Friday July 08, 2011

From Creamer Media in Johannesburg, I’m Brad Dubbelman

Making headlines:

Public Protector Advocate Thuli Madonsela did not break any laws when her company offered services to the Department of Justice while she was the South African Law Reform Commissioner. In a statement released on Thursday Justice Minister Jeff Radebe said his department had at the request of the National Treasury investigated if there had been a conflict of interest when her company Waweth rendered services to the department. Radebe was reacting to reports published in The Star and Pretoria newspapers published on Wednesday. The reports alleged that Madonsela faced imminent arrest for fraud and corruption in connection with her work at the South African Law Reform Commission several years ago.

Foreign companies in Zimbabwe will not be seized but bought out under a black economic-empowerment scheme sponsored by President Robert Mugabe's Zanu-PF party, a government minister said. However, destitute Zimbabwe, the world's second-largest platinum producer, does not have enough money to purchase majority stakes in the foreign firms and could be trying to ease the concerns of overseas investors, analysts said. Speaking at the launch of a five-year economic development plan, Economic Planning and Investment Promotion Minister Tapiwa Mashakada said the drive would take time and would not destroy the country's fragile economy.

Leading dissidents from Swaziland urged South Africa not to bail out the cash-strapped government of King Mswati III in order to keep the pressure on Africa's last absolute monarch. With his appointed administration facing a Greece-scale budget deficit and moribund economy, the UK-educated monarch has turned to Pretoria for help, having tried and failed to get any cash from the International Monetary Fund or other lenders. His opponents fear that even a small amount of aid from his giant neighbour will take the heat off Mswati, who has at least a dozen wives, an estimated $200-million fortune and runs the landlocked nation of 1.4-million as a personal fiefdom.

Also making headlines:
Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi said he was against Nato intervention in Libya but had to go along with it, an admission that exposed the fragility of the alliance trying to unseat Muammar Gaddafi.
Moroccan voters' endorsement of a new constitution may provide only a short-term boost for King Mohammed if concrete change is not delivered to silence a growing protest movement.
And, the persistent call from the African National Congress Youth League for nationalisation of South Africa’s banks and mines threatens economic growth and employment, economists and industry players have warned.

That’s a roundup of news making headlines today.