December 13, 2013
From Creamer Media in Johannesburg, I’m Motshabi Hoaeane.
Making headlines:

Former President Nelson Mandela’s traditional burial preparations are underway in Qunu.

Former President Thabo Mbeki questions South Africa’s current leadership.

And, Democratic Republic of Congo signs a peace deal with the M23 rebels.

Nelson Mandela will be laid to rest on Sunday in an elaborate ceremony combining a state funeral and all its military pomp with the traditional burial rituals of his Xhosa clan to ensure he has an easy transition into the afterworld.

A man who for many embodied the Christian values of forgiveness, Mandela was the product of Xhosa traditional upbringing and Methodist schooling.

In his autobiography 'Long Walk to Freedom,' Mandela spoke approvingly of the Xhosa rituals, which his mother, a convert to the Methodist faith, resisted but his father followed, presiding over slaughter rituals and other traditional rites.

A scholar of African religion, Nokuzola Mndende, said Africans have rites of passage, whether it is a birth, marriage or funeral. Mandela will be sent off into the spiritual world so that he is welcomed in the world of ancestors. And also so that he doesn't get angry.

While thousands of South Africans grieved at the open coffin of former president Nelson Mandela on Thursday, a debate grew about discontent with the country's leadership. On Wednesday night, former President Thabo Mbeki openly suggested that South Africa needed better leadership.

The sight of Mandela lying in state at the Union Buildings turned the mood from one of noisy celebration of his legacy at his official memorial on Tuesday to that of mass mourning, as people wept beside his body.

Since Mandela's death, President Jacob Zuma has lived in an uncomfortable spotlight. He was loudly booed by sections of the crowd at the memorial service in Soweto as international statesmen and millions of viewers watched.

Mbeki, on the other hand, was cheered, as was South Africa's last white president FW de Klerk, who freed Mandela from jail and unbanned the ANC.

 

The Congolese government signed a peace deal on Thursday with the M23 rebels it had been fighting until they laid down their arms last month, ending weeks of wrangling over the terms of an agreement.

Two declarations were signed which together comprise 11 points agreed on by the parties, said the communique, signed by President Yoweri Museveni of Uganda and President Joyce Banda of Malawi.

These include a decision by the M23 to end the rebellion and transform itself into a political party, an amnesty to M23 members only for acts of war or insurgency and the demobilisation of former M23 members.

The deal concludes the most serious rebellion in Congo in a decade but analysts say the region remains fragile, not least because the agreement does not address the status of other armed groups.
 

Also making headlines:

Broadband is expected to be a potential ‘game changer’ in the post-2015 development agenda.

Opposition parties in Guinea said on Thursday they would take their seats in the National Assembly despite election disputes.

And, construction advances on Zimbabwe’s 22 solar-powered tollgates.
 

That's a roundup of news making headlines today.