When the new Pan-African Parliament is inaugurated in Ethiopia next week, it will confront a host of challenging issues - not least the role of mercenaries in Africa. “Mercenaries are now topical. They are in the news,” Frene Ginwala, the Speaker of South Africa's National Assembly, told journalists in Johannesburg on Friday. Ginwala was referring to the 79 suspected mercenaries who were arrested in Zimbabwe and the oil-rich West African nation of Equatorial Guinea this week. Along with four of her colleagues in the legislature, the speaker will represent South Africa in the Pan-African Parliament (PAP), which is to hold its first session from March 15 to 20 in Addis Ababa.