The Supreme Court of Appeal has dismissed an appeal by the Judicial Service Commission and the Judge President of the Western Cape High Court John Hlophe in regard to possible disciplinary hearings against Hlophe
The SCA held that the JSC was not properly constituted, nor did it act with the requisite majority, when it dismissed a complaint lodged by Justices of the Constitutional Court against Hlophe. The proceedings of the JSC and its decision were declared unconstitutional and set aside.
The Justices complained that Hlophe had improperly sought to influence two of them in a case involving President Jacob Zuma before he became president. The SCA also held that in terms of the Constitution, the Premier of the Western Cape Helen Zille, was entitled to be present when the complaint was considered by the JSC.
Zille had brought the application in the High Court against the acting chairperson of the JSC, the JSC itself, past and present Justices of the Constitutional Court and the Judge President of the Western Cape. She did not ask for any relief against the Justices, who were cited because of the interest they might have in the application.
During the appeal hearing in the SCA, the JSC submitted that the decisions taken should not be set aside because of considerations of pragmatism and practicality. However, in a unanimous judgment, five appeal court judges held that it would be a sorry day for the country’s constitutional democracy if serious allegations of judicial misconduct were swept under the carpet for such reasons. The JSC was also criticised for its initial refusal to disclose how many people had voted for and against a resolution to drop an investigation into the alleged misconduct charges against Hlophe.
Hlophe had argued in the SCA that setting aside the decisions of the JSC would be an exercise in futility because Zille had disqualified herself from sitting on the JSC because of bias. The SCA rejected the argument. The Bloemfontein court found that the JSC had not performed its constitutional mandate to consider and make findings on whether there was judicial misconduct on the part of Hlophe.
The SCA judgment found it necessary that the findings of the JSC be set aside to enable it to perform the function which it was still obliged to perform under the Constitution.
The appeal by the JSC and Hlophe was dismissed and they were ordered to pay Zille’s legal costs.
Source: The Sowetan
Thursday, March 31, 2011
Wednesday, March 30, 2011
MEC promises an end to potholes
More than 60 roads with potholes roads in Limpopo are expected to be repaired by the end of this week. Tabling her department's 2011/2012 budget in Lebowakgomo this week, Roads and Transport MEC Pinky Kekana said the projects were part of the department's drive to maintain roads and create jobs for the unemployed.
"The department will spend R60-million on more than 60 pothole projects in all districts. These projects will be completed at the end of this week," said Kekana.
Kekana said the department would spend an additional R200-million on 11 projects aimed at repairing potholes and routinely maintaining roads in the 2011/12 financial year.
"As the responsible authority on secondary and gravel roads, our role will steadily move away from the current practice of reactionary maintenance on repairing potholes to preventative maintenance so as to keep the roads in good condition so that potholes do not develop," she said.
She said it was common sense that preventative maintenance was way cheaper than reactive maintenance.
In preventative maintenance of roads, money is spent on pothole repairs instead of spending it on accidents that could have been prevented through good maintenance of roads.
"It is our collective view that when potholes do occur, they must be properly repaired," Kekana said.
Kekana said the department would spend R452-million on 32 other preventative maintenance projects that have been identified in the province.
She said that an amount of R250-million had also been set aside for infrastructure improvement, including the construction of pedestrian bridges, walkways and an interchange in Botlokwa outside Polokwane.
She said after discussions with the South African National Roads Agency, the department would award the infrastructure contract in June 2011.
"The people of Botlokwa will finally say government has listened to us. We cannot shy away from acknowledging that on a daily basis pedestrians in particular were dicing and risking with their own lives having to cross a busy freeway,” she said.
“We can safely say that when the yellow machines start arriving, that will be the beginning of improved safety for the people of Botlokwa."
Kekana added that the department would complete two bridges that go over the Olifants River. The bridges include Mankele and a bridge between Maredi and Senyatho in the Sekhukhune area, both of which will cost R46-million and R47-million respectively.
"It is with great joy that the pain endured by the people of Mankele and others, of having to cross the Olifants River under very horrendous and risky conditions, is finally coming to an end," she said.
Kekana added that the bridge R24-million between Sibasa, Khalavha, Fondwe, Nzhelele and Musekwaspoort outside Thohoyandou was also near completion.
Source: Polity
"The department will spend R60-million on more than 60 pothole projects in all districts. These projects will be completed at the end of this week," said Kekana.
Kekana said the department would spend an additional R200-million on 11 projects aimed at repairing potholes and routinely maintaining roads in the 2011/12 financial year.
"As the responsible authority on secondary and gravel roads, our role will steadily move away from the current practice of reactionary maintenance on repairing potholes to preventative maintenance so as to keep the roads in good condition so that potholes do not develop," she said.
She said it was common sense that preventative maintenance was way cheaper than reactive maintenance.
In preventative maintenance of roads, money is spent on pothole repairs instead of spending it on accidents that could have been prevented through good maintenance of roads.
"It is our collective view that when potholes do occur, they must be properly repaired," Kekana said.
Kekana said the department would spend R452-million on 32 other preventative maintenance projects that have been identified in the province.
She said that an amount of R250-million had also been set aside for infrastructure improvement, including the construction of pedestrian bridges, walkways and an interchange in Botlokwa outside Polokwane.
She said after discussions with the South African National Roads Agency, the department would award the infrastructure contract in June 2011.
"The people of Botlokwa will finally say government has listened to us. We cannot shy away from acknowledging that on a daily basis pedestrians in particular were dicing and risking with their own lives having to cross a busy freeway,” she said.
“We can safely say that when the yellow machines start arriving, that will be the beginning of improved safety for the people of Botlokwa."
Kekana added that the department would complete two bridges that go over the Olifants River. The bridges include Mankele and a bridge between Maredi and Senyatho in the Sekhukhune area, both of which will cost R46-million and R47-million respectively.
"It is with great joy that the pain endured by the people of Mankele and others, of having to cross the Olifants River under very horrendous and risky conditions, is finally coming to an end," she said.
Kekana added that the bridge R24-million between Sibasa, Khalavha, Fondwe, Nzhelele and Musekwaspoort outside Thohoyandou was also near completion.
Source: Polity
Saturday, March 26, 2011
Passivity over corruption imperils our constitution
Mamhela Ramphele: The level of corruption and mismanagement in public life reflect a dangerous tendency towards a culture of impunity.
The recent launch by the Council for the Advancement of the South African Constitution (Casac), of a campaign for an independent anti-corruption agency, is an invitation to SA citizens to commit to halting this dangerous tendency. Appropriately, the campaign began the week before the celebration of Human Rights Day. A culture of impunity for those abusing power and profiting from corruption is the antithesis of conditions that promote human rights. Various commentators suggest that South Africa is only following the usual post-colonial trajectory of former liberators abusing their power to enrich themselves and those close to them.
There are unfortunately enough examples of corruption, nepotism and mismanagement of public resources to support this view. The auditor-general, the Independent Complaints Directorate of the SA Police and the launch of a civil service anti-corruption unit by the Department of Public Service and Administration, all point to ineffective mechanisms for the enforcement of accountability. But there is nothing inevitable about this slide into impunity. The independent mechanisms to promote integrity and strengthen our democracy are alive and well.
The public protector's recent fearless report about wrongdoing in the procurement of premises for police headquarters by the commissioner of police is a case in point. The Constitutional Court ruling that the Hawks were not independent enough - in terms of constitution requirements - to investigate wrongdoing without fear or favour to promote integrity in public service, is another.
The case for an independent anti-corruption agency is a strong one. The proposed agency would have a triple mandate: public education; enforcement and prevention. The success of this agency would depend on the level of accountability to both parliament and civil society; the independence of the directorate and board appointed through a transparent public participation process; and adequate resources to discharge its mandate.
The culture of impunity is made possible by passive, uninformed citizens who tend to regard corrupt practices as normal to the business of governance. This tolerance is based on their experiences under non-democratic rule, and a sense of loyalty to those in power. This loyalty is fuelled by disinformation by some of those in power, that reporting wrongdoing is a betrayal of those who sacrificed for our freedom. Citizens are also made to believe that wrongdoing is necessary to right the wrongs of the apartheid past.
Enforcement is also severely constrained by public officials placing loyalty to their comrades above defending the constitution. Take the case of Bosasa, the service provider of the Department of Correctional Services, which was investigated by the Special Investigating Unit. Taxpayers have every right to demand that the recommendations of the 2009 comprehensive report into the procurement of these services, be followed.
Our disengaged attitude as citizens and taxpayers promotes this culture of a lack of accountability, which fuels impunity. Prevention requires the promotion of a culture aligned to the values of our constitution, which insists on equality before the law, respect for human dignity and the progressive realisation of socioeconomic rights. These values are violated every day by public servants who abuse national resources which are supposed to address the basic needs of the poor. Even more disconcerting is the failure of political leaders and those in authority to establish cultures in every tier of government to promote our founding values.
Seen from all perspectives then, I come to the unfortunate conclusion that the culture of impunity is fuelled by the sense of entitlement of those in power, who seem to believe society owes them a debt of gratitude for the freedom we enjoy. This conclusion is supported by the series of public scandals for which no one has been held accountable.
First, the arms deal continues to fester, despite evidence that, at the very least, a judicial commission of inquiry needs to investigate this matter. Second, the Travelgate scandal saw those involved in defrauding the taxpayer simply being slapped on the wrist. The abuse of travel allowances occurred in a parliament in which MPs are well looked after in terms of salaries and benefits. Third, the open fronting by the ANC of black economic empowerment under the aegis of Chancellor House violates a central pillar of the constitution: equality under the law.
The ANC, at its landmark 2007 Polokwane conference, resolved to promote greater transparency in the funding of political parties. But the voices within the ANC supporting the unwinding of the deals involved, including the lucrative Hitachi deal to build a boiler at Eskom's Medupi Power Plant, have been silenced. No progress has been made - as was admitted by the chairman of the ANC Ethics Committee, Professor Ben Turok.
Fronting in businesses involving state-owned enterprises such as Eskom, gives the ruling party an unfair advantage over opposition parties. This is a serious threat to democracy. Opposition parties have little chance of competing with an incumbent party that has deep pockets courtesy of the South African taxpayer. Undermining political competition erodes the very foundations of our multiparty democracy. In addition, the participation of the governing party in fronting BEE deals undermines its capacity to regulate and hold other fronting entities and persons accountable.
Good governance is seriously undermined by the failure to demonstrate intolerance for corruption. It lays the foundations for impunity - and corruption in the private sector cannot be addressed adequately by a government which is compromised by being seen to be involved in questionable deals. Nor can the work of transforming the inherently corrupt apartheid culture be accomplished by a government which has been compromised.
South African citizens have a responsibility to acknowledge this elephant in the room and deal with it before it harms our democracy irreparably. Let us campaign for the independent anti-corruption agency - as proposed by the Council for the Advancement of the South African Constitution. It will give South Africans the platform from which to educate themselves, enforce the law and prevent corruption in their midst. We dare not fail future generations.
Source: Times Live
The recent launch by the Council for the Advancement of the South African Constitution (Casac), of a campaign for an independent anti-corruption agency, is an invitation to SA citizens to commit to halting this dangerous tendency. Appropriately, the campaign began the week before the celebration of Human Rights Day. A culture of impunity for those abusing power and profiting from corruption is the antithesis of conditions that promote human rights. Various commentators suggest that South Africa is only following the usual post-colonial trajectory of former liberators abusing their power to enrich themselves and those close to them.
There are unfortunately enough examples of corruption, nepotism and mismanagement of public resources to support this view. The auditor-general, the Independent Complaints Directorate of the SA Police and the launch of a civil service anti-corruption unit by the Department of Public Service and Administration, all point to ineffective mechanisms for the enforcement of accountability. But there is nothing inevitable about this slide into impunity. The independent mechanisms to promote integrity and strengthen our democracy are alive and well.
The public protector's recent fearless report about wrongdoing in the procurement of premises for police headquarters by the commissioner of police is a case in point. The Constitutional Court ruling that the Hawks were not independent enough - in terms of constitution requirements - to investigate wrongdoing without fear or favour to promote integrity in public service, is another.
The case for an independent anti-corruption agency is a strong one. The proposed agency would have a triple mandate: public education; enforcement and prevention. The success of this agency would depend on the level of accountability to both parliament and civil society; the independence of the directorate and board appointed through a transparent public participation process; and adequate resources to discharge its mandate.
