Pambazuka News 421: Zimbabwe: Transitional justice without transition?

Zanu-PF leader Robert Mugabe has dismissed as "nonsense" Western demands that he free up Zimbabwe's media in order to get sanctions lifted. In an interview with Zimbabwe television aired late on Thursday, Mugabe also denied foreign media reports that his family recently bought a luxury home in Hong Kong, and criticised Britain for plans to help some of its nationals leave Zimbabwe.

On 25 February 2009, the Malawi Communications Regulatory Authority (MACRA) has temporarily closed Mzimba Community Radio Station, based in the northern part of the country, on grounds that the station did not comply with the regulatory body's rules and regulations as stipulated in the Communications Act.

A Bandundu court has declared the charges pending against Bwamputu Akienzin Zéphyrin unfounded, acquitting him on all counts at his fifth court appearance. Zéphyrin was originally summoned to court in December 2008 on a defamation charge brought by Marie Théodore Kipulu Samba, a former RTNC director, after he broadcast the news of Kipulu's sacking as director of RTNC-Bandundu. Kipulu asked the court for US$50,000 in damages, in addition to the sentence provided for by law. His request was den...read more

Last week, regulars at the HIV treatment clinic at Pelonomi hospital, in Bloemfontein, capital of South Africa's Free State Province, would have told you that the clinic has never been this quiet. Ever since the provincial government stopped initiating new patients on antiretroviral (ARV) drugs, the buzzing treatment literacy classes for people about to start taking ARVs had shrunk in size, while some existing patients stopped coming to check whether their drugs were in stock.

Calm has returned to the northern Nigerian city of Bauchi following two days of sectarian clashes that killed 14 people, displaced 4,500 and left 100 hospitalised, according to police and the International Committee of the Red Cross. The violence erupted on 20 February, with youths burning mosques and churches, according to residents of Bauchi, the capital of Bauchi state, about 300km northeast of the capital Abuja.

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