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• South African opposition party, the Independent Democrats, says it will bring a motion of no confidence against President Thabo Mbeki and his Cabinet for failing to avert power cuts that have forced some industries to shut down. ID leader Patricia de Lille accuses Mbeki and his government of having ignored warnings about the crunch in electricity supplies. The ID, with only five seats in the African National Congress-dominated 400-seat parliament, is unlikely to win the support of a majority but the motion is highly symbolic. De Lille says it will be brought at the first sitting of Parliament's National Assembly on February 12, a few days after Mbeki's annual State of the Nation address.
• A Zimbabwean tribunal begins proceedings to decide whether the nation's Attorney-General should be removed from office for allegedly abusing his power in a case involving a fugitive banker. Attorney-General Sobusa Gula-Ndebele was suspended in December after police charged him with corruption in connection with his ties to James Mushore, former director of NMBZ Holdings who fled to Britain in 2004 during a banking crisis.
• Kenyan opposition politician, Melitus Were, is shot dead at his home. It is not clear whether the killing was politically motivated, but if it proves to be, he would the first politician to be killed in the violence which has swept Kenya after last month's disputed election, dramatically ramping up tension. More than 800 people have been killed since the vote.
Also making headlines:
• Democratic Alliance leader Helen Zille meets with President Thabo Mbeki at the Union Buildings to discuss issues ranging from the electricity crisis to the prosecution of National Police Commissioner Jackie Selebi.
• Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi says African leaders meeting in Ethiopia this week should stop wasting time and unite in a single government to stop foreign powers taking control of the continent.
• US President George W. Bush urges Congress in his annual State of the Union speech to help provide more food aid to poor nations by buying more crops overseas.
This bulletin has been compiled with the assistance of Reuters and Sapa.
Also available on the Polity website are a number of recommended reports and documents that provide for interesting reading, including:
• The South African Reconciliation Barometer Survey, a national representative survey conducted annually by the Institute for Justice and Reconciliation.
• Erosion of trade preferences in the post-Hong Kong framework: From "trade is better than aid" to "aid for trade", and;
• A study by the World Energy Council that contributes to the debate on global energy sustainability.
Also freely downloadable on the site are several new pieces of South African legislation and a collection of important addresses made by South African government leaders and other leading figures from around the African continent.
That’s a round-up of this week’s activities on Creamer Media’s polity.org.za.
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