"West's scribes serving colonial edifice"

Diamonds and Apartheid
South Africa's racist colonial history left black people disenfranchised, landless and vulnerable, a situation that was exploited by mine owners after the discovery of diamonds. Each act and law passed in the interest of mine owners and white laborers sowed the seeds for apartheid. It could be said that the discovery of rough diamonds polished racism into apartheid.

Peace in Ivory Coast Signed in Tshwane, South Africa
With the mediation of South Africa´s President Thabo Mbeki, the warring factions in Ivory Coast have signed a peace agreement in Tshwane on Wednesday and agreed to hold elections in October.

All Africa Conference of Churches
Comments on Mugabe's Zimbabwe Election Win

Chief Can Cut Inmates Hair
She noted too that while some people believed they had a right to wear hair a certain way for religious purposes, they had to understand that the Constitution did not confer any absolute right on anyone. She said too it did not mean the superintendent would immediately set about cutting every prisoner's hair, since there were the reasonable grounds of public safety and security that had to be satisfied.

Hands Off!!
TOUCH THE HAIR of the Rastaman and face a class action suit!
Rastafarians yesterday condemned Parliament's amendment of the Prisons Act, giving the Superintendent of Prisons discretionary powers to cut the hair of any male inmate.

West's scribes serving colonial edifice
Like journalists, politicians communicate to influence, but this is on the understanding that they have integrity and are well disposed towards telling the truth. But, in the pursuit of power and influence, journalists can tell monstrous lies.

Global Fund grant to come through, finally
After a three-year delay, a US $10.3 million grant to Zimbabwe by the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria is "very close to signing", an official told IRIN on Monday.

Infrastructure development could stave-off food shortages
Rehabilitating irrigation schemes and major dams in Zimbabwe's arid Matabeleland South province could help ease its perennial food shortages, experts told IRIN this week

Horn of Africa's thorny dispute
THE growing probability of a military standoff between Eritrea and Ethiopia - witnessed by growing offensive military deployment in the temporary security zone - is likely to continue for as long as a political solution to the dispute between the neighbours is not found. This is the only real potential for all-out interstate conflict on the continent this year.

Booming SA-EU Trade Ties See Envoy Leaving in High Spirits
Much as government may wish to diversify the country's trade and economic contacts, the European Union (EU) is by far the largest trading and investment partner - and aid donor - to SA. About 30% of South African exports head for Europe, and SA receives around 40% of its imports from Europe. At the end of his tour of duty as EU ambassador to SA, Michael Lake returned to Brussels over the weekend upbeat about the relationship with Pretoria.

Critics Say Law Would Make Florida 'Wild, Wild West'
The House approved the proposed law that expands people's rights to use deadly force when they are attacked any place they have a right to be. The Senate already approved the bill that allows people to meet force with force. The bill would allow people in the street or someplace like a baseball game or bar to legally kill someone in cases of self-defense.

Ethiopia plans to expand Internet access

Bombing and looting Iraq's heritage
ONCE again the dictum which says that countries which have no history should not wage war in regions of the world with glorious histories has been proven true. Although the first Bush administration was warned by US scholars who had worked for decades in Iraq that a new war would damage the country's rich cultural heritage, George Bush and his minions went ahead with their project which involved invading the country with tens of thousands of troops, toppling the government, and installing an occupation regime.

They're Talking Up Arms
Military recruiters are fortifying their outposts at high schools, hoping a chummy familiarity will entice students to enlist. Some decry the tactics.

Is Washington planning a bloodbath in Caracas?
The US is targeting Chavez because of his role in encouraging the mass mobilisation of Venezuela's poor. However, killing Chavez would only be prelude to further intervention aimed at physically crushing the revolutionary masses. The death of Chavez, the leader of the revolution, could trigger the kind of confusion and chaos that Washington could use to justify military intervention — directly, through US allies in Colombia or through counter-revolutionary Venezuelans. This would almost certainly be accompanied by a violent campaign to exterminate the popular organisations and the revolutionary militants in the cities and countryside, just as was done in Chile in 1973 when the CIA-backed Pinochet dictatorship overthrew the democratically elected President Salvador Allende.

Study puts Oakland dropout rate at 52%
Mayor decries crisis -- district questions research accuracy