New South African President Jacob Zuma was to unveil his Cabinet yesterday with all eyes on the key finance portfolio tasked with steering the country through approaching recession.
Zuma has promised to boost the country’s lackluster public service and at his inauguration on Saturday reiterated that much work lay ahead in a speech that balanced themes of reconciliation and sober challenges.
“The dreams and hopes of all the people of our country must be fulfilled,” he told 5,000 invited guests and 50,000 onlookers at his swearing-in in Pretoria.
“There is no place for complacency, no place for cynicism, no place for excuses. Together we must build a society that prizes excellence and rewards effort, which shuns laziness and incompetence,” he said.
South African newspapers called for honesty and hard work as they ushered in the new era.
Zuma and his Cabinet would have to “do more with less” to deliver promises to do away with poverty, crime and unemployment, the Sunday Times said.
“Jacob Zuma holds the prize,” said its editorial, which called for good governance. “Now it is the country and not the party that begs the attention of the new government.”
While speculation is rife on who will be named to the country’s fourth democratic government, the 67-year-old has warned that there will be no favors when he announces his line-up, despite pressure to please leftist backers.
They supported him throughout an eight-year corruption probe and drove his stunning come-back from the political wilderness after he was fired as deputy president in 2005 by then president Thabo Mbeki.
His team takes office as South Africa heads into its first recession since the fall of apartheid 15 years ago.
“We must acknowledge that we find ourselves in difficult economic times,” Zuma said on Saturday.
“We will not be spared the negative impact and are beginning to feel the pinch. This will require more hard work than ever before,” he said.
The finance portfolio is the most closely watched with popular, long-serving minister Trevor Manuel tipped for a Cabinet redeployment after 13 years at that post, which made him a favorite with investors.
Manuel is credited with having steered South Africa’s banks safely through the global meltdown. The charismatic finance chief also oversaw the country’s first budget surplus in 30 years.
Another key appointment will be Zuma’s choice of health minister after years of AIDS denial under Mbeki that let the world’s worst HIV crisis spiral to lethal proportions.
Activists want Zuma to retain no-nonsense veteran activist Barbara Hogan who was appointed to the post late last year by Zuma’s immediate predecessor, president Kgalema Motlanthe.
Motlanthe is tipped to serve as his deputy where he is likely to be viewed as a steady hand and a welcome sign of continuity in the presidency.
“There will be a mix of old and new” in Zuma’s Cabinet, political analyst Adam Habib said.
The media called on Zuma to watch his Cabinet ministers closely and replace those who did not perform. Mbeki was frequently criticized for keeping on under-performing ministers.
“Corrupt ministers and officials must be fired, not redeployed or allowed to fight on endlessly at the public’s expense,” the Sunday Times said.
Zuma took office after his ascent to power was nearly derailed by corruption claims and bitter in-fighting within the ruling African National Congress.
Also See: South Africans make a song and dance about politics
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un sent Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) greetings with what appeared to be restrained rhetoric that comes as Pyongyang moves closer to Russia and depends less on its long-time Asian ally. Kim wished “the Chinese people greater success in building a modern socialist country,” in a reply message to Xi for his congratulations on North Korea’s birthday, the state-run Korean Central News Agency reported yesterday. The 190-word dispatch had little of the florid language that had been a staple of their correspondence, which has declined significantly this year, an analysis by Seoul-based specialist service NK Pro showed. It said
On an island of windswept tundra in the Bering Sea, hundreds of miles from mainland Alaska, a resident sitting outside their home saw — well, did they see it? They were pretty sure they saw it — a rat. The purported sighting would not have gotten attention in many places around the world, but it caused a stir on Saint Paul Island, which is part of the Pribilof Islands, a birding haven sometimes called the “Galapagos of the north” for its diversity of life. That is because rats that stow away on vessels can quickly populate and overrun remote islands, devastating bird
‘CLOSER TO THE END’: The Ukrainian leader said in an interview that only from a ‘strong position’ can Ukraine push Russian President Vladimir Putin ‘to stop the war’ Decisive actions by the US now could hasten the end of the Russian war against Ukraine next year, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Monday after telling ABC News that his nation was “closer to the end of the war.” “Now, at the end of the year, we have a real opportunity to strengthen cooperation between Ukraine and the United States,” Zelenskiy said in a post on Telegram after meeting with a bipartisan delegation from the US Congress. “Decisive action now could hasten the just end of Russian aggression against Ukraine next year,” he wrote. Zelenskiy is in the US for the UN
A 64-year-old US woman took her own life inside a controversial suicide capsule at a Swiss woodland retreat, with Swiss police on Tuesday saying several people had been arrested. The space-age looking Sarco capsule, which fills with nitrogen and causes death by hypoxia, was used on Monday outside a village near the German border. The portable human-sized pod, self-operated by a button inside, has raised a host of legal and ethical questions in Switzerland. Active euthanasia is banned in the country, but assisted dying has been legal for decades. On the same day it was used, Swiss Department of Home