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JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - Outspoken South African ANC youth leader Julius Malema has emerged stronger after his rebuke by President Jacob Zuma and the ruling ANC party, he was quoted as saying in The Sunday Times newspaper.

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JOS, Nigeria (Reuters) - Youths hacked to death three Muslim herders in central Nigeria on Saturday and burned their bodies, days after a curfew was lifted in a region where hundreds have died in religious violence this year.

Military officials said the three herders from the Muslim Fulani ethnic group were searching for lost cattle when they were set upon by Christian Berom villagers in Tusung, some 40 km (25 miles) south of the Plateau state capital, Jos.

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By Daren Butler and Abdiaziz Hassan

ISTANBUL (Reuters) - U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said on Saturday that international support for the current Somalia government was the only chance to stabilise the chaotic country.

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PRESS TV

At least 16 people, including six children, have been killed and dozens injured in heavy gun battles in Somalia's capital Mogadishu, residents and medics say.

The clashes erupted after Somali fighters launched an attack on government troops' bases in northern districts of Shibis and Bondhere, a Press TV correspondent reported on Sunday.

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PRESS TV

Voting has begun in Ethiopia to elect members of the lower House of Representatives and local councilors amid rights groups' criticism of "shrinking freedom."

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ALJAZEERA

Somalia's al-Shabab, the armed anti-government group, has attacked the presidential palace in Mogadishu, leaving at least 14 civilians dead, officials and witnesses say.

Government forces backed by African Union troops retaliated on Saturday against the fighters, whose attack came as Sharif Sheikh Ahmed, the Somali president, was attending a conference in Turkey.

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ALJAZEERA

Vote counting is underway in Ethiopia following a national election that Meles Zenawi, the country's long-standing prime minister, has said he expects to win.

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AFRICA NEWS

Dozens of armed Al-Shabaab fighters stormed Somaliweyn Radio - an independent broadcasting house - in Mogadishu, capital of Somalia, managers said on Friday. According to the station's website the militants took FM transmitters after the insurgents had seized the area from government forces.

10/05/2010
Dar es Salaam, (The Observer) -- There were snap calls for Africa’s youth to embrace hope ahead of doubt, and have the self-belief that only they can shape their destiny, as the World Economic Forum on Africa came to an end in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.

The calls were provoked by a need for a change in Africa’s growth strategy, the theme of the three-day conference.

A press statement from the forum notes that “To end the continent’s marginalization, Africans must believe in themselves” and, quoting Jacob Zuma, South Africa’s President, “be the change they want to see.”

To those who still have doubts about Africa, Zuma said that proof of the continent’s potential will be unveiled when the football World Cup tournament – one of the most watched competitions – kicks off in a month’s time in South Africa.

“There were a lot of doubts and scepticism. But people who come to Africa will see that we are not just bushes and mountains. They will see how Africa is ready to do anything that can be done anywhere else in the world.”

Africa will field six countries in the 32-nation football showpiece, all with the potential of beating the mighty countries from the West. But when it comes to matters Economics, Africa remains on the periphery.

Africa accounts for 3.5% of global exports despite the fact that it possesses immense resources, and Foreign Direct Investment into the continent remains a trickle, 0.96%, regardless of the fact that the bloc offers one of the highest returns on investment.

Jakaya Kikwete, Tanzania’s President, tried to offer an explanation for this discrepancy. “Africa remains predominantly a primary producer and importer for industrial use. We produce what we don’t consume and we consume what we don’t produce,” he said. “This cannot continue.”

Solutions to this dilemma seem to be placed around the youth, who constitute 60% of the African population.

“Let’s take a bunch of young people and put their minds on fire. You should believe in the demographics [of Africa], make your human capital capable and entrepreneurship will happen,” said Ajai Chowdhry, the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, HCL Infosystems.

Anna Tibaijuka, the UN Under Secretary General and Executive Director, United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-HABITAT), could not have agreed more.