The culture of impunity is made possible by passive, uninformed citizens who tend to regard corrupt practices as normal to the business of governance. This tolerance is based on their experiences under non-democratic rule, and a sense of loyalty to those in power. This loyalty is fuelled by disinformation by some of those in power, that reporting wrongdoing is a betrayal of those who sacrificed for our freedom. Citizens are also made to believe that wrongdoing is necessary to right the wrongs of the apartheid past.
Enforcement is also severely constrained by public officials placing loyalty to their comrades above defending the constitution. Take the case of Bosasa, the service provider of the Department of Correctional Services, which was investigated by the Special Investigating Unit. Taxpayers have every right to demand that the recommendations of the 2009 comprehensive report into the procurement of these services, be followed.
Our disengaged attitude as citizens and taxpayers promotes this culture of a lack of accountability, which fuels impunity. Prevention requires the promotion of a culture aligned to the values of our constitution, which insists on equality before the law, respect for human dignity and the progressive realisation of socioeconomic rights. These values are violated every day by public servants who abuse national resources which are supposed to address the basic needs of the poor. Even more disconcerting is the failure of political leaders and those in authority to establish cultures in every tier of government to promote our founding values.
Seen from all perspectives then, I come to the unfortunate conclusion that the culture of impunity is fuelled by the sense of entitlement of those in power, who seem to believe society owes them a debt of gratitude for the freedom we enjoy. This conclusion is supported by the series of public scandals for which no one has been held accountable.
First, the arms deal continues to fester, despite evidence that, at the very least, a judicial commission of inquiry needs to investigate this matter. Second, the Travelgate scandal saw those involved in defrauding the taxpayer simply being slapped on the wrist. The abuse of travel allowances occurred in a parliament in which MPs are well looked after in terms of salaries and benefits. Third, the open fronting by the ANC of black economic empowerment under the aegis of Chancellor House violates a central pillar of the constitution: equality under the law.
The ANC, at its landmark 2007 Polokwane conference, resolved to promote greater transparency in the funding of political parties. But the voices within the ANC supporting the unwinding of the deals involved, including the lucrative Hitachi deal to build a boiler at Eskom's Medupi Power Plant, have been silenced. No progress has been made - as was admitted by the chairman of the ANC Ethics Committee, Professor Ben Turok.
Fronting in businesses involving state-owned enterprises such as Eskom, gives the ruling party an unfair advantage over opposition parties. This is a serious threat to democracy. Opposition parties have little chance of competing with an incumbent party that has deep pockets courtesy of the South African taxpayer. Undermining political competition erodes the very foundations of our multiparty democracy. In addition, the participation of the governing party in fronting BEE deals undermines its capacity to regulate and hold other fronting entities and persons accountable.
Good governance is seriously undermined by the failure to demonstrate intolerance for corruption. It lays the foundations for impunity - and corruption in the private sector cannot be addressed adequately by a government which is compromised by being seen to be involved in questionable deals. Nor can the work of transforming the inherently corrupt apartheid culture be accomplished by a government which has been compromised.
South African citizens have a responsibility to acknowledge this elephant in the room and deal with it before it harms our democracy irreparably. Let us campaign for the independent anti-corruption agency - as proposed by the Council for the Advancement of the South African Constitution. It will give South Africans the platform from which to educate themselves, enforce the law and prevent corruption in their midst. We dare not fail future generations.
Source: Times Live
Friday, March 25, 2011
Jailed Radovan Krejcir reaches a deal with the Hawks
Krejcir is now behind bars in a secret location. He had been on the run since Tuesday night when a Hawks raid found a hit list containing the name of Cyril Beeka, who was killed on Monday in Cape Town. The list also included security consultant Paul O’Sullivan, a doctor and state prosecutor.
One of Krejcir’s attorney’s Eddie Claasen said everything went according to plan when Krejcir presented himself to police. “What was intended was that Mr. Krejcir can be handed over to the police and avoid the media frenzy that previously took place at the raided Mr. Krejcir’s home,” he said.
Meanwhile, O’Sullivan, who has been investigating Krejcir, said his detention does not mean people on the Czech fugitive’s hit list are now safe. He said those on the list should still take precautions, “This is a man who was able to arrange murders in the Czech Republic while he was in prison. He was arranging murders in the Czech Republic while he was in the Seychelles.”
The Hawks’ McIntosh Polela said Krejcir is now in a secret location, “He was detained in the early hours of the morning and we are still making provisions for when he is likely to appear in court.” Krejcir had been due to hand himself over on Thursday morning.
Source: Eye Witness News
Protector agrees to probe alleged arms sales to Libya
Public Protector Thuli Madonsela agreed this week to a request by Democratic Alliance MP David Maynier to investigate allegations that South Africa sold more than 100 sniper rifles and 50 000 rounds of ammunition to Libya in late 2010.
Maynier told the Mail & Guardian he believes that the investigation could establish whether the alleged sale, brought to his attention by reliable sources, was illegal. Madonsela informed Maynier on Thursday her office would commence with a "preliminary investigation".
Maynier was expelled from Parliament on Wednesday for asking Justice Minister Jeff Radebe, chairperson of the National Conventional Arms Control Committee (NCACC), whether he had allowed the sale and, "if the answer is yes, will the honourable minister tell this House what it feels like to have blood on his hands?"
An irate ANC raised a point of order that "talk of blood on hands was unparliamentary and out of order".
In November Maynier was ejected from the House after telling Defence Minister Lindiwe Sisulu that she was telling Parliament a "big political fib" after she refused to make available to MPs reports on conditions in the military. While the sale of the arms would have taken place before a United Nations arms embargo on Libya, Maynier said he did not believe it would have complied with the provisions of South Africa's legislation, which sets a high human rights standard. "There have been multiple reports that security forces used sniper rifles to fire on protesters in Libya," he told the M&G. "The company alleged to have exported the sniper rifles and ammunition not only lists Libya as a target market in Africa, but also exhibited sniper rifles at an arms fair in Libya in 2008. We understand that the export of sniper rifles and ammunition was authorised by the NCACC."
Maynier said that parliamentary oversight of conventional arms exports had "effectively collapsed". The NCACC quarterly reports had not been distributed to members of the portfolio committee on defence and military veterans or the joint standing committee on defence. "The NCACC last appeared before the portfolio committee on defence and military veterans on September 2 2009," he said. "Radebe should appear before the portfolio committee on defence and military veterans as soon as possible to properly account to Parliament. We have to get to the bottom of whether these sniper rifles and ammunition, or indeed any other weapons, were sold to Libya."
In February Radebe confirmed that the NCACC had "duly authorised arms trade between South African companies operating in defence-related industry and the Republic of Libya". However, he said in a press release that at the time the transaction was concluded with Libya, there was no evidence that there would be any political unrest in the country. "Some in the media or through the use of the media as a platform have been quick to conclude that the deaths that have been reported in Libya during the period of political unrest have a direct link with the arms sold by the South African companies to Libya," Radebe said. "There is no evidence to back up such a claim."
Radebe said that the transactions were authorised and complied with the guiding principles and criteria set out in the law regarding the conventional arms trade. However, the details of the transactions could not be provided because of confidentiality clauses in the contracts with Libya. In his letter to Madonsela, Maynier asked that she establish who signed the transaction. "I suspect that inter alia, given the human rights standard, obligation to avoid contributing to terrorism and crime and the end-user certificate reliability criteria, that the decision to authorise the transaction did not comply with guiding principles and criteria set out in the law regulating conventional arms sales in South Africa," he wrote.
Maynier also asked the protector to look at whether information concerning conventional arms sales could be lawfully withheld from the public, given the alleged "confidentiality clauses" in the contracts with Libya.
Source: Mail & Guardian
Maynier told the Mail & Guardian he believes that the investigation could establish whether the alleged sale, brought to his attention by reliable sources, was illegal. Madonsela informed Maynier on Thursday her office would commence with a "preliminary investigation".
Maynier was expelled from Parliament on Wednesday for asking Justice Minister Jeff Radebe, chairperson of the National Conventional Arms Control Committee (NCACC), whether he had allowed the sale and, "if the answer is yes, will the honourable minister tell this House what it feels like to have blood on his hands?"
An irate ANC raised a point of order that "talk of blood on hands was unparliamentary and out of order".
In November Maynier was ejected from the House after telling Defence Minister Lindiwe Sisulu that she was telling Parliament a "big political fib" after she refused to make available to MPs reports on conditions in the military. While the sale of the arms would have taken place before a United Nations arms embargo on Libya, Maynier said he did not believe it would have complied with the provisions of South Africa's legislation, which sets a high human rights standard. "There have been multiple reports that security forces used sniper rifles to fire on protesters in Libya," he told the M&G. "The company alleged to have exported the sniper rifles and ammunition not only lists Libya as a target market in Africa, but also exhibited sniper rifles at an arms fair in Libya in 2008. We understand that the export of sniper rifles and ammunition was authorised by the NCACC."
Maynier said that parliamentary oversight of conventional arms exports had "effectively collapsed". The NCACC quarterly reports had not been distributed to members of the portfolio committee on defence and military veterans or the joint standing committee on defence. "The NCACC last appeared before the portfolio committee on defence and military veterans on September 2 2009," he said. "Radebe should appear before the portfolio committee on defence and military veterans as soon as possible to properly account to Parliament. We have to get to the bottom of whether these sniper rifles and ammunition, or indeed any other weapons, were sold to Libya."
In February Radebe confirmed that the NCACC had "duly authorised arms trade between South African companies operating in defence-related industry and the Republic of Libya". However, he said in a press release that at the time the transaction was concluded with Libya, there was no evidence that there would be any political unrest in the country. "Some in the media or through the use of the media as a platform have been quick to conclude that the deaths that have been reported in Libya during the period of political unrest have a direct link with the arms sold by the South African companies to Libya," Radebe said. "There is no evidence to back up such a claim."
Radebe said that the transactions were authorised and complied with the guiding principles and criteria set out in the law regarding the conventional arms trade. However, the details of the transactions could not be provided because of confidentiality clauses in the contracts with Libya. In his letter to Madonsela, Maynier asked that she establish who signed the transaction. "I suspect that inter alia, given the human rights standard, obligation to avoid contributing to terrorism and crime and the end-user certificate reliability criteria, that the decision to authorise the transaction did not comply with guiding principles and criteria set out in the law regulating conventional arms sales in South Africa," he wrote.
Maynier also asked the protector to look at whether information concerning conventional arms sales could be lawfully withheld from the public, given the alleged "confidentiality clauses" in the contracts with Libya.
Source: Mail & Guardian
Wednesday, March 23, 2011
Magistrate halts cheeky exchange in Jub Jub trial
The magistrate in Molemo ‘Jub Jub’ Maarohanye’s murder trial was forced to call the state and defence to order after a cheeky exchange over legal ethics on Wednesday.
Maarohanye and Themba Tshabalala are facing murder and attempted murder charges in the Protea Magistrate’s Court. They are accused of crashing their cars into a group of Soweto school children in March 2010 in an alleged drag racing accident.
Four pupils were killed and two others were injured.
On Wednesday 18-year-old state witness Portia Mafika took to the stand to testify.
She told the court how her friends became excited when they saw that Maarohanye was driving one of the cars. She added that another girl used her cellphone to take a video of the two drivers racing.
Mafika said she initially saw the cars standing stationary in the middle of Mdlalose Road and noticed Maarohanye speaking to a passenger in the other vehicle. She said their heads and arms were poking through the window.
The teen, who appeared tense when she first took the stand, underwent several hours of intense questioning.
Maarohanye’s attorney Ike Motloung then asked Mafika to demonstrate how her friend took a video of the two drivers racing. When she responded, state prosecutor Raymond Mathenjwa interjected.
That prompted a confident Motloung to call Mathenjwa mischievous for trying to stop the witness from answering certain questions. Mathenjwa then brought the issue of ethics and professionalism into the argument.
However, when the exchange started getting personal, the magistrate intervened and told them to behave in a manner that would ensure justice was served.
Source: Eye Witness News
Maarohanye and Themba Tshabalala are facing murder and attempted murder charges in the Protea Magistrate’s Court. They are accused of crashing their cars into a group of Soweto school children in March 2010 in an alleged drag racing accident.
Four pupils were killed and two others were injured.
On Wednesday 18-year-old state witness Portia Mafika took to the stand to testify.
She told the court how her friends became excited when they saw that Maarohanye was driving one of the cars. She added that another girl used her cellphone to take a video of the two drivers racing.
Mafika said she initially saw the cars standing stationary in the middle of Mdlalose Road and noticed Maarohanye speaking to a passenger in the other vehicle. She said their heads and arms were poking through the window.
The teen, who appeared tense when she first took the stand, underwent several hours of intense questioning.
