South Africa to sit on their hands and do nothing while the ANC was waging a total onslaught against South Africa. Look at what the current president of South Africa said.This is what Thabo Mbeki had to say, "We can't fight a bush war in South Africa. Look at the map. It is all developed. There are roads, radios and landing strips everywhere. This is not Angola or Mozambique. We do not have forests. The (military) machine would smash us if we tried to send in an army from outlying areas. Also, 87% of the Whites are in towns and cities. Our masses have to serve as our bush. The Black community is our bush."Mr Thabo Mbeki, as a member of the National Executive Committee of the ANC (1977)"There is going to be more bloodshed and the whole country will be involved. The Soviet Union will give us what the West does not want to give us - namely weapons."Mr Oliver Tambo in an interview with the Washington Post, 9 September 1985.
"We want to make the death of a collaborator so grotesque that people will never think of it (i.e. collaboration)."Mr Tim Ngubane, ANC representative in the USA, in an address to students of the California State University at Long Beach, on 10 October 1985.
"Together, hand in hand, with our boxes of matches and our necklaces, we shall liberate this country ... We have no guns - we have only stones, boxes of matches and petrol."Ms Winnie Mandela, as quoted by Agence France Presse, Sunday, 13 April 1986.General Magnus Malan in his address to parliament (17 May 1988) said the following:"South Africa cannot live with such a morality. If the ANC, with worldwide approval, reserves the right to plant bombs against innocent people in South Africa, and continues to export revolution and terrorism to South Africa, the Republic of South Africa reserves the right to act against the ANC in neighbouring countries. South Africa is not acting provocatively or tauntingly. We are not seeking confrontation, but when innocent people are murdered or crippled by terrorists beyond our borders, we cannot sit with our hands folded."Let me again remind hon members of the words of Mr George Schultz: The civilised world will have to think long, hard and seriously about more active means of defense, namely defense through preventative actions against terrorists before they strike. Consequently to act against the ANC in neighbouring countries and destroy their facilities is a form of self-defense for the Republic of South Africa. It is based on a justified principle.
Now looking at the above definitions of terrorism and comparing it to the current crime situation in South Africa, is our crime just “Crime” or is it deliberate “Terrorism”?

Russia restores bomber patrols:

2007-08-17T10:28:00.001-07:00

Russia restores bomber patrols
Story Highlights
Russia to send bomber aircraft on long-range flights on a permanent basis
President Vladimir Putin said the move was in response to security threats
The White House says the flights do not pose a threat to the United States
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var clickExpire = "08/31/2007";
http://edition.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/europe/08/17/russia.airforce.reut/index.html

CHEBARKUL, Russia (Reuters) -- President Vladimir Putin said on Friday security threats had forced Russia to revive the Soviet-era practice of sending bomber aircraft on regular patrols beyond its borders.

A Russian startegic bomber flies over an airfield outside Moscow during an air show.

Putin said 14 strategic bombers had taken off simultaneously from airfields across Russia in the early hours of Friday on long-range missions.
"We have decided to restore flights by Russian strategic aviation on a permanent basis," Putin told reporters after inspecting joint military exercises with China and four Central Asian states in Russia's Ural mountains.
"Today, August 17 at 00:00 hours, 14 strategic bombers took to the air from seven airfields across the country, along with support and refueling aircraft ... From today such patrols will be carried out on a regular basis.
"We hope our partners will treat this with understanding."
At U.S. President George W. Bush's Texas ranch, White House spokesman Gordon Johndroe said he did not believe the flights posed a threat to the United States.
"Militaries around the world engage in a variety of activities, so this is not entirely surprising," he said.
But the sorties are likely to add to Western concern about Russia's growing assertiveness. That trend has prompted some U.S. policymakers to draw parallels with the Cold War.
Don't Miss
Russia resumes nuke bomber sorties
Putin caused a stir this year by saying Russian missiles would once again be aimed at targets in Europe if Washington persisted with plans to build a missile defense shield in eastern Europe.
Russian diplomats have clashed with the United States and European governments on issues such as Kosovo, energy, and Moscow's treatment of its ex-Soviet neighbors.
Western military leaders have said this year that Russian flights near their airspace were becoming more frequent after a long quiet period.
One Western defense official called the flights "a little bit of chest-pounding, trying to let people know Russia is back in the game".
Putin said that when Russia had cut its flights in 1992, other military powers had not reciprocated.
"Flights by other countries' strategic aircraft continue and this creates certain problems for ensuring the security of the Russian Federation," Putin said.
That appeared to be a swipe at the U.S. and NATO, whose strategic bombers have continued to fly long-range missions.
As Putin spoke to reporters and television cameras, four Russian military helicopters appeared and hovered in the background while Russian tanks trundled behind him, even though the exercises had ended long before.
During the Cold War, Russian long-range bombers, which can carry strategic nuclear weapons, played elaborate games of cat-and-mouse with Western air forces.
Earlier this month Russian air force generals said bomber crews had flown near the Pacific island of Guam, where the U.S. military has a base, and "exchanged smiles" with U.S. pilots scrambled to track them.
The Pentagon said the Russian aircraft had not come close enough to U.S. ships to prompt American aircraft to react.
In July, two Russian Tu-95 "Bear" bombers made unusually long sorties over the North Sea, leading Norway and Britain to scramble fighter jets to follow them. Russia's air force said later it was a routine flight. E-mail to a friend

