Friday, February 19, 2010
From Creamer Media in Johannesburg, I'm Amy Witherden.
Making headlines:
The African National Congress Youth League (ANCYL) does not want President Jacob Zuma's support in its bid for nationalisation, it wants the support of the masses, its leader Julius Malema said yesterday.
Speaking at a memorial lecture at the University of the Witwatersrand commemorating former President Nelson Mandela's release from prison 20 years ago, Malema said: "We don't care who says what. Nationalisation will become the policy of the ANC."
On Tuesday, during debate on his State of the Nation address in Parliament, Zuma told opposition parties that the nationalisation of mines was not government policy. Malema, however, is determined to influence ANC branches to make nationalisation party policy, which would then filter into the government.
To reinforce his argument, a video clip of an interview with Mandela, filmed shortly after his release from prison, was played. In the interview, Mandela said that nationalisation was part of the country's history and that he did not understand how privatisation was being justified.

Trade ministers are unlikely to gather in late March as proposed to decide whether a deal is possible this year in the World Trade Organisation's (WTO's) long-running Doha Round.
WTO DG Pascal Lamy is expected to tell the global trade body's General Council next week that there has not been enough progress in trade negotiations to bring in ministers for a decision. Lamy took the decision at a meeting of key WTO delegations on Thursday, after a week of intense negotiations where Geneva-based ambassadors were reinforced by senior officials from national capitals.
The decision underlines the mismatch in the eight-year-old talks, with leaders calling for a Doha pact to boost the global economy in the wake of the crisis but failing to give their negotiators the leeway to cut a deal.

An estimated 825 706 direct and 2,5-million indirect jobs could be created over the next ten years through the successful implementation of South Africa's new Industrial Policy Action Plan (Ipap), the second round (Ipap2) of which would run from 2010/11 to 2012/13, Trade and Industry Minister Rob Davies said yesterday, and could also facilitate significant industrial diversification.
Addressing Parliament, Davies said that Ipap2, represented a significant step forward in scaling up government's efforts to promote long-term industrialisation and industrial diversification beyond the current reliance on traditional commodities and nontradable services. Its purpose is to expand production in value-added sectors with high employment and growth multipliers that compete in export markets, as well as in the domestic market against imports. Davies insists that the promotion of value-added sectors will be fundamental in driving decent work opportunities.

Also making headlines:

The Côte d'Ivoire's Prime Minister Guillaume Soro requests two extra days to form a government to replace the one that was dissolved by President Laurent Gbagbo last week.
The Police Ministry reports that a Cape Town student who gave President Jacob Zuma's blue light convoy the finger apologises for his actions.
The International Monetary Fund's board will consider whether to restore Zimbabwe's voting rights today.
And, Niger's President Mamadou Tandja is captured after the presidential palace was stormed yesterday, in a military coup.

That's a roundup of news making headlines today.