Maarohanye’s attorney Ike Motloung then asked Mafika to demonstrate how her friend took a video of the two drivers racing. When she responded, state prosecutor Raymond Mathenjwa interjected.
That prompted a confident Motloung to call Mathenjwa mischievous for trying to stop the witness from answering certain questions. Mathenjwa then brought the issue of ethics and professionalism into the argument.
However, when the exchange started getting personal, the magistrate intervened and told them to behave in a manner that would ensure justice was served.
Source: Eye Witness News
Tuesday, March 22, 2011
Rest in silence, Syd Kitchen, the legend
Old men with grey ponytails, who speak of Joni Mitchell and Emmylou Harris in reverential tones, who know all the lyrics to “The Times They Are a-Changin” and see it’s as relevant today as it was in 1963 – they know who Syd Kitchen was. The rest of you, read on in wonder.
For a fair number of South African music fans, the enduring memory of Syd Kitchen, who died in Durban from lung cancer on Tuesday, will be his performances at Splashy Fen each year since that music festival first surfaced in 1990.
For me, it’s of Syd and his brother Pete, along with whichever other musicians happened to make it out to Umhlanga Rocks, playing folk music in our lounge, a reel-to-reel recorder turning in the centre of the room.
Back-dropped by a wall of albums collected by my music journalist dad, Owen Coetzer, and surrounded by the low-slung, dark wood furniture of the era, Syd and Pete would perform the material that had earned them a reputation as songwriters to be envied, even at a time (the early 70s) when pretty terrific singer-songwriters spilled out of Durban and other cities at a steady rate.
If this sounds like a snapshot out of hippiedom, it was. At least sort of.
Although my mother kept a firm handle on our home in the way of the teacher she was, my kaftan-top wearing, cigarette-smoking, furiously typing father brought a no-rules energy to the house. He chased deadlines. He played the sitar. He started a music supplement at the newspaper for which he worked. He frequently piled us in the car to see what ships were in the harbour. And he helped run the Durban Folk Club.
It was through this that my sister Catherine and I first encountered Syd, Pete and a whole bunch of other musicians who performed as part of the club. With regularity, my dad would drag us off to watch the Kitchen brothers, Jannie Hofmeyr and John Oakley-Smith when our friends were mucking around riding bikes in the street – and very soon, I was smitten with folk music at the ripe old age of about eight.
It’s been an unceasing love affair that remained undimmed through my teenage pop years of Abba, the Bay City Rollers, Rabbitt and the Bee Gees - and it’s why, nowadays, I can’t go too many days without listening to “Bright Eyes” and why we named our youngest child, Emmylou. For this, I mostly blame Syd.
To a child, he was a fascinating creature: His hair was long, he sometimes struggled to talk through a stutter, he wore outlandish clothes and, even for children used to being around musicians, Syd seemed to us to carry with him something magical.
The way he worked his way around a guitar – later becoming a noted teacher and musicologist – seemed unlike anyone else, and we didn’t need much persuading to keep the noise down when my dad hit record on the reel-to-reel.
More than that though, Syd stood out as a maverick – not just in his music (that would come later when he left the confines of pure folk) but in living. We hardly knew the word then, but it was clear, as Syd would come sweeping into our house, trailing guitars and more, that he would never be like the men whose children we went to school with.
In the 40 or so years that have passed since that time, Syd proved us right – living a life outside of society’s expectations, at times perilously, but never, it seemed to me, without the utmost devotion to what he saw as his particular path.
It wasn’t easy. Syd was frequently cash-strapped and he’d tell you this, in the forthright way he had. He did feel the frustrations of having to fight for his space in a music industry ill-equipped to deal with defiantly individual talents. The consequence of this was a remarkable 40-year music career, filled with live gigs, songwriting, and albums, that simply never benefited from the mainstream business – not just the labels that never signed him, but retail outlets that never stocked his records and radio that never played his songs.
I don’t think it’s something that would have worried Syd, but I looked for a statement from department of arts and culture minister, Paul Mashatile, on the department’s website this morning and came up empty. For a department who has played the cultural preservation card heavily (though admittedly Mashatile has yet to reveal his hand), Syd’s post-folk music embodies everything the DAC says it wants. His acclaimed work with Madala Kunene, for instance, drew deeply on the traditions of both players – Syd with his English grandfather and Madala’s Zulu roots. Syd’s lyrics, on songs like “Africa’s Not For Sissies” and others spoke, with love, of what it means to live on this continent of extremes. Syd even came up with a description for his mix of folk and African music (sometimes tinged with blues or jazz or rock): Afro-Saxon. And, looking at the artists who’ve emerged from under his wing in KwaZulu-Natal especially, it’s easy to see where Syd’s musical legacy will reside, outside of his recordings and songs. Even so it’s hard to imagine the music industry recognising this with a Lifetime Achievement award at any South African Music Awards in the coming years.
Through it all, the personal ups and downs, the musical creation and struggles, Syd displayed a rare loyalty in an industry where expedience often gains the upper hand. In spite of his diagnosis with stage 4 lung cancer a scant few months ago, he signed up to play this year’s Splashy Fen in April, not wanting to miss out on delivering, what for many, had become the festival’s heart.
I last saw Syd play live at Splashy last year. He emerged onto the stage, long hair shorn, guitar in hand and, like a mystical man opening a treasure box, proceeded to work his way through his songs – the intense folk numbers I’ve always loved, the Afro-Saxon cuts and the quirky songs (the live festival standard, “Wash Your Socks”). Syd’s set was followed by Jack Parow – a starker contrast you could hardly have asked for.
In an email a few weeks back, Syd wrote, with more beauty than I have ever read, about watching a body retreat from life as an unstoppable disease moves through it. “But I’ve had a remarkable life, traversing a territory of creative endeavour with no support from the music industry, and I am proud of that legacy,” he said. To secure his legacy, Syd managed to set up the Syd Kitchen Trust to house his music and writings before he died. In time, like the young child I was when I first knew it, the country may come to see this collection as one of its national treasures.
Source: Daily Maverick
For a fair number of South African music fans, the enduring memory of Syd Kitchen, who died in Durban from lung cancer on Tuesday, will be his performances at Splashy Fen each year since that music festival first surfaced in 1990.
For me, it’s of Syd and his brother Pete, along with whichever other musicians happened to make it out to Umhlanga Rocks, playing folk music in our lounge, a reel-to-reel recorder turning in the centre of the room.
Back-dropped by a wall of albums collected by my music journalist dad, Owen Coetzer, and surrounded by the low-slung, dark wood furniture of the era, Syd and Pete would perform the material that had earned them a reputation as songwriters to be envied, even at a time (the early 70s) when pretty terrific singer-songwriters spilled out of Durban and other cities at a steady rate.
If this sounds like a snapshot out of hippiedom, it was. At least sort of.
Although my mother kept a firm handle on our home in the way of the teacher she was, my kaftan-top wearing, cigarette-smoking, furiously typing father brought a no-rules energy to the house. He chased deadlines. He played the sitar. He started a music supplement at the newspaper for which he worked. He frequently piled us in the car to see what ships were in the harbour. And he helped run the Durban Folk Club.
It was through this that my sister Catherine and I first encountered Syd, Pete and a whole bunch of other musicians who performed as part of the club. With regularity, my dad would drag us off to watch the Kitchen brothers, Jannie Hofmeyr and John Oakley-Smith when our friends were mucking around riding bikes in the street – and very soon, I was smitten with folk music at the ripe old age of about eight.
It’s been an unceasing love affair that remained undimmed through my teenage pop years of Abba, the Bay City Rollers, Rabbitt and the Bee Gees - and it’s why, nowadays, I can’t go too many days without listening to “Bright Eyes” and why we named our youngest child, Emmylou. For this, I mostly blame Syd.
To a child, he was a fascinating creature: His hair was long, he sometimes struggled to talk through a stutter, he wore outlandish clothes and, even for children used to being around musicians, Syd seemed to us to carry with him something magical.
The way he worked his way around a guitar – later becoming a noted teacher and musicologist – seemed unlike anyone else, and we didn’t need much persuading to keep the noise down when my dad hit record on the reel-to-reel.
More than that though, Syd stood out as a maverick – not just in his music (that would come later when he left the confines of pure folk) but in living. We hardly knew the word then, but it was clear, as Syd would come sweeping into our house, trailing guitars and more, that he would never be like the men whose children we went to school with.
In the 40 or so years that have passed since that time, Syd proved us right – living a life outside of society’s expectations, at times perilously, but never, it seemed to me, without the utmost devotion to what he saw as his particular path.
It wasn’t easy. Syd was frequently cash-strapped and he’d tell you this, in the forthright way he had. He did feel the frustrations of having to fight for his space in a music industry ill-equipped to deal with defiantly individual talents. The consequence of this was a remarkable 40-year music career, filled with live gigs, songwriting, and albums, that simply never benefited from the mainstream business – not just the labels that never signed him, but retail outlets that never stocked his records and radio that never played his songs.
I don’t think it’s something that would have worried Syd, but I looked for a statement from department of arts and culture minister, Paul Mashatile, on the department’s website this morning and came up empty. For a department who has played the cultural preservation card heavily (though admittedly Mashatile has yet to reveal his hand), Syd’s post-folk music embodies everything the DAC says it wants. His acclaimed work with Madala Kunene, for instance, drew deeply on the traditions of both players – Syd with his English grandfather and Madala’s Zulu roots. Syd’s lyrics, on songs like “Africa’s Not For Sissies” and others spoke, with love, of what it means to live on this continent of extremes. Syd even came up with a description for his mix of folk and African music (sometimes tinged with blues or jazz or rock): Afro-Saxon. And, looking at the artists who’ve emerged from under his wing in KwaZulu-Natal especially, it’s easy to see where Syd’s musical legacy will reside, outside of his recordings and songs. Even so it’s hard to imagine the music industry recognising this with a Lifetime Achievement award at any South African Music Awards in the coming years.
Through it all, the personal ups and downs, the musical creation and struggles, Syd displayed a rare loyalty in an industry where expedience often gains the upper hand. In spite of his diagnosis with stage 4 lung cancer a scant few months ago, he signed up to play this year’s Splashy Fen in April, not wanting to miss out on delivering, what for many, had become the festival’s heart.
I last saw Syd play live at Splashy last year. He emerged onto the stage, long hair shorn, guitar in hand and, like a mystical man opening a treasure box, proceeded to work his way through his songs – the intense folk numbers I’ve always loved, the Afro-Saxon cuts and the quirky songs (the live festival standard, “Wash Your Socks”). Syd’s set was followed by Jack Parow – a starker contrast you could hardly have asked for.
In an email a few weeks back, Syd wrote, with more beauty than I have ever read, about watching a body retreat from life as an unstoppable disease moves through it. “But I’ve had a remarkable life, traversing a territory of creative endeavour with no support from the music industry, and I am proud of that legacy,” he said. To secure his legacy, Syd managed to set up the Syd Kitchen Trust to house his music and writings before he died. In time, like the young child I was when I first knew it, the country may come to see this collection as one of its national treasures.
Source: Daily Maverick
Monday, March 21, 2011
AU opposes foreign military intervention in Libya
Libya - The ad-hoc High-Level African Union Panel on Libya has said it opposes any foreign military intervention in Libya.
According to media reports on Saturday, Mauritanian President Ould Abdel Aziz said that the situation in the north African country demands urgent action so an African solution can be found to the very serious crisis.
Aziz said the solution to the Libya crisis must take into account "our desire that Libya's unity and territorial integrity be respected as well as the rejection of any kind of foreign military intervention".
The AU panel on the Libya crisis, which was formed a week ago, comprises Mauritanian President Ould Abdel Aziz, South African President Jacob Zuma, Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni, President of the Republic of Congo Denis Sassou Nguesso and Malian President Amadou Toumani Toure.
The AU said the ad hoc committee was set up to engage with all parties in Libya, facilitate in an inclusive dialogue among them, and engage AU parties for the speedy resolution of the crisis in Libya. This comes as France, the United States and Britain said on Saturday that they had conducted air strikes on Libyan targets. French warplanes carried out four air strikes in Libya, destroying several armoured vehicles believed to belong to government troops, while the United States launched Tomahawk missile attacks against the Libyan air defense from warships deployed in the Mediterranean on Saturday.
The US Navy has three submarines outfitted with Tomahawk missiles in the Mediterranean, as well as two guided-missile destroyers, and two amphibious warships, and a command-and-control ship, according to officials who spoke on condition of anonymity. The military also has five surveillance planes in the area. US Pentagon officials said earlier they intended to limit the military's involvement in Libya mainly to help and protect foreign aircraft flying into Libyan air space.
