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That all politicians are lying, venal hypocrites is probably true, but the leader of a confused southern African nation surely takes the biscuit. Last week he rose on his hind legs and told the strangest of lies about his troubled central African neighbour. More remarkable still, he told these particular lies to the entire world. This dissipated leader said, with a straight face, that talks between the ruining Zany Party and the More Drink Coming Party were underway. He said this while standing next to the leader of the free world, liberator of oil producing nations and all-round good guy,...

Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe said on Saturday African leaders had greater admiration for his country than ever before, as he returned from an African Union (AU) summit in Maputo, state television said. Mugabe said his election as regional vice chair of the AU was "an honour to us and it also serves paid to those in the hostile circles who think that Zimbabwe is being isolated." "There is greater admiration now for Zimbabwe than there ever was, and we are very happy about that," he added. The Zimbabwean leader has been in Maputo, in neighbouring Mozambique for the second AU...

THROUGHOUT the African safari of President George W Bush last week, tension mounted over Zimbabwe. Colin Powell, his secretary of state, had been deeply affected by a meeting with Pius Ncube, the Bishop of Matabeleland, only a few weeks before. Ncube had told him in terrible detail of the many murders, rapes and tortures orchestrated by the regime of President Robert Mugabe and the way in which its opponents were being systematically deprived of food aid from America and Britain. Powell declared that Mugabe's time had "come and gone'. The Bush team was also determined to be rid of Charles...

(White House-AP) -- President Bush is back at the White House after ending a week-long trip to Africa on an optimistic note. He told a group of African and African-American leaders in Nigeria yesterday that he's confident the coming decade will be one of rising prosperity and spreading peace for the continent. In addition to Nigeria, Bush's trip took him to Senegal, South Africa, Botswana and Uganda. The five-nation, five-day tour inevitably has drawn comparisons with President Clinton's two, more liesurely visits to Africa. But Secretary of State Powell told reporters, "We're not here for style, we're here for...

- President Bush said Saturday he still has faith in his intelligence chief after CIA Director George Tenet accepted blame for Bush's erroneous claim about Iraqi weapons. Meanwhile, Prime Minister Tony Blair's office insisted he still believes the disputed charge that Iraq sought uranium in Africa was true, saying Britain has reliable information it cannot share with Washington because it comes from foreign intelligence sources. In a letter made public Saturday, British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said the CIA had expressed doubts to Britain about the uranium charge but did not specify what they were. Britain did not know until...

AS PRESIDENT Bush winds up his five-nation tour of Africa, perhaps it's time to revisit that annoying question of whether he should have apologized for slavery. The president started off his tour in Senegal, where he visited the slave castle on Goree Island. Several newscasts quoted Bush when he called slavery a "sin," but added that he didn't issue a blanket apology for slavery. That apology has been a demand of some African-Americans for the past several years. Should Bush have apologized?

Yetunde Ogunwa, a 45-year-old mother of five, lives without water or electricity in a dilapidated house next to mountains of garbage in Lagos, Nigeria's vast seaside commercial capital. Despite the country's massive oil wealth, Nigeria's citizens have grown steadily poorer and its cities more violent in the four years since military rule gave way to democracy. So as the United States turns to Nigeria to help lessen its dependence on Middle East oil, pressure is mounting for US President George Bush to take a stand against rampant corruption in the West African country. "If only they would let him see...

<p>President Bush's multinational African safari displays one of his more valuable talents: He's a fast learner.</p> <p>That's a valuable talent to have when you don't know much.</p> <p>As a candidate, he didn't know much about Africa and didn't much seem to care. During a televised presidential debate in which Africa came up, he accidentally called it a "country" and a low foreign-policy priority on his list.</p>

Bush Vows to Stop Terrorists Using Africa as BaseSat July 12, 2003 02:11 PM ET By John Chiahemen and Patricia Wilson ABUJA (Reuters) - President Bush warned on Saturday he would not allow terrorists to use Africa as a springboard to threaten the world as he ended a five-nation African trip that underlined a major U.S. policy shift. Bush, wrapping up his trip in Nigeria -- a major U.S. oil supplier -- issued fresh vows to help restore peace to war-ruined Liberia, provide funds for Africa to fight its AIDS scourge and promote economic development on the world's poorest continent....

Bush in South Africa? My, What Fools We’ve Become! By Ebrahim Mohamed Institute for Arabic & Islamic Research 09/07/2003 Yeahaah! As if in typical Western fashion, the Bush entourage (Billy the kid and his men) have decided to visit Africa. The West has become too small and unsophisticated for this new-age cowboy to wield his pea-shooter, so now he has to come to Africa to show us what he is really made of. If anything, we as South Africans can learn from our past President, the honorable Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela, that diplomacy is the child of steadfastness. Mr. Mandela has...

