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By Gemma Meyer (Gemma Meyer is the pseudonym of a South African journalist. She and her husband, a former conservative member of parliament, still reside in South Africa.) People used to say that South Africa was 20 years behind the rest of the Western world. Television, for example, came late to South Africa (but so did pornography and the gay rights movement). Today, however, South Africa may be the grim model of the future Western world, for events in America reveal trends chillingly similar to those that destroyed our country. America's structures are Western. Your Congress, your lobbying groups, your...

When Nelson Mandela took power from the white minority government in South Africa in 1994, the longtime anti-apartheid activist held out hope that this was the beginning of the end of his people's poverty and the decades-long oppression that kept them in it. His gestures of reconciliation toward his and their erstwhile oppressors are credited with avoiding bloody conflict in the country, leading the world to hail South Africa as a "miracle." Today, South Africa is at a crossroads. The heirs to Mandela's legacy are battling among themselves, as the hope he inspired is fading under the weight of unmet...

LONDON — There was a time, not all that long ago, when he was the invisible man whose name was a battle cry, his appearance known to most people only from an out-of-date photograph, a hidden hero on a prison island off the coast of Africa. But as he celebrated his 90th birthday Friday, Nelson Mandela was anything but invisible, a figure of reverence whose nine decades have been marked and observed at a huge rock concert in London’s Hyde Park, a gala dinner for his children’s charity in the august, chandeliered Long Room at Lord’s cricket ground and a...

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Former South African President Nelson Mandela is to be removed from U.S. terrorism watch lists under a bill President Bush signed Tuesday. Mandela and other members of the African National Congress have been on the list because of their fight against South Africa's apartheid regime, which gave way to majority rule in 1994. Apartheid was the nation's system of legalized racial segregation that was enforced by the National Party government between 1948 and 1994. The bill gives the State Department and the Homeland Security Department the authority to waive restrictions against ANC members. "He had no place...

WASHINGTON, June 27 (Xinhua) -- Former South African President Nelson Mandela received a gift for his 90th birthday as U.S. Congress finally approved the removal of his name from the country's terrorist list, local media reported on Friday. The Senate unanimously greenlighted the legislation on a voice vote late on Thursday, removing the "terrorist" label and travel restrictions imposed on Mandela and other senior members of his African National Congress (ANC). A same legislation was passed on May 8 at the House of Representatives. In an address to the Senate last month, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice urged for...

The former South African president, who has himself been criticised for his failure to condemn the Mugabe regime, made his comments to an audience of world leaders and celebrities at a private fundraising dinner. Among the guests in Hyde Park were Gordon Brown and Bill Clinton, who also spoke, as well as Boris Johnson, the Mayor of London, and many of the stars who act as ambassadors for Mr Mandela's charities. The statesman, who is in Britain for a week-long visit in advance of his 90th birthday next month, mentioned Zimbabwe only briefly, calling on his audience to reach out...

Residents from the mining town of Kadoma awoke Friday morning to the sound of Zanu PF thugs demanding they pull down their satellite dishes or risk having their homes burnt down. Frightened residents hastily took down their satellite dishes after the Zanu PF mobs moved around the suburbs to enforce their demands. They accused foreign news stations, accessed via satellite, of misinforming Zimbabweans on the political situation in the country. A woman told us that all the men from nearby Venus Mine were forced to join the Zanu PF mobs in ‘a war against the residents of Kadoma.’ Two trucks...

WASHINGTON, May 1 (UPI) -- Nelson Mandela, South Africa's Nobel Prize-winning symbol of hope for leading the fight against apartheid, is reported still on U.S. terrorist watch lists. His inclusion means Mandela must have special permission to enter the United States, USA Today said Thursday. U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice calls it "embarrassing" and some members of Congress vow to fix it, hopefully by Mandela's 90th birthday on July 18. The same entry requirements apply to other members of South Africa's governing African National Congress, the once-banned anti-apartheid organization. In the 1970s and '80s the ANC was officially branded...