Die Engelse gevaar

2007-08-17T10:02:00.000-07:00

Die Engelse gevaar

http://www.praag.org/mambo/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=811&Itemid=37

Geskryf deur Dan Roodt
Vrydag, 17 Augustus 2007
Stem in ons meningspeiling (regs onder): Behoort Boerehaat-Engelse soos Georgina Guedes toegelaat te word om in ons Republiek te woon?
Hiernaas verskyn ’n rubriek deur Anton Barnard, in reaksie op Engelse steun vir die naamsverandering van Pretoria.
So ’n ruk terug wou ek ’n boek begin skryf met die titel, “Die Engelse gevaar”. Oor die afgelope jare, in ’n poging om die gemors te begryp waarin ons land verval het, verslind ek geskiedenis. Soos my vrou droogweg teenoor my opmerk nadat ek haar van die soveelste insident vertel het waartydens die Engelse die Boere of Voortrekkers wou ondermyn: “Suid-Afrika se geskiedenis is eintlik die verhaal van Engelse wat die swartes opstook om die Afrikaners te gaan doodmaak.”
Oral waar daar oorloë tussen ons en swartes uitgebreek het, was daar iewers ’n Engelse sendeling betrokke. “Sendeling, ellendeling,” lui die Afrikaanse gesegde. Volgens sommige geskiedskrywers het Owen, die Britse sendeling wat by Dingaan se kraal werksaam was, vooraf geweet dat die moord op Piet Retief beplan word, maar verkies om nie die Voortrekkers te waarsku nie. Dan weet ons natuurlik van die haatveldtog wat Philip en Van der Kemp teen die Voortrekkers in die 1820s en 1830s gevoer het, en wat regstreeks tot die Groot Trek aanleiding gegee het.
Toe ons uiteindelik ná die Sandrivierkonvensie buite Engelse bereik ons eie republieke verkry het, was dit nie lank nie of Theophilus Shepstone annekseer die Transvaal in 1877. Hierna volg die Eerste Vryheidsoorlog teen die spul Britte en gelukkig vir ons gaan haal ons vir Colley en sy manne van Majuba af en wys hulle waar Dawid die wortels gegrawe het. Die vrede van die Pretoriase konvensie (1881) en die latere Londense konvensie (1884) het egter nie lank gehou nie, want in 1896 poog die Engelse om ’n staatsgreep in die Transvaal uit te voer met die Jameson Raid.
Dit gee regstreeks aanleiding tot die Tweede Vryheidsoorlog waartydens die Engelse gewapende swartes teen die Boere en veral die Boerevroue gebruik. Sowel Engelse as swartes molesteer of verkrag ons vroue, stop hulle en hulle kinders in konsentrasiekampe en pleeg ’n volksmoord waarvoor hulle nog nooit, anders as die Duitsers, die Turke, die Kambodjane of die Hoetoe’s van Rwanda, tot verantwoording geroep is nie.
Die 100 000 swartes wat deur die Britte tydens 1899-1902 bewapen is, vestig die patroon vir die twintigste eeu. Die Engelse het selfs ’n term daarvoor: war by proxy. ’n Mooi Afrikaanse uitdrukking vir dieselfde begrip is ’n “handskoenoorlog”.
Maak geen fout nie: Brittanje en die plaaslike Britte of rooinekke sal nie rus totdat ons as volk uitgewis of ten minste vernietig, gedekultureer en oor die aarde verstrooi is nie. Waarom die Engelse ons so haat, is moeilik om te verklaar. Een teorie is dat die koste van die Tweede Vryheidsoorlog hul empaaier geknak het en dat dit ook die res van Europa teen Engeland gekeer het, iets waarvoor hulle ons nog nooit vergewe het nie.
Myns insiens spruit Suid-Afrika se onophoudelike politieke probleme en twiste uit die verdeelde lojaliteit van die invloedryke groep uitlanders wat steeds, ondanks die ANC se revolusie, ons ekonomie en die media beheer. Ons moet ophou om na dié uitgeweke Britte wat in die noordelike voorstede van Johannesburg, Natal of Kaapstad saamkoek as “Suid-Afrikaners” te verwys, want ten minste die helfte van hulle was nog nooit lojaal aan ons land nie, maar het geheg aan hul ou Queen en die Union Jack gebly.