Bush Press Plane Stowaway Raises Security Scare (2003-07-11) ENTEBBE (Reuters) - A stowaway flew from South Africa to Uganda on the press plane accompanying President Bush on his visit to Africa and entered the compound where Bush met Uganda's president, U.S. officials said. U.S. Secret Service agents conducted a security sweep on the plane after the unidentified stowaway was detained and removed from the compound on the shores of Lake Victoria where Bush met President Yoweri Museveni Friday. "He did not have a credential. He did not have a passport. He has nothing," said White House travel office official Curtis...

Hmmm....

Abuja, Nigeria - Armed police backed by bulldozers tore down illegally built homes and shops in the Nigerian capital Abuja on Friday ahead of a visit by United States President George Bush. The operation began on Thursday after an order from President Olusegun Obasanjo to clean up the city ahead of his American counterpart's arrival, officials said. In one residential quarter of the city an AFP reporter saw about 60 buildings, ranging from brick-built structures to makeshift wooden shanties, ploughed down as hundreds of residents looked on in despair. "They didn't give us any warning," wailed tailor John Emeka, who...

ENTEBBE, Uganda - President Bush (news - web sites) and his national security adviser on Friday put responsibility squarely on the CIA (news - web sites) for the president's erroneous claim in his State of the Union address that Iraq (news - web sites) tried to acquire nuclear material from Africa. "I gave a speech to the nation that was cleared by the intelligence services," Bush told reporters in Uganda. National security adviser Condoleezza Rice (news - web sites) was more direct, saying, "The CIA cleared the speech in its entirety." If CIA Director George Tenet had concerns about the...

My fellow FReeper, if you aren't informed about the elephant incident, you need to be. How will people think you're informed if you don't find this? I checked this morning and didn't see it here in the forum. I checked this afternoon, and nothing. Not in 'search' or in the side bar. We must stay cutting edge when it comes to hold-muh-beer moments such as this. I am very proud of the way GW reacted when he encountered the elephant incident. He had no 'party boy' wit. He is too straight laced a guy. So is his wife. While many...

On Africa, George W Bush has proved a surprising president. Campaigning in 2000, he consigned the continent a lowly place on his list of foreign policy priorities and said he would not have committed American troops to Rwanda in 1994 to prevent genocide. Yet during his visit to Senegal, South Africa, Botswana, Uganda and Nigeria this week, Pentagon teams have been assessing whether Washington should intervene militarily to end the civil war in Liberia. And earlier this year Mr Bush signed into law an emergency plan for Aids relief that would commit $15 billion to fighting the disease, primarily in...

Did anyone else see Terry Moran on ABC this morning when they showed two elephants mating, with a third looking on he exclaimed that birds do it, bees do it, and so do elephants? Then 'Moron' says they are simply producing some more Republicans and that its a lesson for "social conservatives." Or something to that effect. He seemed to get a real kick out of it while the tele-bimbo seemed embarrased. Please forgive if already posted.

SHAKE DJIBOUTI: A US Army Humvee enters Camp Lemonier in Djibouti where some 1,800 troops are based for counterterrorism operations. KAREL PRINSLOO/AP/FILE JOHANNESBURG, SOUTH AFRICA - As he's swept across the continent, visiting a slave house in Senegal, a factory in South Africa, and a safari lodge in Botswana, President Bush has emphasized what America can do for Africa. He's hyped his $15 billion pledge for AIDS and promised to open American markets to African products. But the president's five-day, five-nation tour is also about what Africa can do for America, particularly regarding terrorism. The Sept. 11 terrorist attacks...

The US First Lady, Laura Bush, had tears in her eyes yesterday as she listened to a performance by the Watoto children's choir - made up mainly of children orphaned by HIV/Aids. Laura, and her husband, US President George W. Bush, were at The Aids Support Organisation clinic in Entebbe on the last stop of their four-hour visit to Uganda. During the emotional presentation, where President Yoweri Museveni was also present, Ms Bush wiped tears from her eyes as the children sang Christian songs of hope in English. Later, President Bush promised more support to Uganda in the fight...

**EXCLUSIVE** Secret Service just arrested a stowaway who made it onto the Bush press charter plane in Pretoria, South Africa this morning and flew unmolested to here, Entebbe, Uganda. After getting on and off the 747 with absolutely no credentials, he boarded a bus with the rest of the White House press corps and was taken to the Imperial Botanical Beach Hotel on the shore of Lake Victoria -- the same hotel where Bush arrived 90 minutes later. At length, the White House staff noticed that no one seemed to know the guy, so they alerted Secret Service, who arrested...