IT was early 1994 when Nelson Mandela gave a speech in a slum outside Cape Town and spoke in grand terms of a new beginning and how when he was elected president every household would have a washing machine. People took him literally. A few months later he became South Africa's first black president. That's when clerks in department stores in Cape Town had to turn people away demanding their free washer and dryer. Having spent some time as a reporter in South Africa watching the Mandela presidency I was reminded of that story this week when I travelled with...

It has become apparent that some journalists covering President Bush either have a learning disability or work extra hard to twist his words until the reporters turn into novelists. The latest to prove this theory correct works for Reuters, which sent out a story that claimed George Bush thought that Nelson Mandela had died, when in fact Bush used an analogy that clearly sailed over Reuters' head. It also showed that some progressive bloggers don't do much research when jumping all over a news quote: (via Memeorandum, Instapundit, and Best of the Web) Nelson Mandela is still very much alive...

Reuters Misleads About Bush Saying 'Mandela's Dead' By Warner Todd Huston | September 21, 2007 - 15:26 ET This one takes the cake as today, Reuters is trying to manufacture a controversy. Apparently alReuters doesn't understand the concept of "context" because they're idiotically claiming that in his Thursday press conference Bush said that Nelson Mandela is dead. Calling what Bush said "an embarrassing gaffe," Reuters took Bush's words out of context to make it seem as if Bush was talking about something he was not talking about. But any intelligent person can easily understand Bush's context merely by listening to...

Nelson Mandela (C), celebrating his 89th birthday, stands flanked by ex-US president Jimmy Carter (R) and former UN chief Kofi Annan (L), during the launching ceremony of the group known as The Elders in Johannesburg. A brains trust of elder statesmen such as Carter and former UN chief Kofi Annan was launched by Mandela Wednesday with a call to bring hope to a conflict-ridden world.(AFP/Alexander Joe) 'The Elders' Announcement, Johannesburg, South Africa. Graca Machel, Mary Robinson, Jimmy Carter, Nelson Mandela, Li Zhaoxing, Kofi Annan, Muhammad Yunus, Desmond Tutu.

Excerpt - JOHANNESBURG, South Africa: Bill Clinton charmed crowds in South Africa this week, showing the diplomatic skills he could put to use if his wife becomes America's first woman president. Hillary Clinton has said that she would make her husband a roaming ambassador, using his talent to repair America's tattered image abroad. Guests at a birthday function Bill Clinton attended in Johannesburg on Thursday for former South African President Nelson Mandela wanted to know if the American was ready for a role reversal. "You bet!" Bill Clinton said, sitting next to a chuckling Mandela. ~ snip ~

JOHANNESBURG -- The official order of business yesterday was the introduction of The Elders: convened at the request of Nelson Mandela, a collection of former leaders that has begun to work together to advance the causes of peace and global justice. Five Nobel Laureates and a handful of other eminences gathered on the stage in Johannesburg as Mr. Mandela announced that they would seek to fulfill the traditional role of elders in a village, providing wisdom and leadership and attempting to resolve conflicts, taking on everything from climate change to the fighting in Darfur.<>p>snip But as the Elders sat in...

This editorial board is happy to see that Winnie Madikizela-Mandela -- the former wife of Nelson Mandela -- has been denied a visa to enter Canada from South Africa. Ms. Madikizela-Mandela is a convicted criminal who had a hand in several notorious crimes. Those crimes should not be whitewashed merely because of her past role as an opponent of apartheid. Ms. Madikizela-Mandela had been scheduled to deliver the keynote address at a Toronto fundraiser last night, where she was also to be feted as the subject of a new opera based on her life, The Passion of Winnie. As best...

Mandela sues over 'missing' cash By Christopher Munnion in Johannesburg Last Updated: 1:33am GMT 26/02/2007 Nelson Mandela is taking legal action against a former friend and lawyer after £118,000 was reported to be missing from a trust fund. The retired South African president's legal team alleges in papers filed at the Johannesburg High Court that Ismael Ayob, a former fund trustee, used the money to buy cars and pay large sums into his own companies. In an affidavit, George Bizos and Wim Tremgrove, who are both trustees of the fund, allege that Mr Ayob made "disbursements of more than 1.2...