Georgina Guedes wat Pretoria se naam verander wil sien, is maar net nog ’n Engelse génocidaire oftewel volksmoordenaar wat alles wat Afrikaans is, hetsy ons plekname, hetsy ons kultuur, hetsy ons mense wat al soveel onder Britse wreedheid gely het, uitgeroei wil sien. En natuurlik gaan dit met die handskoen geskied, want sy hoef nie self haar hande vuil te maak nie. Daardie idioot wat haarself die burgemeester van Tshwane noem, gaan dit vir haar doen. Soos sy in haar rubriek skryf, gee Guedes nie om watter name ons stede aanneem nie. Want Londen sal mos altyd Londen wees. Of Lissabon wel Lissabon? Met ’n van soos Guedes haal Georgina nie eintlik Britse uitverkore status nie; dis eerder geval van ’n Porra wat haarself verbeel sy het Engels geword.
Min Afrikaners sal toelaat dat hul kinders met ’n Porra trou, want hulle wil nie ’n geneties verswakte nageslag hê nie. Die ongeletterdheidsyfer in Portugal is iets soos 35%, die hoogste in Wes-Europa. Nadat die Portugese uit Mosambiek en Angola verdryf is, het ons hulle hier as Westerse vlugtelinge verwelkom en hulle blanke status gegee, hoewel heelwat van hulle in hul gewese kolonies oorkant die draad gekuier het. Van Guedes ontvang ons nou stank vir dank. Vanuit die groentewinkel waar sy nog tamaties en koejawels verkoop het, verbeel sy haar nou sy is een of ander koloniale sekretaris in Londen wat die soveelste gewapende aanval op die Boere met ’n span Ghoerkas beplan.
Die huidige bestel met sy naamsveranderings is uit en uit ’n maaksel van die geradikaliseerde Britse intellektuele en joernaliste wat met hul grootse propagandaveldtog die oorwinning behaal het oor die arme Broederbond en Nasionale Party wat in sy sterwensfase een en dieselfde organisasie was.
So ook Zimbabwe, waar Brittanje teen sy eie mense, die Engelssprekende, blanke Rhodesiërs gekies het en geëis het dat Mugabe president word nadat die gematigde biskop Abel Muzorewa aanvanklik ’n demokratiese verkiesing gewen het. Ek onthou nou nog hoe die Engelse studente by Wits waar ek gestudeer het, in 1980 gejuig het toe die nuus oor die radio kom dat Mugabe die verkiesing gewen het. Hoewel daar in Brittanje konserwatiewe Britte bestaan, word ons plaaslike Britse intellektuele, joernaliste en selfs sakeleiers wat die Johannesburgse ekonomie beheer, beïnvloed vanaf plekke soos Kuba of die linkervleuel van die Arbeidersparty wat sedert die sewentigerjare een van die laaste buiteposte van Marxisme in Wes-Europa is.
Soos die ANC bestempel die Britte, hetsy in die moederland, hetsy plaaslikes, die situasie in Zimbabwe as “demokrasie”. Die idee dat hulle in 1980 ’n groteske fout begaan het, het nog nie by hulle posgevat nie en sal ook nooit nie. Toe die Afrikaners onder apartheid naarstiglik swart skole en hospitale opgerig het, het histeriese Engelse intellektuele, joernaliste en kerkleiers dit ’n “misdaad teen die mensdom” genoem. Die Engelse het ‘n probleem met hul werklikheidsbesef en is in staat om enigiets te sê wat in hulle koppe inkom. Wat hulle in Zimbabwe aangevang het, of die geweld en anargie wat hulle en die Amerikaners deur hul militêre inmenging in Irak gesaai het, behang hulle met die pragtige begrip, “demokrasie”.
