Wednesday June 29, 2011

From Creamer Media in Johannesburg, I’m Schalk Burger

Making headlines:

ANC leaders under President Jacob Zuma risk losing Cosatu's support if they do not pull up their socks, the labour federation said. "Help us help you. We don't like the space we are in now," general secretary Zwelinzima Vavi said after delivering his secretariat report at Cosatu’s central committee meeting. As "selflessness" was replaced by a "me first" attitude, there was a battle to contain and maintain the ANC alliance with Cosatu and the SACP as one which led society on moral issues, he said. Vavi said the country's leaders had to guide it in a new direction which enabled it to meet the challenge of an economy which was not working. They had to tackle corruption and poor performance head on, because tact in dealing with faults in the government, was not working.

French Finance Minister Christine Lagarde clinched the top job at the IMF, keeping the international lender in the hands of a European at a time of growing concern over a possible Greek debt default. Lagarde, who starts her five-year term as MD on July 5th, will find herself immediately immersed in efforts by the IMF and European Union (EU) to head off a Greek default that could touch off an international crisis. Minutes after her appointment, Lagarde pressed Greece to move quickly to push through unpopular austerity measures that the IMF and EU say are a prerequisite for further aid.

Only 12% of grade six pupils scored 50% or more for mathematics in a countrywide assessment test earlier this year. This low score was one of several revealed in the delayed 2011 Annual National Assessment (ANA) results, released by Basic Education Minister Angie Motshekga in Pretoria yesterday. The assessment includes numeracy and literacy tests conducted among the six-million so-called foundation phase and intermediate phase pupils attending government schools. According to the document, grade six results for language, based on a sample of results from selected schools, show that as few as 15% of pupils scored more than 50%.

Also making headlines:
Swaziland is too scared to slash civil servant wages to resolve an acute budget crunch, because of the fallout that could accrue to Africa's last absolute monarchy, Finance Minister Majozi Sithole said.
Sudan agreed to bring some former rebels into its army and the south played down a northern threat to shut oil pipelines crucial to getting its oil production to market, as the country's halves scramble to prepare for the south's looming secession.
And, debate over Cameroon President Paul Biya's eligibility in an October Presidential poll is stoking tensions in the central African State that could boil over into protests like those seen in 2008.

That’s a roundup of news making headlines today.