Glasgow, Scotland Amid tight security, Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed Al Megrahi, the man convicted of murdering 270 innocent people on an airliner that was downed by explosive device over Scotland in 1988, was rushed to hospital in Glasgow on Friday from Barlinnie Prison for unknown ailments. Ushered in through a rarely used “Decontamination Entrance Room” at the hospital, the terrorist was whisked down the hospital’s corridors with a SWAT team-like escort. The Decontamination Room in the hospital is specially designed with state of the art equipment to decontaminate victims of NBC (nuclear, biological, chemical) attack. The entrance was used for security...

Washington - The United States (US) treasury department named two South African cousins as al-Qaeda financiers and facilitators, ordering a freeze on any US assets they may have and banning Americans from doing business with them. The treasury, invoking an executive order used to combat terrorist financing and money laundering activities, said Farhad Ahmed Dockrat provided funds to a trust used by al-Qaeda, and his cousin, Junaid Ismail Dockrat, helped facilitate travel of South Africans to Pakistan for al-Qaeda training. The action ends days of speculation about the two Muslim cousins after a South African foreign ministry spokesperson said Johannesburg...

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa - Watch your back in South Africa. They kill folks here. Murder them at a bewildering rate. Robbers kill their victims, bystanders kill criminals, family members kill each other. Gunbattles erupt on streets and in shopping malls. Passers-by whip out pistols and join in firefights between criminals and police or security guards. A recent flurry in high profile bloodshed even has police suggesting they are losing the fight with violent crime. Plans for South Africa to host soccer's next World Cup, in 2010, has focused international attention on the crime rate, with organizers having to answer questions...

What do Nelson Mandela, Michael Collins, Archbishop Makarios, Menachim Begin, Yasser Arafat, Yitzhak Shamir, Eamon DeValera and Jomo Kenyatta have in common, apart from having being heads of state? As everybody knows, but few remember, they were all vilified as "terrorists" by the British or American authorities. Ronald Reagan branded Mandela's African National Congress a terrorist organization - and to be fair, it did commit some terrorist acts, while the ancestors of Likud blew up the King David Hotel, assassinated the highest British official in the Middle East during the war against the Nazis, and gunned down United Nations representative...

CAPE TOWN, South Africa - Sen. Barack Obama started a two-week tour of Africa on Sunday with a visit to Nelson Mandela's former prison island, paying tribute to the "incredible courage, resilience and hopefulness" of the anti-apartheid movement. The only black member of the U.S. Senate and one of the Democratic Party's rising stars, Obama said the two-hour visit to Robben Island made him realize that everyday worries in the United States were "fairly trivial stuff compared to the very elemental, basic struggle" of Mandela and other former inmates. Obama's late father was a goat herder who went on to...

The Irrelevant UN By Jenni Vinson Trejo January 4, 2005 On January 8, 1918 President Woodrow Wilson explained to the US House and Senate that the world had gotten smaller and that nations now affected each other so we needed to form a group of nations who agreed to work together. The world was embroiled in World War I. Wilson put forth fourteen points intended to serve as the basis for an alliance and world peace. Point 14 says: "A general association of nations should be formed on the basis of covenants designed to create mutual guarantees of the political...

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - Buried beneath a thick layer of dirt on a former farm in a northern Johannesburg suburb is the most famous gun in South African history. Or so a team of historians believe. For the past week, a bulldozer has been digging on the Liliesleaf farm in Rivonia in search of the Bulgarian pistol that former South African President Nelson Mandela hid weeks before his 1962 arrest by the nation's white rulers. The effort to find the gun -- which was largely forgotten through the darkest days of apartheid, the fall of white rule and establishment of democracy...

He was Mandela's heir. Now he's accused of raping woman who called him UncleFrom Jonathan Clayton in Johannesburg   HE ASPIRED to be South Africa’s next leader and considered himself the rightful heir to Nelson Mandela’s legacy, a black man ready to lead his people to peace and prosperity. But yesterday Jacob Zuma stood in the dock in a Johannesburg courtroom accused of rape, his quest for the presidency apparently in ruins. As political demises go, it could hardly have been more dramatic.   A hushed courtroom listened as an HIV-positive Aids activist recounted in graphic detail on the...