Voordat ons vergeet, die Kerstraatbom is in Londen beplan, nie in Oos-Berlyn of Moskou nie.
Verwoerd sal onthou word as een van die groot Afrikanerleiers van die twintigste eeu. Immers het hy ons vir ’n wyle uit die verderflike Britse Statebond gekry en ons land in ’n soewereine republiek omskep. Maar hy het ook vele foute begaan.
Een van Verwoerd se grootste foute was sy verdraagsaamheid teenoor ons grootste vyand, die verraderlike Engelsman. Toe Suid-Afrika in 1961 ’n republiek geword het, het Verwoerd die geleentheid gehad om Afrikaans die enigste amptelike taal te maak en van die Engelse te vereis om finaal te kies tussen hierdie land en Engeland. Pleks daarvan, het Verwoerd die perd van “versoening” en die “blanke nasie” wat kastig tweetalig sou wees, opgesaal. Sodoende het hy die Engelse hand versterk en dit was net ’n kwessie van tyd voordat ons herower sou word om die huidige verskrikking van “Engelse demokrasie” saam met die Zimbabwiërs en die Irakiërs te beleef.
Wie Georgina Guedes ook al is, ’n verengelsde Portugees wat haar op haar Johannesburgse identiteit beroep (asof ons hoegenaamd in haar gehegtheid aan Sandton City of die Fourways Mall of ander tempels van Anglo-Amerikaanse kultuur belangstel), verteenwoordig sy ’n simptoom van Suid-Afrika se Engelse probleem wat met die jare net groter geword het.
Agter die moordenaars en verkragters wat ons teister en agter die Zimbabwiese immigrant wat oor ons grense stroom, staan ’n grinnikende Engelsman wat sadistiese behae in sy vernietigingswerk en in ons ondergang skep.
Anders as die gehate Engelse met hul neigings tot volsmoord en etniese suiwering, wil ons die goed nie noodwendig uitwis nie. Maar ons sal moet besef dat tweetaligheid en die blanke nasie van weleer ’n groot fout was. Daar kan geen kompromie met die Engelse heersersklas in Johannesburg en Kaapstad wees nie. As die Afrikaner eers uit sy huidige slaapwandeling wakkergeskrik en agtergekom het wat aangaan, sal ons by die eerste die beste geleentheid Afrikaans as enigste amptelike taal in die hele land, uitgesonderd Natal, moet vestig. Laat die Engelse hulle in die huidige reeks naamsveranderings verkneukel, want by die eerste, beste geleentheid gaan ons elke Engelse naam in hierdie land na ‘n inheemse Afrikaanse naam verander. Elkeen van die kitsch veiligheidsbuurte met hul pretensieuse Engelse of Italiaanse name sal na ‘n Afrikaanse naam verander word, net soos wat die Vlaminge in Vlaandere met Franse name gedoen het. Wie die laaste lag, lag die lekkerste.
Die helfte van die Engelse sal binnekort daarna huistoe gaan omdat hulle dit nie sal kan verdra nie en die ander helfte wat intussen met ons ondertrou, Afrikaans geleer en in ’n groot mate verinheems het, sal by ons integreer en sodoende sal ons ’n Afrikanernasie vir die toekoms kan bou. Sonder Engelse opstokers en kranksinnige linkse rooinekintellektuele en –joernaliste wat dinge soos “transformasie” en kwasi-kommunistiese gelykheid verkondig, sal die verhouding tussen ons en die swartes so goed wees soos dit nog altyd was. ‘n Nuwe tydperk van vrede en voorspoed sal aanbreek en Engelse terreur en anargie sal tot die verre verlede behoort.
Mense soos Georgina Guedes behoort egter aangemoedig te word om hul haat jeens Afrikaans en Afrikaanse plekname uit te spuug. Dit herinner ons aan die ware aard van die Engelsman, die groot vernietiger in Suider-Afrika wat sy handskoenoorlog met Sjona- of Xhosahuurtroepe voer.