“There is a role to be played by everyone. But we cannot afford to have more than half our population underutilized and 60% of young people left behind,” she said.

Directing this youthful energy and strategies could work best in the agricultural sector, the bread winner for more than half of African households. “All of us have to accept and understand that farming is business,” said Joergen Ole Haslestad, President and Chief Executive Officer, Yara International, Norway.

The conference also called for a cleanup in the continent’s volatile politics, which stifles efforts in attracting foreign investors. At least 14 general or presidential elections are to take place on the continent this year, the focus of the highly critical Western media.

The conference noted that democracy boosts economic development and reduces poverty.

Amnesty International on Thursday called for retrial of so-called members of Hezbollah convicted of launching alleged attacks in Egypt by ordinary court.

Egyptian lawmakers rejected the allegations made by Israeli regime that Syria is equipping Hezbollah with Scud missiles.

ABUJA, May 1 (Xinhua) -- The United State Naval Forces has expressed concern over terrorist activities in Africa.

Admiral Mark Fitzgerald, commander of U.S. Naval in Africa and Europe, disclosed this in Abuja on Friday when he visited Nigeria's Chief of Defense Staff (CDS), Air Chief Marshal Paul Dike in his office.

Fitzgerald called for collective efforts to combat the ugly phenomenon of terrorism.

He said the U.S. government would assist Africa in solving its problems, stressing those African problems would be given African solutions because each of the sub regions had its peculiar problems.

The visiting U.S official praised the Nigerian military for its leading role in maintaining peace in Africa and called for more future cooperation among the two nations.

Responding, the CDS expressed appreciation on the efforts of the U.S. government for showing interest in improving the capacity of Nigeria's Armed Forces in the area of training.

Dike called for more collective efforts in combating terrorism, which is a global phenomenon.

The CDS was presented a Medal of Excellence by the U.S. High Command.

DAR ES SALAAM, April 30 (Xinhua) -- Tanzania Information Services Assistant Director Raphael Hokororo on Friday termed 2010 Shanghai World Expo as a good opportunity to promote exchanges and enhance understanding among all countries.

Hokororo made the remarks in a phone interview with Xinhua just after the end of the grand and splendid opening ceremony of the 2010 Shanghai World Expo, noting that the Expo would enhance the relations between African countries and China, as well as that of China and developing countries.

"The Expo will help further open China's market to African products, and Chinese products to enter the African markets," the Tanzanian media official said, hailing China's much support to African countries and the deepened Africa-China partnership.

The Shanghai World Expo is an international exposition that will take place from May 1 to Oct. 31 this year and cover a surface of more than 5 square km in Shanghai, under its main theme of "Better City, Better Life".

It was the first time for the 159-year-old World Expo to be held in a developing country since the inaugural fair in London in 1851.

A total of 189 countries would present their best at the six- month event, which is expected to attract 70 million visitors from China and abroad and likely to be the ever largest World Expo.

ANTANANARIVO, April 30 (Xinhua) -- Madagascar's President of the Highest Transitional Authority (HAT) Andry Rajoelina has promised to present a roadmap to end the crisis to the armed forces on Monday, according to a senior officer of the gendarmerie.

The meeting of the army and Rajoelina could be postponed "if the Pretoria talks to end the crisis fail to come up with anything concrete in the coming days," said the officer declined to be identified.

The officer also disclosed that a meeting will be held on Sunday within the gendarmerie in preparation for the next day's session with the president.

Earlier this month, the army urged Rajoelina to produce a roadmap to end the year-long crisis in the Indian Ocean island country. The army has apparently become impatient since supporting the 36-year-old leader in the ousting of former president Marc Ravalomanana in March 2009.

In a new bid following the failure of last year's agreements, Rajoelina and Ravalomanana opened talks on Wednesday in Pretoria at the initiative of the host South Africa, France and the regional bloc SADC.