WORLD EXCLUSIVE Kate on coke at Mandela's Kate Moss ... snorted cocaine from dirty floor       By CLODAGH HARTLEY in Port Elizabeth, S AfricaTODAY The Sun blows the lid on the sleazy drug-fuelled world that held Kate Moss in a vice-like grip for TEN YEARS. The picture on Page One of  The Sun newspaper shows her in a hotel with cocaine chopped into four lines on the table. The supermodel, 32, is holding a rolled-up tube ready to snort the killer drug in another night of wild partying. We can reveal ‘Cocaine Kate’ even took it at the home...

Sean Penn, Snoop Dogg, Jamie Foxx and Danny Glover are among the thousands of mourners expected to turn out for the funeral of executed former gang leader Stanley 'Tookie' Williams early next week.

'Tookie' offered South Africa burialFrom: Agence France-Presse From correspondents in Johannesburg December 15, 2005 WINNIE Madikizela-Mandela has offered to help fulfil the final wish of executed former Los Angeles gang leader Stanley "Tookie" Williams and hold his burial in South Africa. A spokesman for the flamboyant former wife of Nelson Mandela told the Afrikaans daily newspaper Beeld that Madikizela-Mandela will "honour her promise to see that Williams is buried in South Africa." Williams, who was found guilty of four killings but became an anti-violence crusader on death row and an author of several books, was executed in California yesterday by...

Winnie to keep vow to 'Tookie ' 13/12/2005 22:20  - (SA)     Related Articles Arnie 'a cold-blooded murderer' Execution team struggled How 'Tookie' died 'Tookie' Williams executed Winnie lambastes Arnie Health24:Witnessing an execution   Eduan Roos and Sapa , Beeld  Johannesburg - If it was still his family's wish for him to be buried in South Africa, Winnie Madikizela-Mandela would do everything in her power to ensure that Stanley "Tookie" Williams's body was brought back here. A spokesperson for the ex-wife of former president Nelson Mandela, told Beeld this on Tuesday. Convicted murderer Williams, 51, was executed on Tuesday in San...

Abuja - Winnie Madikizela-Mandela has come out firmly and vehemently in favour of sexual abstinence as the only efficient way to fight the spread of Aids. Speaking at the International Conference on Aids and Sexually Transmitted Infections in Africa (ICASA) in Abuja, Nigeria, on Thursday, Madikizela-Mandela said: "We just have to tell our children to abstain. That's the only way we will prevent Aids as mothers on the continent. "And we tell our daughters it's a very simple remedy, it's called abstinence."

Partial firing continued until 4:30, when a victory having been reported to the Right Hon. Lord Viscount Nelson, KB and commander in chief, he then died of his wound." So reads the simple entry in the log of HMS Victory for Oct 21, 1805, the day of Trafalgar, one of the greatest sea battles of history, in which Admiral Horatio Nelson, architect of the Royal Navy vic­tory over the French and Spanish fleets, lost his life. On this month's 200th anniversary of that battle that ended Napoleon's threat of invasion, a battle is being fought over London's Trafalgar Square, where...

London Mayor Ken Livingstone, dubbed “Red Ken” by the press for his hard-left views, wants to plant, in the heart of Trafalgar Square, a 9-foot statue of another Nelson—Nelson Mandela. The Westminster Council vehemently objects. They say the Mandela statue, which shows him in a loose-fitting shirt, hands uplifted as though in animated conversation, should be placed in front of the South African embassy. Paul Drury, a consultant for the conservation group English Heritage, argues that putting an “informal, small-scale statue” of Mandela alongside the warrior heroes whose statues now stand there “would be a major and awkward change in...

Mandela wins BBC's 'global election'   Mandela was selected by more than half the players Former South African President Nelson Mandela has topped a BBC poll to find the person most people would like to lead a fantasy world government.More than 15,000 people worldwide took part in the interactive Power Play game, in which players were invited to choose a team of 11 to run the world from a list of around 100 of the most powerful leaders, thinkers and other high-profile people on the planet. The second choice was former US President Bill Clinton. The winning 11 were...