The Norwegian Air Force has also been ordered to have six F16 jet fighters and over 100 pilots and other personnel ready for military operations in Libya. The warplanes are expected be based in Sicily, Italy.
The air strikes came after the UN Security Council on Thursday adopted a resolution to authorize a no-fly zone over Libya and called for "all necessary measures," excluding troops on the ground, to protect civilians under threat of attack in the North African country.
Major decision-makers from the United Nations, the United States, Germany, Britain and other western countries, as well as several leaders from Arab world met at a summit in Paris on Saturday. In a statement issued after the meeting, the leaders agreed that Colonel Muammar Gaddafi had defied the ceasefire call in spite of warnings of military intervention, and said they were determined to "act coordinately and resolutely" to enforce the UN resolution.
British Prime Minister David Cameron said after the summit that the time had come for action in Libya.
"What is absolutely clear ... is that Colonel Gaddafi has broken his word, has broken the ceasefire and continues to slaughter his own civilians. This has to stop. We have to make it stop. We have to make him face the consequences. So I think it is vitally important that action takes place, that action takes place urgently," Cameron said.
Gaddafi has meanwhile warned against "interference" in Libyan issues in letters sent to western leaders and the UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon. At a news conference in the capital, Tripoli, a government spokesperson read letters from the Libyan leader to French President Nicolas Sarkozy, British Prime Minister David Cameron, and the UN Secretary General that "Libya is not yours. Libya is for the Libyans. The Security Council resolution is invalid." He further said that "this is injustice... you will regret it if you take a step towards interfering in our internal affairs."
In his letter to Obama, Gaddafi said, "If you had found them taking over American cities with armed force, tell me what you would do. I have all the Libyan people supporting me and they are prepared to die for me," he said. He also said that he was "facing al-Qaeda here".
Friday, March 18, 2011
Libya: UN backs action against Colonel Gaddafi
The UN Security Council has backed a no-fly zone over Libya and "all necessary measures" to protect civilians short of an occupation.
It was not immediately clear what form intervention would take and when it would begin, though France signalled that action could start soon.
The resolution appears to give legal weight to attacks against Col Muammar Gaddafi's ground forces.
Col Gaddafi's forces have recently retaken several towns seized by rebels.
Rebel forces reacted with joy to the UN resolution in their Benghazi stronghold, but a government spokesman condemned UN "aggression".
Loyalist forces are bearing down on Benghazi, home to a million people.
'Threatens unity'
"Strikes will take place rapidly," French government spokesman Francois Baroin said on Friday morning. But he added: "You will understand that there's no question of talking as early as this morning about when, how, which targets or in which form."
It is not thought that the US would be involved in the first strikes. The British and French, along with some Arab allies, are expected to play a leading role. Norway has said it will also participate.
BBC diplomatic correspondent Jonathan Marcus says signals from Paris suggest that air operations could be imminent, but this may be an attempt to keep Col Gaddafi guessing.
US officials said an attempt to ground Col Gaddafi's air force could begin on Sunday or Monday.
The UK, France and Lebanon proposed Security Council Resolution 1973, with US support.
In New York, the 15-member Security Council voted 10-0 in favour, with five abstentions.
Russia and China - which often oppose the use of force against a sovereign country as they believe it sets a dangerous precedent - abstained rather than using their power of veto as permanent members.
'Killing must stop'
French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe, introducing the resolution, said: "In Libya, for a number of weeks the people's will has been shot down... by Colonel Gaddafi who is attacking his own people.
"We cannot let these warmongers do this, we cannot abandon civilians."
He added: "We should not arrive too late."
The US ambassador to the UN, Susan Rice, said: "This resolution should send a strong message to Colonel Gaddafi and his regime that the violence must stop, the killing must stop and the people of Libya must be protected and have the opportunity to express themselves freely."
But Germany, which abstained, will not be contributing to the military effort. Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle said his government sees "considerable dangers and risks" in military action against Col Gaddafi.
Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu said Beijing had "serious reservations" about the resolution but did not veto it "in view of the concerns and stance of the Arab countries and African Union and the special circumstances that currently apply in Libya".
'No mercy'
In rebel-held Benghazi, locals cheered, fired guns in the air and let off fireworks to celebrate the imminent no-fly zone.
But Libya's Deputy Foreign Minister Khaled Kaaim said the vote amounted to "a call for Libyans to kill each other", AFP news agency reported.
"This resolution shows an aggressive attitude on the part of the international community, which threatens the unity of Libya and its stability," he was quoted as saying.
Shortly before the vote, Col Gaddafi told Portuguese television: "If the world is crazy, we will be crazy too."
Earlier on Thursday, addressing the people of Benghazi, Col Gaddafi said his troops were coming "tonight" and there would be "no mercy".
Shortly before the UN vote on Thursday, anti-aircraft fire and explosions were heard in Benghazi, where forces loyal to Col Gaddafi reportedly launched their first air attacks, targeting the airport at Benina.
'Amnesty offer'
The Libyan military earlier warned that civilian and military activities in the Mediterranean would become "the target of a Libyan counter-attack" following any foreign operation.
In other developments:
- Col Gaddafi's forces were reported to be bombarding the city of Misrata. Libyan state TV had claimed the city was almost entirely under government control, but rebels and residents denied this
- Pro-Gaddafi forces attacked the rebel-held town of Ajdabiya, a key objective before launching a ground assault on Benghazi, but rebels deployed tanks, artillery and a helicopter to repel the assault
- Official Libyan news agency Jana reported that government forces would cease military operations from midnight on Sunday to give rebels the opportunity to hand over their weapons and "benefit from the decision on general amnesty"
Following the toppling of the long-time leaders of neighbouring Tunisia and Egypt earlier this year, Libyan protesters started to demand that Col Gaddafi step down after more than 40 years of autocratic rule.
Source: BBC
Thursday, March 17, 2011
Bungling, cover-ups define Japanese nuclear power
Behind Japan's escalating nuclear crisis sits a scandal-ridden energy industry in a comfy relationship with government regulators often willing to overlook safety lapses. Leaks of radioactive steam and workers contaminated with radiation are just part of the disturbing catalog of accidents that have occurred over the years and been belatedly reported to the public, if at all. In one case, workers hand-mixed uranium in stainless steel buckets, instead of processing by machine, so the fuel could be reused, exposing hundreds of workers to radiation. Two later died.
"Everything is a secret," said Kei Sugaoka, a former nuclear power plant engineer in Japan who now lives in California. "There's not enough transparency in the industry." Sugaoka worked at the same utility that runs the Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear plant where workers are racing to prevent a full meltdown following Friday's 9.0 magnitude quake and tsunami. In 1989 Sugaoka received an order that horrified him: edit out footage showing cracks in plant steam pipes in video being submitted to regulators. Sugaoka alerted his superiors in the Tokyo Electric Power Co., but nothing happened. He decided to go public in 2000. Three Tepco executives lost their jobs.
The legacy of scandals and cover-ups over Japan's half-century reliance on nuclear power has strained its credibility with the public. That mistrust has been renewed this past week with the crisis at the Fukushima Dai-Ichi plant. No evidence has emerged of officials hiding information in this catastrophe. But the vagueness and scarcity of details offered by the government and Tepco - and news that seems to grow worse each day - are fueling public anger and frustration. "I can't believe them," said Taketo Kuga, a cab driver in Tokyo, where low levels of radiation was observed Tuesday, despite being 140 miles (220 kilometers) away from the faulty plant.
Kuga has been busy lately driving to airports and train stations people eager to get out and flee southward. And it unsettles him the information about radiation is all over the Internet, hours before officials make their announcements. "I don't feel safe," he said. Tokyo Electric Power Co. official Takeshi Makigami says experts are doing their utmost to get the reactors under control. "We are doing all that is possible," he told reporters.
Worried that over-dependence on imported oil could undermine Japan's humming economy, the government threw its support into nuclear power, and the industry boomed in profile and influence. The country has 54 nuclear plants, which provide 30 percent of the nation's energy needs, is building two more and studying proposals for 12 more plants. Before Friday's earthquake and tsunami that triggered the Fukushima crisis and sent the economy reeling, Japan's 11 utility companies, many of them nuclear plant operators, were worth $139 billion on the stock market. Tepco - the utility that supplies power for Japan's capital and biggest city - accounted for nearly a third of that market capitalization, though its shares have been battered since the disasters, falling 65 percent over the past week to 759 yen ($9.6) Thursday. Last month, it got a boost from the government, which renewed authorization for Tepco to operate Fukushima's 40-year-old Unit 1 reactor for another 10 years.
With such strong government support and a culture that ordinarily frowns upon dissent, regulators tend not to push for rigorous safety, said Amory Lovins, an expert on energy policy and founder of the Rocky Mountain Institute. "You add all that up and it's a recipe for people to cut corners in operation and regulation," Lovins said.
Competence and transparency issues aside, some say it's just too dangerous to build nuclear plants in an earthquake-prone nation like Japan, where land can liquefy during a major temblor. "You're building on a heap of tofu," said Philip White of Tokyo-based Citizens' Nuclear Information Center, a group of scientists and activists who have opposed nuclear power since 1975. "There is absolutely no reason to trust them," he said of those that run Japan's nuclear power plants.
Japan is haunted by memories of past nuclear accidents.
-In 1999, fuel-reprocessing workers were reported to be using stainless steel buckets to hand-mix uranium in flagrant violation of safety standards at the Tokaimura plant. Two workers later died in what was the deadliest accident in the Japanese industry's history.
- At least 37 workers were exposed to low doses of radiation at a 1997 fire and explosion at a nuclear reprocessing plant operated in Tokaimura, northeast of Tokyo. The operator, Donen, later acknowledged it had initially suppressed information about the fire.
- Hundreds of people were exposed to radiation and thousands evacuated in the more serious 1999 Tokaimura accident involving JCO Co. The government assigned the accident a level 4 rating on the International Nuclear Event Scale ranging from 1 to 7, with 7 being most serious.
- In 2007, a powerful earthquake ripped into Japan's northwest coast, killing at least eight people and causing malfunctions at the Kashiwazaki Kariwa nuclear power plant, including radioactive water spills, burst pipes and fires. Radiation did not leak from the facility.
Tepco has safety violations that stretch back decades. In 1978, control rods at one Fukushima reactor dislodged but the accident was not reported because utilities were not required to notify the government of such accidents. In 2006, Tepco reported a negligible amount of radioactive steam seeped from the Fukushima plant - and blew beyond the compound. Now with the public on edge over safety, Tatsumi Tanaka, head of Risk Hedge and a crisis management expert, believes the government would find it difficult to approve new plants in the immediate future.
Tanaka says that, true to Japan's dismal nuclear power record, officials bungled the latest crisis, failing to set up a special crisis team and appoint credible outside experts. Tokyo Electric Power Co., regulators and the government spokesman have been holding nationally televised news conferences, sometimes several a day, on the latest developments at the Fukushima plant.
But the reactors have been volatile, changing by the hour, with multiple explosions, fires and leaks of radiation. The utility, regulators and government spokesmen often send conflicting information, adding to the confusion and the perception they aren't being forthright, Tanaka says. "They are only making people's fears worse," he said. "They need to study at the onset what are the possible scenarios that might happen in about five stages and then figure out what the response should be."
Source: Huron Daily Tribune
Associated Press writers Joji Sakurai and Mari Yamaguchi in Tokyo and Justin Pritchard in Los Angeles contributed to this report.
Tuesday, March 15, 2011
"Structural Incentives" for Abuse: Mortgage Service Providers Must be Better Policed
In recent months, the mortgage servicing industry has emerged from the shadows to take its place as one of the great villains of the mortgage meltdown and foreclosure crisis. Last fall, state attorney generals across the country launched a concerted probe of the industry and compiled a mountain of evidence of deceptive and abusive practices that have had devastating effects on homeowners struggling to avoid foreclosure. The suit filed in just one state, Nevada, against one lender -- Bank of America and its servicers -- runs 152 pages and is filled with horror stories. (See below)
Charges of foreclosure fraud, in which servicers fabricated documents for foreclosure proceedings, are among the least of the abuses uncovered by the probe. More heartbreaking are the stories of homeowners who drained their savings or ran up debt to continue making payments as part of mortgage modifications deals, only to have their homes foreclosed on anyway. Or the stories of homeowners who were outright lied to about the status of their modification requests or the reasons that these requests were denied.
It would be bad enough if the banks had only thumbed their nose at the Obama Administration's effort to give people a chance to modify loans. But the banks and their servicers managed to behave even more badly than that by using the existence of the modification programs as an opportunity to exploit some of the most desperate people in America. It is no exaggeration to say that stringing along and sucking dry struggling homeowners appears to have become a business model of the mortgage industry.