Just before leaving for South Africa on Tuesday, Rajoelina already said he would return with a concrete roadmap leading to the establishment of the Fourth Republic on solid grounds.

Although the Pretoria meeting was arranged mainly between Rajoelina and Ravalomanana, a political solution must be adopted by former presidents Didier Ratsiraka and Albert Zafy as well. The four parties signed the Maputo and Addis Ababa agreements last year, which collapsed partly due to Ravalomanana's challenge to Rajoelina's role to head the transition.

HAT is also under pressure from the African Union, which imposed sanctions on Rajoelina and 109 other officials in March for failing to implement the Maputo and Addis Ababa agreements. The sanctions include the denial of travel visas, the freeze of their external assets and the prohibition from international meetings.

Rajoelina's replacement of Ravalomanana is seen as unconstitutional. The international community has been working for a return to democracy and the constitutional order.

2010-04-30
LONDON (Reuters) - Oil tankers are routing their voyages further east into the Indian Ocean away from Somalia's coastline to avoid pirates who are striking deeper out at sea, a senior ship industry official said on Friday.

Somali pirates have increased their attacks in recent months, making tens of millions of dollars in ransoms from seizing ships, including tankers and dry bulkers, in the Indian Ocean and the Gulf of Aden.

Graham Westgarth, chairman of INTERTANKO, an association whose members own the majority of the world's tanker fleet, said while navy patrols had ensured the Gulf of Aden was a more secure area, vessels faced growing attacks in the Indian Ocean.

"What is happening is that people are routing their ships further and further east which of course adds miles to the route," he told Reuters in an interview.

"There seems to be no limit to the distances that the Somali pirates are prepared to go."

The use of mother ships has enabled Somali pirates to strike as far as the Mozambique Channel and off India's coast in recent months launching smaller boats known as skiffs against ships.

An estimated 7 percent of world oil consumption passes through the Gulf of Aden. Ship brokers have said some tankers are travelling as far as Madagascar or even around the Cape of Good Hope to avoid seaborne gangs.

Better weather is expected to enhance opportunities for attacks in the coming weeks.

Ship brokers said there had been reports this week of an attack on a Japanese oil tanker between the Middle East Gulf and the west coast of India, which broker Braemar Seascope said was a "disturbing development".

"(Somali pirates) are casting their net wider and even more brazenly than before," it said in a report.

Foreign navies have boosted activities off the Gulf of Aden since 2009 and have operated convoys, as well as setting up a transit corridor across dangerous waters. But their forces have been stretched over the vast area, leaving ships vulnerable.

The U.N. Security Council suggested this week creating special piracy courts to plug a gap in the world response to the costly attacks on merchant ships off the lawless Somali coast.

Prosecution of captured pirates has been hampered by disagreements over which country should try them. Somalia itself lacks the legal infrastructure to support trials.

Westgarth said there needed to be a much more aggressive approach taken by governments in combating piracy.

"If they are captured they should be brought to trial and dealt with accordingly," he said.

2010-04-30
KIGALI (Reuters) - Two former Rwandan rebels have claimed they received money to build a new insurgency from presidential hopeful Victoire Ingabire, who has been charged with crimes linked to genocide, the national prosecutor said on Friday.

Ingabire, who heads one of the central African nation's emerging opposition parties, denied she had met either individual or sent them funds.

The accusations may jeopardise her chances of being allowed to register her party and run against President Paul Kagame in August presidential elections, in which he is expected to win another seven-year term.

National Prosecutor Augustin Nkusi said the pair had pleaded guilty to charges of plotting to destabilise Rwanda, belonging to a terrorist organisation and collaborating with Ingabire to launch a new rebel group, the Coalition of Democratic Forces.

"Ingabire met them in the Democratic Republic of Congo and asked them if they could make a force for her. She said she could give them political and financial support," Nkusi told Reuters.

"They are accused of being terrorists because they belonged to the Democratic Liberation Forces of Rwanda (FDLR), and after that they tried to make their own forces: governed, supported and launched by Ingabire," he said.