Mandela statue provokes another battle of Trafalgar By Nigel Reynolds, Arts Correspondent(Filed: 28/09/2005)Less than a fortnight after a statue of a pregnant naked woman with no arms went up in Trafalgar Square, the battle to commemorate another Nelson - Nelson Mandela - close by went into overdrive yesterday as two of the country's top sculptors clashed at a public inquiry.Glynn Williams, professor of sculpture at the Royal College of Art, denounced the £400,000 statue of Mr Mandela by Ian Walters as "run-of-the mill mediocre modelling" that did not measure up as a good work of art.   Ian Walters...

Farmers threaten armed struggle. 07/09/2005 21:39 - (SA) Pretoria - White farmers have threatened an armed struggle similar to that waged by the African National Congress unless their property and cultural concerns were addressed. A handful of farmers presented a memorandum on Wednesday to the Transvaal Agricultural Union's SA president, Paul van der Walt, urging him to convey their concerns to the government in the strongest possible language. These included "artificial pressure" on their language, culture, land and arms. "The way in which white farmers are being made a legitimate target as an excuse for slow land reform, should stop...

"The Fate of Africa"... is a heavy book, but it is light reading because it is so unfashionably straightforward. Martin Meredith has written a narrative history of modern Africa, devoid of pseudointellectual frills, gender discourse or postcolonial angst. He takes each of the larger African countries and tells you what happened there after independence.... Mr. Meredith's critics will accuse him of cultural insensitivity. By knocking down Africa's heroes, he is denying Africans the right to be proud of their own heritage. This is piffle. If Africa is to prosper, the first step is for Africans to understand what has gone...

THE HEADLINES out of Tehran concern the predictable failure of yet another round of farcical negotiations designed to stop Iran's nuclear weapons program. Meanwhile, a much more dramatic story is unfolding with much less attention. Investigative journalist Akbar Ganji has been on a hunger strike since June 11 to protest his unwarranted imprisonment over the last five years for the crime of criticizing the theocratic thugs who have hijacked his country. Recently, he has been moved from prison to a hospital, where he is said to be at death's door. His condition is so perilous that even his advocate —...

JOHANNESBURG, July 19 (Xinhuanet) -- A planned statue dedicated to former South African president Nelson Mandela will be tall enough to eclipse the Statue of Liberty in the United States, South African newspaper Die Burger reported on Tuesday. The statue, called the Freedom Monument, has a spiral design that will stand 122 meters high, taller than the American symbol of freedom, which stands 305 feet (92.99 meters) above the New York harbor, said the report. Local authorities of the southern city of Port Elizabeth announced the winning design of the monument as Mandela, a widely-respected anti-apartheid hero and Nobel Peace...

Move over Superman: here comes Mandela, the comic strip hero Thu Jul 7,11:16 AM ET JOHANNESBURG (AFP) - South Africa's first black president Nelson Mandela is to become a comic strip hero in a new project aimed at encouraging young people to read, his charity foundation said. "We are harnassing comics to get across the message and the values of Mr Mandela," John Samuel, chief executive of the Nelson Mandela Foundation, said Thursday. One million copies of each of the seven comic strips depicting Mandela's life will be distributed in newspapers and schools across South Africa as part of events...

Former South African president Nelson Mandela has joined with a star-studded cast of rock stars in the Arctic to plead for a global response to the AIDS pandemic. The pandemic affects 40 million people around the world and Mr Mandela, 86, has himself lost a son to AIDS. He has devoted considerable time to fighting the stigma surrounding the disease. The Norway concert, which Mr Mandela says aims to show "AIDS is a global issue", features Peter Gabriel and Annie Lennox. Some 40 million people around the world suffer from AIDS, including 25 million in Africa alone. The Nelson Mandela...

Palestinian security forces in Ramallah on Monday arrested a suspect in the murder of Samir Rantisi, a local journalist and spokesman for former PA Information Minister Yasser Abed Rabbo. Rantisi, 42, had for years urged Palestinians to endorse non-violent methods in their confrontation with Israel and was strongly opposed to suicide bombings. He was murdered early Monday morning while he was sleeping in his bedroom in the Sateh Marhaba neighborhood. A lone gunman who broke into his apartment in the Shkukani Building shot him twice in the head in front of his wife. The wife managed to identify the suspect,...