Last week, the attorney generals announced preliminary settlement terms that would extract $20 billion from the nation's largest banks as punishment for their abuses and those of their mortgage servicers, and use these funds to help modify mortgages. (See the document below).
This proposed deal has been drawing fire from conservatives, including Virginia's Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli who likened helping struggling homeowners to "welfare." Meanwhile, Republican Senator Richard Shelby called the deal "nothing less than a regulatory shakedown."
In fact, the tough stance of the AGs should have ordinary folks -- and those who purport to speak for them -- on their feet cheering. While the Obama Administration has generally coddled the banks when it comes to pushing for mortgage modifications, the AGs are trying to achieve real justice in face of the overwhelming evidence of illegal, abusive, and unethical behavior that has been systematic across the nation and driven by a bottom line focus on profits.
If there is a problem with the deal, it is that it doesn't go far enough and only begins the process of bringing a rogue sector of the mortgage industry -- the servicers -- under control.
The basic problem is that mortgage servicers now have what Fed governor Sarah Bloom Raskin has called "structural incentives" to mislead, cheat, and exploit struggling homeowners. As Raskin explained in a speech last November:
The servicer makes money, to oversimplify a bit, by maximizing fees earned and minimizing expenses while performing the actions spelled out in its contract with the investor. In the case, for instance, of a homeowner struggling to make payments, a foreclosure almost always costs the investor money, but may actually earn money for the servicer in the form of fees. Proactive measures to avoid foreclosure and minimize cost to the investor, on the other hand, may be good for the homeowner, but involve costs that could very well lead to a net loss to the servicer. In the case of a temporary forbearance for a homeowner, for example, the investor and homeowner both could win--if the forbearance allows the homeowner to get back on their feet and avoid foreclosure--but the servicer could well lose money. In the case of a permanent modification, the investor and homeowner could both be considerably better off relative to foreclosure, but the servicer could again lose money. . . .
Even in the case of a servicer who has every best intention of doing "the right thing," the bottom-line incentives are largely misaligned with everyone else involved in the transaction, and most certainly the homeowners themselves.
Got all that?
Basically, Raskin is making a point others have stressed elsewhere: Which is that the front lines of the foreclosure crisis are being manned by an industry that actually has a self-interest in extending this crisis to boost earnings. And, as we've seen in other parts of the financial and real estate sector, companies and managers hungry for profits in a lightly regulated wild west environment all too often will bend the rules, even when it has devastating effects on people's lives.
While some servicers are independently owned, many are subsidiaries of the banks. Either way, as Raskin explained in her speech, the fee structures that servicers still operate under were designed for good times, when loan servicing was easy -- not bad times, when "loss mitigation" requires some real heavy lifting by servicers that cuts into profits. Until the fee structures are changed to incentivize servicers to do the right thing, which will mean higher costs for the banks, further abuses are inevitable regardless of any settlement imposed by the AGs.
Also, it should be obvious by now that the federal government needs to exercise more oversight around the foreclosure process -- an area now regulated by the states. The Obama Administration is working on this and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, led by John Walsh, has begun drafting "New National Mortgage Servicing Standards." Walsh outlined some of the ideas behind these standards in testimony before a Senate Committee last month. He stressed that the process is still in a preliminary stage.
One things seems certain, though: Despite the well-documented suffering of homeowners at the hands of mortgage servicers, opponents of regulation are likely to do their best to torpedo steps to prevent future abuses. That is the way Washington works these days.
Source: PolicyShop
Charges of foreclosure fraud, in which servicers fabricated documents for foreclosure proceedings, are among the least of the abuses uncovered by the probe. More heartbreaking are the stories of homeowners who drained their savings or ran up debt to continue making payments as part of mortgage modifications deals, only to have their homes foreclosed on anyway. Or the stories of homeowners who were outright lied to about the status of their modification requests or the reasons that these requests were denied.
It would be bad enough if the banks had only thumbed their nose at the Obama Administration's effort to give people a chance to modify loans. But the banks and their servicers managed to behave even more badly than that by using the existence of the modification programs as an opportunity to exploit some of the most desperate people in America. It is no exaggeration to say that stringing along and sucking dry struggling homeowners appears to have become a business model of the mortgage industry.
Last week, the attorney generals announced preliminary settlement terms that would extract $20 billion from the nation's largest banks as punishment for their abuses and those of their mortgage servicers, and use these funds to help modify mortgages. (See the document below).
This proposed deal has been drawing fire from conservatives, including Virginia's Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli who likened helping struggling homeowners to "welfare." Meanwhile, Republican Senator Richard Shelby called the deal "nothing less than a regulatory shakedown."
In fact, the tough stance of the AGs should have ordinary folks -- and those who purport to speak for them -- on their feet cheering. While the Obama Administration has generally coddled the banks when it comes to pushing for mortgage modifications, the AGs are trying to achieve real justice in face of the overwhelming evidence of illegal, abusive, and unethical behavior that has been systematic across the nation and driven by a bottom line focus on profits.
If there is a problem with the deal, it is that it doesn't go far enough and only begins the process of bringing a rogue sector of the mortgage industry -- the servicers -- under control.
The basic problem is that mortgage servicers now have what Fed governor Sarah Bloom Raskin has called "structural incentives" to mislead, cheat, and exploit struggling homeowners. As Raskin explained in a speech last November:
The servicer makes money, to oversimplify a bit, by maximizing fees earned and minimizing expenses while performing the actions spelled out in its contract with the investor. In the case, for instance, of a homeowner struggling to make payments, a foreclosure almost always costs the investor money, but may actually earn money for the servicer in the form of fees. Proactive measures to avoid foreclosure and minimize cost to the investor, on the other hand, may be good for the homeowner, but involve costs that could very well lead to a net loss to the servicer. In the case of a temporary forbearance for a homeowner, for example, the investor and homeowner both could win--if the forbearance allows the homeowner to get back on their feet and avoid foreclosure--but the servicer could well lose money. In the case of a permanent modification, the investor and homeowner could both be considerably better off relative to foreclosure, but the servicer could again lose money. . . .
Even in the case of a servicer who has every best intention of doing "the right thing," the bottom-line incentives are largely misaligned with everyone else involved in the transaction, and most certainly the homeowners themselves.
Got all that?
Basically, Raskin is making a point others have stressed elsewhere: Which is that the front lines of the foreclosure crisis are being manned by an industry that actually has a self-interest in extending this crisis to boost earnings. And, as we've seen in other parts of the financial and real estate sector, companies and managers hungry for profits in a lightly regulated wild west environment all too often will bend the rules, even when it has devastating effects on people's lives.
While some servicers are independently owned, many are subsidiaries of the banks. Either way, as Raskin explained in her speech, the fee structures that servicers still operate under were designed for good times, when loan servicing was easy -- not bad times, when "loss mitigation" requires some real heavy lifting by servicers that cuts into profits. Until the fee structures are changed to incentivize servicers to do the right thing, which will mean higher costs for the banks, further abuses are inevitable regardless of any settlement imposed by the AGs.
Also, it should be obvious by now that the federal government needs to exercise more oversight around the foreclosure process -- an area now regulated by the states. The Obama Administration is working on this and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, led by John Walsh, has begun drafting "New National Mortgage Servicing Standards." Walsh outlined some of the ideas behind these standards in testimony before a Senate Committee last month. He stressed that the process is still in a preliminary stage.
One things seems certain, though: Despite the well-documented suffering of homeowners at the hands of mortgage servicers, opponents of regulation are likely to do their best to torpedo steps to prevent future abuses. That is the way Washington works these days.
Source: PolicyShop
Friday, March 11, 2011
Gaddafi Warns Benghazi Rebels: We Are Coming, And There’ll Be No Mercy
In a recently concluded address broadcast on Libyan state radio, Muammar Gaddafi offered a grim warning to residents of Benghazi, the center of the rebellion seeking to topple the Gaddafi regime: “We are coming tonight, and there will be no mercy.”
The past week has seen troops loyal to Gaddafi march closer to Benghazi, Libya’s second city with a population of roughly a million people. They’ve deployed airpower and heavy artillery against a string of towns once held by rebels, reclaiming strategic coastal cities one by one. The death toll is unknown. (The government offensive has also, according to reports, led to thedisappearance of four New York Times journalists.) Now, ahead of a pivotal vote in the U.N. Security Council that may place a no-fly zone over Libya and prompt international air strikes on Gaddafi’s forces, the dictator who has ruled for 41 years insists his victory at hand. He demanded Benghazi residents turn on the rebel fighters and chillingly told the city to expect their homes to be searched for “traitors,” house by house, “alley by alley.”
The speech, like all Gaddafi oratory, was suffused with his typical bluster, echoing decades-old anti-colonial rhetoric. In Gaddafi’s address, it was he who was the agent of Benghazi’s “liberation” — this when, for the past few weeks, the entire east of Libya has hailed itself “Free Libya.” As TIME has observed, after the heady, exuberant initial success of the anti-Gadaffi rebellion, the government counteroffensive has been swift and ruthless. The latest town to fall was Ajbadiyah; rebel fighters and residents streamed out of the city on the road to Benghazi, fleeing tank and mortar fire.
But Benghazi — larger, more populous, and the most significant base for the opposition movement — will prove far trickier to capture. Observers expect the rebels to put up a last stand here, and a bloody siege may only spur the slow-moving international community to finally intervene. Not surprisingly, Gaddafi made overtures to Benghazi, describing the city as his “sweetheart,” and cooingly called on his “children” to come back to the fold before things got too out of control. But, if live footage from Benghazi’s main square is to be believed, few in the rebellion’s last stronghold are listening. Standing up to the threat of a brutal final offensive by Gaddafi’s troops, thousands in Benghazi gathered at night and hurled shoes at images of the dictator. Attention now turns to New York, where, in a matter of hours, the international community may have its most significant mandate yet to intervene in the conflict.
March 17, 2011
Wednesday, March 9, 2011
Qaddafi Forces Renew Attacks on Rebels
With airstrikes, armor and artillery, military units loyal to Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi hammered the rebels seeking his ouster in battles along the eastern Mediterranean coast and in the besieged western city of Zawiyah on Tuesday, as a new report documented how badly the insurgents lagged the Qaddafi forces in equipment and capabilities.
Qaddafi forces battered the rebel-held city of Zawiyah for a fifth day. With land lines, cellphones and the Internet down, and journalists barred from the area, it was impossible to tell whose flag flew over the central square as darkness fell. Fighting was also reported in the rebel-held city of Misratah, Libya’s third largest, about 100 miles east of Tripoli.
The Libyan air force, dominated by members of Colonel Qaddafi’s native tribe, renewed its strikes on rebel positions around the coastal oil city of Ras Lanuf. Rebels had taken control of the city days ago, when they appeared to be moving briskly westward. On Tuesday they were struggling to regroup after losses the night before, so that they might move again toward the Qaddafi stronghold of Surt, west of Ras Lanuf on the road to Tripoli.
Rebel fighters — including an increasing number of professional soldiers — prepared themselves for a government drive to recapture Ras Lanuf. All afternoon, reinforcements in the form of dozens of white Toyota pickup trucks mounted with heavy machine guns and antiaircraft guns streamed in from the opposition-controlled east. The battles unfolded in an atmosphere of rumors and uncertainty in the capital, where reliable information was increasingly scarce and unrealistic propaganda increasingly plentiful. Unconfirmed reports circulated of peace proposals that could involve Colonel Qaddafi’s giving up power.
The only basis for the reports appeared to be televised remarks by a former prime minister suggesting, without elaboration, that both sides should negotiate, as Colonel Qaddafi had suggested before. By the end of the day, both sides had vigorously denied making or receiving any overtures of any kind.
President Obama and the British prime minister, David Cameron, agreed in a phone call on the shared objective of “the departure of Qaddafi from power as quickly as possible,” the White House said in a statement, adding that they would “press forward with planning, including at NATO, on the full spectrum of possible responses, including surveillance, humanitarian assistance, enforcement of the arms embargo and a no-fly zone.”
In the Middle East, the Gulf Cooperation Council has already endorsed a no-flight zone, and speaking in Washington, a representative of the Arab League said it was expected to support the idea as well. Britain and France are working on a United Nations resolution to authorize a no-flight zone, though it is unclear that such a measure could gain needed support from Russia and China, which are traditionally leery of military intervention.