INGABIRE DENIES SUPPORT

Ingabire told Reuters she did not know either Lt. Col Noel Habiyaremye or Lt. Col Tharcisse Mbiturende. They were arrested in Burundi last year while seeking military support for their insurgency, according to Nkusi.

"I don't have any contact with them. I don't know them ... I don't have any military groups," Ingabire said. "They said I met these people in Kinshasa in March, but in my passport I can show that in March 2008 I was not in Kinshasa."

"If I sent money to them, (the courts) have to provide evidence of when and where I sent this money," she said.

A former accountant who in February returned to Rwanda from The Netherlands after 16 years in exile, Ingabire was last week charged with peddling genocide ideology, ethnic division and collaborating with the FDLR rebels who have destabilised eastern Congo for more than a decade.

Ingabire said the charges were baseless. She was subsequently released on bail but is not allowed to leave the capital Kigali or return home.

Ingabire also rejects allegations made in a 2009 U.N. report linking some of her party members to the FDLR, some of whose leaders were responsible for the genocide.

Since returning to Rwanda, Ingabire's questions over the success of ethnic reconciliation and justice have prompted heavy criticism from the country's largely pro-government media.

They accuse Ingabire of flouting the country's post-genocide constitution which bans sectarianism and acts that could incite conflict or disputes. The law was established in 2008 to prevent inflammatory language which played a major role in fomenting the genocide.

Rights groups say the law is vague and frequently used by the government to stifle legitimate dissent.

2010-04-30
ABUJA (Reuters) - The European Union will not impose trade sanctions against African states under controversial leadership, including Madagascar, for fear of unfairly punishing ordinary citizens, a senior EU official said.

Peter Thompson, director of development for the European Commission's trade arm, said diplomatic pressure through the United Nations and other international organisations remained the best route to seeking political reforms in Africa.

"In the history of EU and (African) relations, we have never, ever used trade sanctions," Thompson told Reuters during a visit to Nigeria's capital Abuja.

"We have never used them because we think trade is helping deliver development to the people, not the government."

Madagascar's former leader, Marc Ravalomanana, last month urged the EU to follow the African Union's lead and impose sanctions on President Andry Rajoelina for failing to install a unity government with opposition groups.

The two are among Madagascar's political elite meeting in South Africa this week for talks on resolving the crisis to avoid a possible military takeover.

"The chances of us ever using trade sanctions against Madagascar are as close to zero as you can possibly imagine," Thompson said.

But, although the EU has not barred trade, it has suspended aid worth hundreds of millions of dollars to Madagascar, the world's fourth largest island.

MAIN TRADING PARTNER

The European Union is the main trading partner for most African countries, importing around 40 billion euros of goods each year -- mostly oil, cocoa and diamonds.

The EU is working to finalise major trade agreements with East and West African trading blocs this year.

Thompson said he hoped the East African Community, made up of Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda, would sign a new trade deal in the next few months.

East African countries reached an Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) in 2007, securing EU market access, but later said they would not sign a final deal without firm EU commitments to development aid.

The EPA is meant to replace preferential trade agreements that the World Trade Organisation has struck down.

Thompson said that if an agreement is not sewn up soon, the entire initiative could collapse.

"At some point, the position of having an agreement ... no longer makes sense. The situation becomes increasingly unsustainable, untenable and legally bankrupt."

The EU is also seeking a trade deal with the West African trade bloc, but talks are not as advanced.

A ministerial meeting is planned in the next few months to resolve a number of technical issues between the two sides.

2010-04-30
DAR ES SALAAM (Reuters) - The United States and Zanzibar signed a $28.1 million aid package on Friday for financing a power project aimed at alleviating frequent electricity outages in the semi-autonomous islands.

The agreement will finance the manufacture and installation of a new 100 megawatt submarine power cable between mainland Tanzania and Zanzibar, the U.S. embassy said in a statement.