Q: Is the ANC better or worse than you expected in 1994?A: The ANC turned out to be exactly as was forecasted by the renowned anthropologist Dr. Wiets Beukes who warned of an impending danger. He predicted that South Africa would follow the same patterns as all African states. The demonisation of the Afrikaner community was crucial for the policies of black empowerment to survive international scrutiny. Black empowerment is blatant racial discrimination - even worse than under the apartheid government. Rectifying the injustices of the past was the 'hobby horse' selected. The ANC is now turning out to be...

Q: What is FF+ doing currently to achieve independence or autonomy for Afrikaners? A: Firstly, we are building the party in terms of organisation and members. The party is slowly becoming the only party in the country, and the world, who speaks on behalf of all the Afrikaners in the world. Our experience has shown that the present government reacts to pressure, and only the strong can exert pressure. We, therefore, participate in every municipal election where we have support, to enable our supporters to cast their votes in our favour. We have seen a steady indicator of growing support....

Hello all. Today I was talking with coworkers about South Africa and how Dave Chapel went there. While talking about South Africa the topic of Nelson Mandela came up. Now All I can remember about the man was that he was locked up in prison and eventually became head of that African continental organization thing. Problem is, I didn't know much about the man or what had happened with him, or what he did... other than being in prison for soem reason. If memory serves correct, it had something to do with the Whites and the Blacks and the Apartheid...

JOHANNESBURG: Former South African President Nelson Mandela is suing a former associate and a businessman for selling copies of his paintings depicting his prison years, local media reported today.

Here's an answer I haven't seen elsewhere to the phony "scandal" regarding Africa, yellowcake, and the forged documents gathered as part of the evidence.Freepers will recall that when the US advance captured the Salman Pak site during the war, the US forces came under criticism because they did not (because they could not for obvious reasons, its a multi-thousand acre site) fully protect the entire site. As a result, the Bush critics said, local Iraqis had looted unprotected areas and exposed themselves to radiation poisoning. Why? How? Here's why -- they found large quantities of plastic tubs filled with --...

My “Closing Argument”—poor Nelson Mandela. No not because the man spent 27 years of his life as a political prisoner in South Africa for refusing to support an unconscionable system of apartheid. But because it seems some of the world‘s more unsavory characters think that Mandela being jailed for leading a mass political struggle against racism is somehow comparable to their plights. The most recent, Michael Jackson. He told the Reverend Jesse Jackson this weekend that he like Mandela was being victimized by white officials pursuing child molestation charges against him. Whatever you think about the Jackson case and even...

President Bush has issued a statement on "Ten Years of Democracy in South Africa," conveniently ignoring the fact that South African President Thabo Mbeki is a Marxist who has surrounded himself with followers of radical Islam. The other curious omission is that while the president complimented "South Africa's commitment to progress at home and around the world," evidence is emerging that South Africa has played a role in nuclear weapons proliferation, including to Iran. The evidence is contained in a hot new book, Iran's Nuclear Option: Tehran's Quest for the Atom Bomb, by journalist Al Venter. Some people forget that...

Former South African President Nelson Mandela says poverty is equivalent to slavery and apartheid, and must be eliminated with the support of the world's richest nations. Mr. Mandela is in Britain at the government's invitation as part of Prime Minister Tony Blair's drive to push for poverty alleviation in developing countries, especially Africa. The former South African president spoke to several thousand people at a midday rally in London's Trafalgar Square, where he said poverty is a violation of fundamental human rights. "Like slavery and apartheid, poverty is not natural," he said. "It is man-made and it can be overcome...

Western nations should make reparations for enslaving and colonising Africans and finance a Marshall Plan-type fund for Africa, says US actor Danny Glover. "I believe in reparations for slavery and colonisation as well, in the shape of a Marshall Plan," Glover told the Associated Press on the sidelines of month-long celebrations in Ethiopia of the 60th anniversary of reggae legend Bob Marley who died in 1981. "Our basic attitude towards Africa is still one of the coloniser," said Glover, a UNICEF goodwill ambassador for the UN children's agency that has co-organised the celebrations with the Bob Marley Foundation. "The...