Western leaders have stressed the need for international support before undertaking a no-flight zone, so they do not appear to be meddling. Colonel Qaddafi has already begun attacking the idea of Western airstrikes as a form of colonialism. A report released Tuesday by the International Institute for Strategic Studies, a London-based group known for its assessments of relative military strength, underscored the challenge facing the rebels. Colonel Qaddafi “has long neglected the military formations in the east; the dilapidated bases and installations there contrast sharply with the well-kept barracks and tank parks outside Tripoli,” the report said, relying in part on satellite images to compare the number and make of tanks and other equipment. “This goes a long way toward explaining why the momentum generated by the revolution has yet to overwhelm pro-regime forces.”
Air power is Colonel Qaddafi’s biggest advantage, the report found, noting that so far the rebels appeared unable to use bases and planes they captured in the east. Planes and helicopters give the Qaddafi forces an additional advantage, the report said, in moving ammunition and supplies, a crucial factor given the length of the Libyan coast between the rebel stronghold of Benghazi and the capital, Tripoli.
The rebels obtained “an extensive collection of surface-to-air missiles” from defecting bases in the east, the report noted, but have been unable to get them to the front lines, where they might counter Colonel Qaddafi’s Russian-made warplanes. Still, despite the weapons advantage, the report noted that the Qaddafi forces appeared lacking in morale. “In recent skirmishes in small coastal towns the rebels have easily repelled the pro-government forces’ largely uncoordinated attacks with the most rudimentary of weapons,” the report said. “The loyalty of the air force has also been called into question as many bombs have been reportedly dropped miles from their targets.” In an interview with the pan-Arab news channel Al Arabiya on Monday night, Colonel Qaddafi’s son Saadi appeared to pull back the curtain on some Qaddafi sibling rivalry — a weighty issue because his sons command private militias, play major roles in the government and own communications companies and other businesses. Colonel Qaddafi’s son Muatassim, considered a hard-liner, is national security adviser, while his brother Seif al-Islam has campaigned for more open government and become Colonel Qaddafi’s heir apparent.
Complaining that all his own personal initiatives for Libya were thwarted, Saadi el-Qaddafi contended that for the last four years it was Seif, not their father, who was in fact “the person who used to run the show every day in Libya.” Colonel Qaddafi told Seif and the country’s top ministers, “ ‘You have to run the show, you have to run the affairs, take care of people, tribes, cities and the budget,’ ” Saadi el-Qaddafi said.
Saadi, a former professional soccer player who has sometimes enjoyed a playboy lifestyle abroad, told Al Arabiya that he always felt underappreciated. “I used to propose projects, but they used to tell me that your ideas are always difficult and complicated, asking me to suggest something simple,” he said.
But Saadi also reiterated his father’s warning that Libya would descend into chaotic tribal warfare if the colonel left power. “All the tribes are armed, of course,” he said. “There are hundreds of thousands, and maybe millions, who all support the leader, and all of them are armed tribes. If something happens to the leader or steps down, who will control these tribes then? He answered his own question: “Each one will act on its own, and we will face a civil war like in Somalia or Afghanistan.”
As the Qaddafi government pushes back at the rebels in the east and protesters in Tripoli, its efforts are posing mounting obstacles to the roughly 130 foreign journalists the government has invited to the capital to cover the unrest. Senior government officials have promised the journalists the chance to report freely, and reporters were initially able to interact freely even with rebels. But a profusion of heavily armed checkpoints have made it increasingly treacherous to move around the Tripoli area.
More than a dozen journalists have been detained trying to investigate reports of a massacre by Qaddafi forces in the rebel-held city of Zawiyah. A group of 10, including correspondents from The Los Angeles Times and the BBC, were held for about seven hours. Three others from the BBC were held overnight.
In an interview about the issue, Musa Ibrahim, a government spokesman, told Reuters that the Libyan military had little experience with free-roaming journalists. “They are involved in ground operations,” he said. “They don’t want any media presence.”
Source: New York Times
Qaddafi forces battered the rebel-held city of Zawiyah for a fifth day. With land lines, cellphones and the Internet down, and journalists barred from the area, it was impossible to tell whose flag flew over the central square as darkness fell. Fighting was also reported in the rebel-held city of Misratah, Libya’s third largest, about 100 miles east of Tripoli.
The Libyan air force, dominated by members of Colonel Qaddafi’s native tribe, renewed its strikes on rebel positions around the coastal oil city of Ras Lanuf. Rebels had taken control of the city days ago, when they appeared to be moving briskly westward. On Tuesday they were struggling to regroup after losses the night before, so that they might move again toward the Qaddafi stronghold of Surt, west of Ras Lanuf on the road to Tripoli.
Rebel fighters — including an increasing number of professional soldiers — prepared themselves for a government drive to recapture Ras Lanuf. All afternoon, reinforcements in the form of dozens of white Toyota pickup trucks mounted with heavy machine guns and antiaircraft guns streamed in from the opposition-controlled east. The battles unfolded in an atmosphere of rumors and uncertainty in the capital, where reliable information was increasingly scarce and unrealistic propaganda increasingly plentiful. Unconfirmed reports circulated of peace proposals that could involve Colonel Qaddafi’s giving up power.
The only basis for the reports appeared to be televised remarks by a former prime minister suggesting, without elaboration, that both sides should negotiate, as Colonel Qaddafi had suggested before. By the end of the day, both sides had vigorously denied making or receiving any overtures of any kind.
President Obama and the British prime minister, David Cameron, agreed in a phone call on the shared objective of “the departure of Qaddafi from power as quickly as possible,” the White House said in a statement, adding that they would “press forward with planning, including at NATO, on the full spectrum of possible responses, including surveillance, humanitarian assistance, enforcement of the arms embargo and a no-fly zone.”
In the Middle East, the Gulf Cooperation Council has already endorsed a no-flight zone, and speaking in Washington, a representative of the Arab League said it was expected to support the idea as well. Britain and France are working on a United Nations resolution to authorize a no-flight zone, though it is unclear that such a measure could gain needed support from Russia and China, which are traditionally leery of military intervention.
Western leaders have stressed the need for international support before undertaking a no-flight zone, so they do not appear to be meddling. Colonel Qaddafi has already begun attacking the idea of Western airstrikes as a form of colonialism. A report released Tuesday by the International Institute for Strategic Studies, a London-based group known for its assessments of relative military strength, underscored the challenge facing the rebels. Colonel Qaddafi “has long neglected the military formations in the east; the dilapidated bases and installations there contrast sharply with the well-kept barracks and tank parks outside Tripoli,” the report said, relying in part on satellite images to compare the number and make of tanks and other equipment. “This goes a long way toward explaining why the momentum generated by the revolution has yet to overwhelm pro-regime forces.”
Air power is Colonel Qaddafi’s biggest advantage, the report found, noting that so far the rebels appeared unable to use bases and planes they captured in the east. Planes and helicopters give the Qaddafi forces an additional advantage, the report said, in moving ammunition and supplies, a crucial factor given the length of the Libyan coast between the rebel stronghold of Benghazi and the capital, Tripoli.
The rebels obtained “an extensive collection of surface-to-air missiles” from defecting bases in the east, the report noted, but have been unable to get them to the front lines, where they might counter Colonel Qaddafi’s Russian-made warplanes. Still, despite the weapons advantage, the report noted that the Qaddafi forces appeared lacking in morale. “In recent skirmishes in small coastal towns the rebels have easily repelled the pro-government forces’ largely uncoordinated attacks with the most rudimentary of weapons,” the report said. “The loyalty of the air force has also been called into question as many bombs have been reportedly dropped miles from their targets.” In an interview with the pan-Arab news channel Al Arabiya on Monday night, Colonel Qaddafi’s son Saadi appeared to pull back the curtain on some Qaddafi sibling rivalry — a weighty issue because his sons command private militias, play major roles in the government and own communications companies and other businesses. Colonel Qaddafi’s son Muatassim, considered a hard-liner, is national security adviser, while his brother Seif al-Islam has campaigned for more open government and become Colonel Qaddafi’s heir apparent.
Complaining that all his own personal initiatives for Libya were thwarted, Saadi el-Qaddafi contended that for the last four years it was Seif, not their father, who was in fact “the person who used to run the show every day in Libya.” Colonel Qaddafi told Seif and the country’s top ministers, “ ‘You have to run the show, you have to run the affairs, take care of people, tribes, cities and the budget,’ ” Saadi el-Qaddafi said.
Saadi, a former professional soccer player who has sometimes enjoyed a playboy lifestyle abroad, told Al Arabiya that he always felt underappreciated. “I used to propose projects, but they used to tell me that your ideas are always difficult and complicated, asking me to suggest something simple,” he said.
But Saadi also reiterated his father’s warning that Libya would descend into chaotic tribal warfare if the colonel left power. “All the tribes are armed, of course,” he said. “There are hundreds of thousands, and maybe millions, who all support the leader, and all of them are armed tribes. If something happens to the leader or steps down, who will control these tribes then? He answered his own question: “Each one will act on its own, and we will face a civil war like in Somalia or Afghanistan.”
As the Qaddafi government pushes back at the rebels in the east and protesters in Tripoli, its efforts are posing mounting obstacles to the roughly 130 foreign journalists the government has invited to the capital to cover the unrest. Senior government officials have promised the journalists the chance to report freely, and reporters were initially able to interact freely even with rebels. But a profusion of heavily armed checkpoints have made it increasingly treacherous to move around the Tripoli area.
More than a dozen journalists have been detained trying to investigate reports of a massacre by Qaddafi forces in the rebel-held city of Zawiyah. A group of 10, including correspondents from The Los Angeles Times and the BBC, were held for about seven hours. Three others from the BBC were held overnight.
In an interview about the issue, Musa Ibrahim, a government spokesman, told Reuters that the Libyan military had little experience with free-roaming journalists. “They are involved in ground operations,” he said. “They don’t want any media presence.”
Source: New York Times
Police Kill Protesters in Major Ivory Coast City
At least four demonstrators, including a 19-year-old woman, were shot dead by riot police officers on Tuesday as they protested the shooting deaths of women who marched last week, witnesses said.
Volleys of bullets fired by the security forces of the nation’s strongman, Laurent Gbagbo, continued to sound around the clinic where the dead were taken Tuesday afternoon, as relatives and others pressed for cover inside the tiny building in the Treichville district. Three of the bodies lay on the floor under bloodied sheets, while a wounded man gasped in pain in the hall.
Mr. Gbagbo’s refusal to give up power after losing a presidential election last November is yielding a mounting toll of death, lawlessness and economic collapse here in this sprawling commercial capital of nearly four million people.
Gunfire sounds across the city every day, and youths with machetes and pistols staff impromptu checkpoints. Nearly 400 have died in all, according to the United Nations, including at least seven women last week who were cut down while protesting in the rebellious Abobo neighborhood by large-caliber machine-gun fire from Mr. Gbagbo’s security forces.
It was to protest those earlier deaths that the women in Treichville, a bustling neighborhood just across a lagoon from downtown Abidjan’s tattered high-rises, came out to march Tuesday, several people at the clinic said. “We came to cry for our dead,” said Marie-Louise Diby, a teacher.
The march was just ending, and neighborhood youths had formed a security cordon around the women, Ms. Diby said. The women tried to walk a final stretch to the headquarters of the political party whose standard-bearer, Alassane Ouattara, won last November’s election. The riot police then launched tear-gas canisters and fired into the crowd, Ms. Diby said. “They didn’t want to let us finish,” Ms. Diby said. “It’s then they started firing.” Three of the dead were men from the neighborhood. “It was the C.R.S. that started firing,” said Saly Cissé, an official of Mr. Ouattara’s party who was at the march on Tuesday, referring to Mr. Gbagbo’s Republican Security Units. “We had finished the march.”
Protests against Mr. Gbagbo’s rule, often ending in bloodshed, have been multiplying here. An assortment of abandoned flip-flops jettisoned by panicked women still marked the spot where the seven women were killed in the Abobo district last week.
While Mr. Gbagbo maintains an iron grip on much of this once prosperous port city, the Abobo neighborhood, home to over a million people, appears to be slipping from his grasp. Entering it on Tuesday required passing through heavy checkpoints of burnt-out vehicles staffed by young men bearing pistols and grenades.
When Mr. Gbagbo’s security forces penetrate here, they do so only in armored vehicles, often spraying bullets on either side as they go through, residents said. Many civilians have been killed in this rough Ouattara-supporting neighborhood of Muslim immigrants from northern Ivory Coast, but so have some of Mr. Gbagbo’s security forces. It is the one neighborhood that has taken up arms against him.
