South Africa

JOHANNESBURG - Former Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) president Willie Madisha accuses the trade union federation of putting personality interest above workers' concerns and says he will push ahead with plans to set up an independent rival body. Madisha says 150 representatives of independent unions decided at a meeting to hold a national founding conference by December. "This course of action has been necessitated by the failure of government and, by extension, Cosatu to address the material conditions of workers in this country," he says. Madisha accuses the new administration of failing to act on election promises to curb poverty and create half a million new jobs while protecting existing ones. It is instead wasting energy on party infighting, Madisha says, adding that Cosatu has invited questions about its relevance as the vanguard of workers' interests by focusing on succession battles shaping up in the African National Congress. He says Cosatu has become nothing more than "a band of armchair revolutionaries".

CAPE TOWN - Democratic Alliance (DA) leader Helen Zille accuses the African National Congress (ANC) of subverting the judiciary and State institutions to settle political scores within the ruling party. "In the six months since pril, we have had ANC party control taking over the independent institutions of the State," Zille writes in her weekly newsletter. She says prime examples are the "political abuse" of the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) to abandon the corruption charges against President Jacob Zuma and that of the Judicial Service Commission (JSC) to exonerate Western Cape Judge President John Hlophe. The DA reacted with outrage when, in response to its application for a judicial review of the NPA's decision not to prosecute Zuma, his lawyer, Michael Hulley, filed an affidavit arguing that a sitting head of State cannot be charged with criminal conduct. Zuma says he does not consider himself to be above the law and will testify if called before court. Zille says Zuma is obviously mindful that powerful institutions can be turned against him if, like former President Thabo Mbeki, he lost the support of powerful factions in the ANC. Zille adds that the DA believes that the independence of the judiciary is the bedrock of decent societies and should be sacrosanct and that "the assault on this independence by the ANC is of the gravest concern".

Africa & the world

WASHINGTON - President Barack Obama says that all signs point to the US economy starting to grow again but there may not be enough new jobs created until next year. "I want to be clear that probably the jobs picture is not going to improve considerably - and it could even get a little bit worse - over the next couple of months," he says in an interview with CNN's State of the Union. Federal Reserve chairperson Ben Bernanke says that the worst US recession since the Great Depression of the 1930s is probably over but the recovery will be slow and it will take time to create new jobs. Obama has sought in recent weeks to highlight the signs of an improving economy in an effort to boost his popularity, which has suffered amid a heated debate over his plan to overhaul the nation's healthcare system. Obama says jobs figures tend to be the last to catch up in an economic recovery. "The other problem is we lost so many jobs that making up for those that have already been lost is going to require really high growth rates," he says.

NEW YORK - Poor harvests owing to lack of rain, combined with worsening conflict and the El Niño climatic effect, could leave millions more people in East Africa facing food shortages this year, the United Nations (UN) says. A report by the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) says that, from Uganda to Ethiopia, Kenya and Somalia, a drop in cereal production is likely to increase the nearly 20-million people already dependent on food assistance in one of the world's poorest regions. According to the FAO, the perilous situation could be worsened by the El Niño climatic effect, which brings heavy rains towards the end of the year that produce floods and mudslides, ruining crops, killing livestock and damaging infrastructure. The food security situation is dire in conflict-torn Somalia, which faces its worst humanitarian crisis in 18 years, with about one-half of the population - an estimated 3,6-million people - in need of emergency aid, the FAO says.