"This new cable will more than double the capacity of the existing cable that recently broke down," said the statement.

Erratic power supply is hurting the economy of the Indian Ocean archipelago that relies on tourism for more than 25 percent of its gross domestic product and 70 percent of its foreign exchange.

Electrical power was restored to Zanzibar on March 8, three months after the islands were plunged into darkness.

"Adequate and reliable power supply is absolutely vital for this island. It is not only an essential foundation for economic growth and prosperity -- it is fundamental to the very health and well-being of every resident of this island," U.S. Ambassador Alfonso Lenhardt said at the signing ceremony.

He urged the Tanzanian and Zanzibar governments to push forward with policy reforms in the energy sector.

Zanzibar President Amani Abeid Karume announced in March that his government would invest more than $150 million over the next two years in power projects.

2010-04-30
ABUJA (Reuters) - A Nigerian militant faction on Friday claimed it had attacked a Shell-operated oil facility in the Niger Delta, but the Anglo-Dutch firm denied any such incidents in the area.

The Joint Revolutionary Council (JRC) said it blew up the "Shell Creek manifold" in Buguma in Rivers state late on Thursday to mark the beginning of a new operation.

A Shell spokesman and security sources said they had found no evidence of an attack in the region.

The JRC has in the past claimed attacks which oil firms, the military and security contractors have subsequently been unable to confirm.

2010-04-30
PORT LOUIS (Reuters) - A parliamentary election in Mauritius on May 5 will be closely contested but analysts expect reforms designed to diversify the Indian Ocean island's economy to continue, regardless of who wins.

Both the ruling Labour Party and its opposition Mauritian Militant Movement rivals have campaigned on strengthening the welfare state and social justice in one of Africa's most stable and prosperous economies.

"It is difficult at this stage to say who will win this election though some analysts predict it will be the Labour Party-led alliance," political analyst Jocelyn Low told Reuters.

"The two alliances have said they will both stick to the same economic agenda ... but with more emphasis on poverty alleviation and welfare measures to tone down the liberal policies."

Prime Minister Navinchandra Ramgoolam has overseen sustained growth since he was elected in 2005, slashing red-tape to lure foreign investors and weathering the financial crisis better than expected thanks to economic policies praised by donors.

Ramgoolam's Labour Party formed an alliance with the smaller Militant Socialist Movement (MSM) to bolster its support base.

There has been strong speculation that MSM's leader, Pravind Jugnauth, has given his support to the prime minister on the understanding he will become finance minister if they win.

Ramakrishna Sithanen, the incumbent finance minister and architect of Mauritius' reform package, has been denied a ticket to stand in the elections by Ramgoolam.

HUMANISE THE ECONOMY

Mauritius has pitched itself as a bridge between Africa, India and China, with a flourishing offshore financial sector, that has allowed the island nation of 1.3 million people to pack an economic punch above its weight.

But Chandan Jankee, economics professor at the University of Mauritius, said Sithanen's ultra-liberal economic strategy had failed to distribute resources to low income earners.

"A new government will have the responsibility to humanise Sithanen's reforms to ensure that resources trickle down to the mass of the population," said Jankee.

Mauritius, which is located about 500 km (300 miles) east of Madagascar in the southwestern Indian Ocean, is split into 20 constituencies, each with three legislators represented in the National Assembly.

The tiny island of Rodrigues, 560 km further east where infrastructure remains basic, has two representatives in the chamber. Another eight seats are allocated to best losers, to ensure all ethnic communities are represented fairly.

Mauritians are demanding the next government tackle poverty, fight crime and make the Mauritius rupee go further.

"The next government must make it a priority to improve the purchasing power of the population. Inflation is low but we don't feel it when we go to the supermarket," Josian Botte told Reuters in the capital Port Louis.

Some analysts said a Labour Party win would see Rundheersing Bheenick reinstated as governor of the Bank of Mauritius. Bheenick's mandate was not renewed in February after allegations he abused his authority.