On Tuesday, the shabby main road through Abobo was taken over by hundreds of angry marchers, mostly women. Chanting in Dioula, a local language, they said “Gbagbo needs to leave,” alternating between mocking laughter and cries against the strongman who refuses to step down. Residents here insisted that Abobo is now autonomous, thanks to the shadowy young men with stolen Kalashnikov rifles who have waged an armed campaign against Mr. Gbagbo — the Invisible Commando, as the group is known in the neighborhood. “It’s not under the authority of Gbagbo now, not at all,” said Idrissa Tolo, a chauffeur, who was watching the women march. “Have you seen Gbagbo’s army here?” asked Fousseny Doumia, a truck driver. “We are the ones who provide security around here.”
Several members of the Invisible Commando — brusque, stocky young men carrying weapons and giving orders — were in evidence at the checkpoints Tuesday. They wore amulets, bracelets or trinkets that residents here said carried magic powers to protect them from Mr. Gbagbo’s bullets. One such young man appeared behind a group of shacks off a main road peppered with bullet holes to calmly explain the group’s position. He refused to give his name or age, or acknowledge his membership, but the telltale bulge under his shirt indicated the presence of a protective amulet, and residents said he was a ranking member of the Invisible Commando. They called him “Captain Fongnon,” which means “wind” in Dioula. “The ex-president,” he said, referring to Mr. Gbagbo, “is not capable of managing the situation. He’s killing us, and he’s killing our women. We, the young Ivorians, have banded together to protect our families and our possessions.”
Mr. Gbagbo’s men, he said, do not dare walk the streets of Abobo anymore, “because they are scared. But they shoot when they come through. And we’re sick of it. So we’re defending ourselves.”
“We are proud,” he added. “And we know this can’t last. This man has got to go.”
Source: New York Times
Volleys of bullets fired by the security forces of the nation’s strongman, Laurent Gbagbo, continued to sound around the clinic where the dead were taken Tuesday afternoon, as relatives and others pressed for cover inside the tiny building in the Treichville district. Three of the bodies lay on the floor under bloodied sheets, while a wounded man gasped in pain in the hall.
Mr. Gbagbo’s refusal to give up power after losing a presidential election last November is yielding a mounting toll of death, lawlessness and economic collapse here in this sprawling commercial capital of nearly four million people.
Gunfire sounds across the city every day, and youths with machetes and pistols staff impromptu checkpoints. Nearly 400 have died in all, according to the United Nations, including at least seven women last week who were cut down while protesting in the rebellious Abobo neighborhood by large-caliber machine-gun fire from Mr. Gbagbo’s security forces.
It was to protest those earlier deaths that the women in Treichville, a bustling neighborhood just across a lagoon from downtown Abidjan’s tattered high-rises, came out to march Tuesday, several people at the clinic said. “We came to cry for our dead,” said Marie-Louise Diby, a teacher.
The march was just ending, and neighborhood youths had formed a security cordon around the women, Ms. Diby said. The women tried to walk a final stretch to the headquarters of the political party whose standard-bearer, Alassane Ouattara, won last November’s election. The riot police then launched tear-gas canisters and fired into the crowd, Ms. Diby said. “They didn’t want to let us finish,” Ms. Diby said. “It’s then they started firing.” Three of the dead were men from the neighborhood. “It was the C.R.S. that started firing,” said Saly Cissé, an official of Mr. Ouattara’s party who was at the march on Tuesday, referring to Mr. Gbagbo’s Republican Security Units. “We had finished the march.”
Protests against Mr. Gbagbo’s rule, often ending in bloodshed, have been multiplying here. An assortment of abandoned flip-flops jettisoned by panicked women still marked the spot where the seven women were killed in the Abobo district last week.
While Mr. Gbagbo maintains an iron grip on much of this once prosperous port city, the Abobo neighborhood, home to over a million people, appears to be slipping from his grasp. Entering it on Tuesday required passing through heavy checkpoints of burnt-out vehicles staffed by young men bearing pistols and grenades.
When Mr. Gbagbo’s security forces penetrate here, they do so only in armored vehicles, often spraying bullets on either side as they go through, residents said. Many civilians have been killed in this rough Ouattara-supporting neighborhood of Muslim immigrants from northern Ivory Coast, but so have some of Mr. Gbagbo’s security forces. It is the one neighborhood that has taken up arms against him.
On Tuesday, the shabby main road through Abobo was taken over by hundreds of angry marchers, mostly women. Chanting in Dioula, a local language, they said “Gbagbo needs to leave,” alternating between mocking laughter and cries against the strongman who refuses to step down. Residents here insisted that Abobo is now autonomous, thanks to the shadowy young men with stolen Kalashnikov rifles who have waged an armed campaign against Mr. Gbagbo — the Invisible Commando, as the group is known in the neighborhood. “It’s not under the authority of Gbagbo now, not at all,” said Idrissa Tolo, a chauffeur, who was watching the women march. “Have you seen Gbagbo’s army here?” asked Fousseny Doumia, a truck driver. “We are the ones who provide security around here.”
Several members of the Invisible Commando — brusque, stocky young men carrying weapons and giving orders — were in evidence at the checkpoints Tuesday. They wore amulets, bracelets or trinkets that residents here said carried magic powers to protect them from Mr. Gbagbo’s bullets. One such young man appeared behind a group of shacks off a main road peppered with bullet holes to calmly explain the group’s position. He refused to give his name or age, or acknowledge his membership, but the telltale bulge under his shirt indicated the presence of a protective amulet, and residents said he was a ranking member of the Invisible Commando. They called him “Captain Fongnon,” which means “wind” in Dioula. “The ex-president,” he said, referring to Mr. Gbagbo, “is not capable of managing the situation. He’s killing us, and he’s killing our women. We, the young Ivorians, have banded together to protect our families and our possessions.”
Mr. Gbagbo’s men, he said, do not dare walk the streets of Abobo anymore, “because they are scared. But they shoot when they come through. And we’re sick of it. So we’re defending ourselves.”
“We are proud,” he added. “And we know this can’t last. This man has got to go.”
Source: New York Times
The Hague: 6 Top Kenyan Politicians Are Summoned
Six top politicians from Kenya have been summoned to appear at the International Criminal Court in April to answer charges of crimes against humanity in connection with Kenya’s election violence in 2007 and 2008. The men, whose names were first cited by the prosecutor in December, include Uhuru Kenyatta, finance minister and son of Kenya’s founding leader; Mohammed Hussein Ali, the former police chief; and several other ministers. Coinciding with the court’s announcement, Kenyan government envoys have arrived at the United Nations in New York, seeking to block the move.
Source: New York Times
Source: New York Times
Zimbabwe Report Focuses on Abuses
Zimbabwe faces a “crisis of impunity” that has festered for decades and allows killings, torture and beatings to go unpunished, Human Rights Watch said in a report released on Tuesday.
The police refuse to act on complaints of abuse and even murder, and judges are co-opted, threatened or attacked, the report said.
Tiseke Kasambala, a senior researcher for the human rights group, which is based in New York, told reporters that the climate in the country should prevent the holding of elections, which President Robert Mugabe, who has been in office for 31 years, is seeking. “If reforms are not instituted, then we say that there must be no elections in Zimbabwe,” Ms. Kasambala said.
Human Rights Watch called for Zimbabwe’s unity government to set an independent commission to investigate serious human rights abuses.
Source: New York Times
The police refuse to act on complaints of abuse and even murder, and judges are co-opted, threatened or attacked, the report said.
Tiseke Kasambala, a senior researcher for the human rights group, which is based in New York, told reporters that the climate in the country should prevent the holding of elections, which President Robert Mugabe, who has been in office for 31 years, is seeking. “If reforms are not instituted, then we say that there must be no elections in Zimbabwe,” Ms. Kasambala said.
Human Rights Watch called for Zimbabwe’s unity government to set an independent commission to investigate serious human rights abuses.
Source: New York Times
Monday, March 7, 2011
Nigeria: 400 More Children Killed by Lead Poisoning
Lead poisoning linked with illegal gold mining has killed a further 400 children in northern Nigeria since November, the National Emergency Management Agency said Monday. The latest figures suggest that the death toll from the crisis in the northern state of Zamfara is rising after the United Nations said lead poisoning in the region had killed at least 400 children between March and October last year.
Source: New York Times
Source: New York Times
Men ‘paid cops for protection’
A Pretoria High Court judge has expressed shock and disdain at evidence that four members of the public, arrested for no reason, had to pay R1 500 each to the police in eMalahleni (formerly Witbank) to protect them while they were kept in the holding cells of the police station. Barend Olivier, Frederick Haycock and Harry and Kyriakos Haralambous said the police, before locking them up, told them they each had to pay up to not be assaulted in the cells.
While they were being taken to the cells, one said he saw a detainee being assaulted and thrown into a toilet pit. Their parents paid the money to the police and the four were removed to another cell.
Judge Joseph Raulinga said this evidence raised alarm on the observance of human rights in the country. It also raised suspicion that this practice was not confined to eMalahleni. “This might be a practice countrywide. Unless this evil deed is investigated and stopped immediately, the whole justice system may at the end be corrupted to the core.”
While one was aware of the efforts made by many police members who on a daily basis tried to dedicate their lives to a better service to the people, one could not close an eye to this humiliating practice by a few police officers, he said. “The question is whether the defendants (who include the Minister of Police) knew about this practice. “If they did, then their unlawful detention of the plaintiffs must be treated with the contempt it deserves.”
The judge said he was certain that the matter deserved the attention of the Commissioner of Police in Mpumalanga and the National Police Commissioner. The judge’s remarks were sparked by a damages claim against the police by the four young men. They claimed the police shot at them and arrested them for no reason. They were locked up in a police cell for nearly two days, but nothing came of the charges against them.
The police denied wrongdoing and said they thought the four were buying drugs from a notorious Nigerian drug dealer in the area. The police said they had set a trap for the dealer that night and saw the men speaking to the “dealer” before heading with him into tall grass, where he stashed his drugs. But the four had no idea what the police were talking about. They said they were on their way home from a club and wanted to take a shortcut home. They got lost in a nearby township and stopped to ask a man who was walking along the road, for directions. Two of them got out of the vehicle to urinate. When they got back into the car, they heard a noise and only later realised their tyres had been shot. They stopped at a garage as they thought they were being hijacked. They wanted to phone the police when a police contingent on quad bikes stopped at the garage with tyres screeching .
The four claimed they were accused of attempted murder, among other things, assaulted and taken to the police station in the early hours of Saturday morning, May 17, 2008. They were only allowed to go home on the Monday morning, without charges brought against them.
The police said they had information about a drug dealer in Tasbet Park in eMalahleni, who hid his stash in the veld. They conducted a police operation that day and hid their quad bikes in the veld. They saw the four young men speaking “in a jovial manner” to the “drug dealer”. The police claimed the four even walked with the dealer into the veld. One said he could hear the rustle of plastic bags as the “dealer” fiddled in the bags to get the drugs.
The four had discovered the police quad bikes, hidden under netting in the veld, and they feared the men were going to steal the bikes, police said. They fired at the suspects, but the men raced away in their car. They gave chase and caught them at the garage.
The judge said there were many suspicious aspects in this case, including why the cops, if they were so anxious to catch the drug dealer, did not apprehend him if they were close enough to hear the rustle of the plastic bags.
He awarded damages to the four men ranging from between R65 000 and R39 000. The judge also accepted the evidence of the petrol attendant, who said he saw the police assaulting the men. He said the cops told him the men were drug dealers.
Source: IoL
While they were being taken to the cells, one said he saw a detainee being assaulted and thrown into a toilet pit. Their parents paid the money to the police and the four were removed to another cell.
Judge Joseph Raulinga said this evidence raised alarm on the observance of human rights in the country. It also raised suspicion that this practice was not confined to eMalahleni. “This might be a practice countrywide. Unless this evil deed is investigated and stopped immediately, the whole justice system may at the end be corrupted to the core.”
While one was aware of the efforts made by many police members who on a daily basis tried to dedicate their lives to a better service to the people, one could not close an eye to this humiliating practice by a few police officers, he said. “The question is whether the defendants (who include the Minister of Police) knew about this practice. “If they did, then their unlawful detention of the plaintiffs must be treated with the contempt it deserves.”
The judge said he was certain that the matter deserved the attention of the Commissioner of Police in Mpumalanga and the National Police Commissioner. The judge’s remarks were sparked by a damages claim against the police by the four young men. They claimed the police shot at them and arrested them for no reason. They were locked up in a police cell for nearly two days, but nothing came of the charges against them.
