Vol 38 No 17 | SOUTH AFRICA Fighting for top jobs 29th August 1997 Mandela's imminent retirement as ANC leader is the signal for a race for top jobs Nothing can stop the carefully orchestrated ascendancy of Deputy President Thabo Mbeki, first to the African National Congress leadership and then to the South African presidency. The shadow...
Vol 38 No 17 | SOUTH AFRICASUDAN NIF targets Mandela 29th August 1997 President Nelson Mandela's extraordinary peacemaking bid in Sudan, which appears to have pleased only the National Islamic Front, came without South African Foreign Ministry support, Africa Confidential understands....
Vol 38 No 15 | SOUTH AFRICA Heading south 18th July 1997 Chief Buthelezi is making common cause with the ANC's Modise to keep out illegals Deputy President Thabo Mbeki speaks animatedly of an 'African Renaissance' – an updated version of Kwame Nkrumah's Pan-Africanism but with South Africa rather than Ghana steering the way....
Vol 38 No 12 | LIBYASOUTH AFRICA Gesture politics 6th June 1997 Colonel Moammar el Gadaffi may plan to fly to South Africa in breach of United Nations Security Council (Lockerbie) sanctions on Libya flights. Britain and the United States...
Vol 38 No 9 | SOUTH AFRICA Keep trekking 25th April 1997 Afrikaner farmers move north, funded by the EU and some mysterious benefactors One hundred and sixty years after the 'Great Trek' of Afrikaners from the Western Cape into the interior, a smaller, more bizarre trek is under way. Under government...
Vol 38 No 6 | SOUTH AFRICA Comrade shareholders 14th March 1997 Union leaders are following the capitalist road to black empowerment In a revolutionary mix of ideology and pragmatism, black trade unionists are invading the fringes of white capitalist power. Once the unions led the way to black empowerment...
Vol 38 No 6 | SOUTH AFRICAEUROPE Trading places 14th March 1997 European politicians sound friendly but do not match post-apartheid expectations A cloud of misunderstandings surrounds the unfinished negotiations between South Africa and the European Union on the rules for trade between them. In the days before South Africa...
Vol 38 No 5 | SOUTH AFRICA First, the good news 28th February 1997 Having weathered political and economic storms in the past year, the ANC-led government is showing results After just over a thousand days in office, President Nelson Mandela and his ministers have a spring in their step. The rand is strengthening; the economic management is...
Vol 38 No 5 | SOUTH AFRICA Deep foreground 28th February 1997 It was an impressive, if slightly bizarre, demonstration of open government. On 10 February, 30 or so journalists found themselves in the hospitality suite of the National Intelligence...
Vol 38 No 4 | SOUTH AFRICA Hard bargains 14th February 1997 Buthelezi raises the stakes at a time when his ANC opponents need successful peace talks The Zulu nationalist Inkatha Freedom Party is poised to extract far reaching concessions from its main opponents, the African National Congress. The ANC wants a peace agreement, having...