The police denied wrongdoing and said they thought the four were buying drugs from a notorious Nigerian drug dealer in the area. The police said they had set a trap for the dealer that night and saw the men speaking to the “dealer” before heading with him into tall grass, where he stashed his drugs. But the four had no idea what the police were talking about. They said they were on their way home from a club and wanted to take a shortcut home. They got lost in a nearby township and stopped to ask a man who was walking along the road, for directions. Two of them got out of the vehicle to urinate. When they got back into the car, they heard a noise and only later realised their tyres had been shot. They stopped at a garage as they thought they were being hijacked. They wanted to phone the police when a police contingent on quad bikes stopped at the garage with tyres screeching .
The four claimed they were accused of attempted murder, among other things, assaulted and taken to the police station in the early hours of Saturday morning, May 17, 2008. They were only allowed to go home on the Monday morning, without charges brought against them.
The police said they had information about a drug dealer in Tasbet Park in eMalahleni, who hid his stash in the veld. They conducted a police operation that day and hid their quad bikes in the veld. They saw the four young men speaking “in a jovial manner” to the “drug dealer”. The police claimed the four even walked with the dealer into the veld. One said he could hear the rustle of plastic bags as the “dealer” fiddled in the bags to get the drugs.
The four had discovered the police quad bikes, hidden under netting in the veld, and they feared the men were going to steal the bikes, police said. They fired at the suspects, but the men raced away in their car. They gave chase and caught them at the garage.
The judge said there were many suspicious aspects in this case, including why the cops, if they were so anxious to catch the drug dealer, did not apprehend him if they were close enough to hear the rustle of the plastic bags.
He awarded damages to the four men ranging from between R65 000 and R39 000. The judge also accepted the evidence of the petrol attendant, who said he saw the police assaulting the men. He said the cops told him the men were drug dealers.
Source: IoL
Police hunt hitmen
POLICE in Limpopo are searching for three suspects who shot and wounded an off-duty police constable and his girlfriend at Brukedo Lodge in Tshisaulu village near Thohoyandou yesterday.
It is alleged the gunmen were hunting for the girlfriend but the reason why they wanted her dead is not known.
Thohoyandou police spokesperson Captain Mashudu Malelo said the suspects held the receptionist hostage and demanded to be shown to the couple's room. He said the men fired at random, shooting the constable and the woman, who are fighting for their lives in the Polokwane Provincial Hospital
Source: The Sowetan
It is alleged the gunmen were hunting for the girlfriend but the reason why they wanted her dead is not known.
Thohoyandou police spokesperson Captain Mashudu Malelo said the suspects held the receptionist hostage and demanded to be shown to the couple's room. He said the men fired at random, shooting the constable and the woman, who are fighting for their lives in the Polokwane Provincial Hospital
Source: The Sowetan
Friday, March 4, 2011
Bulawayo Man Arrested Over Facebook Message
A Bulawayo man has become Zimbabwe's first "Facebook arrest" over an innocent comment he posted on the social networking site on the 13th February.
Vikas Mavhudzi of Old Magwegwe, is being charged with "subverting a constitutional government" after he posted a message on a Facebook page allegedly belonging to Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai. Mavhudzi's message simply read: "I am overwhelmed, I don't want to say Mr. or PM what happened in Egypt is sending shockwaves to dictators around the world. No weapon but unity of purpose worth emulating, hey."
The court was told that police arrested Mavhudzi on February 24th, after receiving an anonymous call that claimed he had sent a 'security threat' via his mobile phone. It was only after the arrest that police went through his phone and discovered the message in the sent folder.
Prosecutor Jeremiah Mutsindikwa accused Mavhudzi of "advocating or attempting to take-over government by unconstitutional means". And the state opposed bail when he appeared before a city magistrate on Thursday. Mavhudzi was remanded in custody till March 9th.
Protests against dictators in North Africa appear to have rattled Robert Mugabe and ZANU PF, as any discussion of the events there is now considered a crime in Zimbabwe. A group of activists who gathered to watch video footage of the protests were arrested on February 19 and are still in detention. Lawyers said suspected ringleaders have been brutally assaulted.
Meanwhile there are signs that the Mugabe regime intends to increase its ability to spy on innocent civilians. As we reported on SW Radio Africa this week, the government is allegedly moving at a 'very fast pace' with the construction of a secret electronic eavesdropping complex just outside Harare. A trusted source said that the Chinese, who are building the complex, have a system that enables most security agencies to 'spy at will' on emails, website visits, social networking sessions, and telephone calls made over the internet on a massive scale.
Source: AllAfrica
Vikas Mavhudzi of Old Magwegwe, is being charged with "subverting a constitutional government" after he posted a message on a Facebook page allegedly belonging to Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai. Mavhudzi's message simply read: "I am overwhelmed, I don't want to say Mr. or PM what happened in Egypt is sending shockwaves to dictators around the world. No weapon but unity of purpose worth emulating, hey."
The court was told that police arrested Mavhudzi on February 24th, after receiving an anonymous call that claimed he had sent a 'security threat' via his mobile phone. It was only after the arrest that police went through his phone and discovered the message in the sent folder.
Prosecutor Jeremiah Mutsindikwa accused Mavhudzi of "advocating or attempting to take-over government by unconstitutional means". And the state opposed bail when he appeared before a city magistrate on Thursday. Mavhudzi was remanded in custody till March 9th.
Protests against dictators in North Africa appear to have rattled Robert Mugabe and ZANU PF, as any discussion of the events there is now considered a crime in Zimbabwe. A group of activists who gathered to watch video footage of the protests were arrested on February 19 and are still in detention. Lawyers said suspected ringleaders have been brutally assaulted.
Meanwhile there are signs that the Mugabe regime intends to increase its ability to spy on innocent civilians. As we reported on SW Radio Africa this week, the government is allegedly moving at a 'very fast pace' with the construction of a secret electronic eavesdropping complex just outside Harare. A trusted source said that the Chinese, who are building the complex, have a system that enables most security agencies to 'spy at will' on emails, website visits, social networking sessions, and telephone calls made over the internet on a massive scale.
Source: AllAfrica
UN probes Zimbabwe arms sent to Côte d'Ivoire
The United Nations is investigating suspected arms transfers from Zimbabwe to Côte d'Ivoire's incumbent leader Laurent Gbagbo in violation of UN sanctions, according to a report obtained by Reuters.
The report emerged after a week of gun battles between forces loyal to Gbagbo and his rival Alassane Ouattara, almost universally recognised as winner of a November 28 poll, that risk pushing the top cocoa grower back to full-blown civil war.
Diplomats on the UN Security Council said the possible transfer of weapons to Gbagbo was a serious matter. They said his forces could use them against UN peacekeepers -- UNOCI, who recognise Ouattara as Côte d'Ivoire's president -- or Ivorian civilians who support Ouattara.
UNOCI's confidential Embargo monitoring report January 2011, obtained by Reuters on Thursday, said the mission was gathering more information on "the arrival of light weapons cargoes from Zimbabwe". UN officials told Reuters arms from Zimbabwe would have been intended for Gbagbo and not Ouattara.
In January, Gbagbo sent a special envoy to Harare to meet with and enlist the support of Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe, who like Gbagbo has been accused by his opponents of election fraud and is under US and European Union sanctions.
Côte d'Ivoire has been under an arms embargo since the last bout of serious violence in 2004, when pro-Gbagbo forces bombed French peacekeepers in the rebel-held north. Analysts say both sides have repeatedly violated the embargo.
The report also said UNOCI was monitoring a shipment of 10 large wooden boxes that "may contain trucks or tanks".
"This cargo has been at Abidjan airport for six months," the UNOCI report said. "Aerial pictures confirmed the presence of these boxes, which are under 24/7 hours military surveillance."
Aircraft
Philippe Bolopion of Human Rights Watch said countries aiding Gbagbo should be careful: "Given the documented pattern of unlawful attacks on civilians by pro-Gbagbo forces, countries violating the arms embargo to provide weapons to his forces might be complicit in grave human rights abuses."
The report spoke of a "suspected cargo delivery from Angola", involving two Soviet-manufactured Sukhoi-27 fighter jets and a Soviet-made MIG-25 interceptor and reconnaissance bomber, spotted at San Pedro airport in Cape Verde, and a Russian cargo plane seen at Abidjan in January.
The Russian aircraft "has a considerable cargo capacity to carry heavy military equipment or a company of soldiers", the report said.
The report did not explicitly say whether the fighter jets were linked to Gbagbo's government. But it said UNOCI had received information that the "same [Russian cargo] aircraft had supplied equipment to the Ivorian government in 2005".
An official at Zimbabwe's mission expressed surprise about the allegation and declined to comment. Diplomats at Angola's UN mission were not immediately available for a reaction.
Gbagbo has ordered UNOCI out of the country, a demand the mission has ignored. UN troops have been protecting Ouattara, who is holed up in an Abidjan hotel along with his advisers.
The UNOCI report is not the first of a possible transfer of military aircraft to Gbagbo. UN peacekeeping chief Alain Le Roy apologised to Belarus for a UN statement on Monday alleging that an initial shipment of attack helicopters had arrived in Côte d'Ivoire from Belarus.
Diplomats said the statement on the helicopter sale issued by Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's press office was based on credible US intelligence. Ouattara's UN envoy Youssoufou Bamba told reporters that the only incorrect part of the statement was that a first shipment had arrived.
"It's true that he [Gbagbo] wanted these three helicopters to be smuggled into Cote d'Ivoire and be assembled," he said. "This is something we have from credible sources of intelligence." - Reuters
Source: Mail & Guardian Online
The report emerged after a week of gun battles between forces loyal to Gbagbo and his rival Alassane Ouattara, almost universally recognised as winner of a November 28 poll, that risk pushing the top cocoa grower back to full-blown civil war.
Diplomats on the UN Security Council said the possible transfer of weapons to Gbagbo was a serious matter. They said his forces could use them against UN peacekeepers -- UNOCI, who recognise Ouattara as Côte d'Ivoire's president -- or Ivorian civilians who support Ouattara.
UNOCI's confidential Embargo monitoring report January 2011, obtained by Reuters on Thursday, said the mission was gathering more information on "the arrival of light weapons cargoes from Zimbabwe". UN officials told Reuters arms from Zimbabwe would have been intended for Gbagbo and not Ouattara.
In January, Gbagbo sent a special envoy to Harare to meet with and enlist the support of Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe, who like Gbagbo has been accused by his opponents of election fraud and is under US and European Union sanctions.
Côte d'Ivoire has been under an arms embargo since the last bout of serious violence in 2004, when pro-Gbagbo forces bombed French peacekeepers in the rebel-held north. Analysts say both sides have repeatedly violated the embargo.
The report also said UNOCI was monitoring a shipment of 10 large wooden boxes that "may contain trucks or tanks".
"This cargo has been at Abidjan airport for six months," the UNOCI report said. "Aerial pictures confirmed the presence of these boxes, which are under 24/7 hours military surveillance."
Aircraft
Philippe Bolopion of Human Rights Watch said countries aiding Gbagbo should be careful: "Given the documented pattern of unlawful attacks on civilians by pro-Gbagbo forces, countries violating the arms embargo to provide weapons to his forces might be complicit in grave human rights abuses."
The report spoke of a "suspected cargo delivery from Angola", involving two Soviet-manufactured Sukhoi-27 fighter jets and a Soviet-made MIG-25 interceptor and reconnaissance bomber, spotted at San Pedro airport in Cape Verde, and a Russian cargo plane seen at Abidjan in January.
The Russian aircraft "has a considerable cargo capacity to carry heavy military equipment or a company of soldiers", the report said.
The report did not explicitly say whether the fighter jets were linked to Gbagbo's government. But it said UNOCI had received information that the "same [Russian cargo] aircraft had supplied equipment to the Ivorian government in 2005".
An official at Zimbabwe's mission expressed surprise about the allegation and declined to comment. Diplomats at Angola's UN mission were not immediately available for a reaction.
Gbagbo has ordered UNOCI out of the country, a demand the mission has ignored. UN troops have been protecting Ouattara, who is holed up in an Abidjan hotel along with his advisers.
The UNOCI report is not the first of a possible transfer of military aircraft to Gbagbo. UN peacekeeping chief Alain Le Roy apologised to Belarus for a UN statement on Monday alleging that an initial shipment of attack helicopters had arrived in Côte d'Ivoire from Belarus.
Diplomats said the statement on the helicopter sale issued by Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's press office was based on credible US intelligence. Ouattara's UN envoy Youssoufou Bamba told reporters that the only incorrect part of the statement was that a first shipment had arrived.
"It's true that he [Gbagbo] wanted these three helicopters to be smuggled into Cote d'Ivoire and be assembled," he said. "This is something we have from credible sources of intelligence." - Reuters
Source: Mail & Guardian Online
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