African press review 9 September 2013

Kenya and the International Criminal Court, labour relations in South Africa and the economy in Swaziland are among today's subjects...

The International Criminal Court must ensure that the trials of the Kenyan President and his deputy do not overlap, President Kenyatta warned yesterday, according to the Nairobi-based Standard.

Uhuru Kenyatta and William Ruto are separately accused of crimes against humanity for their alleged roles in the 2008 post-election violence

Speaking at a public rally on the eve of Deputy President Ruto’s departure for The Hague, Kenyatta warned the ICC that he and his deputy could withdraw their cooperation with the court unless their trials are rescheduled and set at different times.

The Head of State said he and his deputy wanted to continue cooperating, but not at the expense of honouring their executive responsibilities.

Ruto’s trial begins tomorrow while the President is scheduled to go before judges on 11 November. The trial schedule has the pair at The Hague together between 11 November and 13 December, meaning that both would be unavailable to lead celebrations marking Kenya’s 50th anniversary of independence.

The Standard also reports that the Nairobi parliament has intensified the assault on the International Criminal Court, with a planned vote in the Senate on Tuesday on a resolution to remove Kenya from the Rome Statute, the treaty which established the court.

The National Assembly, which approved a similar resolution to end Kenya’s membership of ICC during an acrimonious emergency session last week, will petition the Pan African Parliament to instigate a mass pull out by the continent.

ICC officials continue to insist that a Kenyan withdrawal from the Rome Statute will have no effect on trials, like those of Ruto and Kenyatta, which have already begun.

There's better news from Kenya on the front page of The Daily Nation. There we read that Kenyan writer Ngugi wa Thiong’o is being touted by some literary insiders as the top candidate for this year’s Nobel Prize for Literature.

Ladbrokes, the British betting agency, temporarily suspended betting on Ngugi on Thursday, leading a US website to suggest he may be one of the five finalists for the Nobel, if not the overall winner.

A Ladbrokes official told The Atlantic Wire, the website reporting the move, that the agency suspends betting only when a sudden large bet or bets have been made.

The Ladbrokes spokesman added that a sizeable bet had apparently been made by “a Swedish customer.”

The Nobel Prize for Literature is awarded by the Swedish Academy.

There's good news and bad news on the labour relations front in South Africa.

According to the main story in the financial paper BusinessDay, as car workers are set to return to assembly lines this morning after a strike of almost three weeks, workers elsewhere in the motor industry, including petrol attendants, are to down tools.

The strike action by the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa completely halted vehicle production.

Analysts and producers say the length of the strike has further dented South Africa’s image as an investment destination.

As one strike ends, thousands of the same Metalworkers union’s petrol attendants, components retailers, panelbeaters, car and spare parts dealers, fitment workshops, and dealerships will begin a strike today in a demand for higher wages.

The same paper looks to Swaziland, where all is decidedly not well. The Kingdom of Swaziland, unfailingly described as Africa’s last absolute monarchy, will stage nonparty elections next Friday. However, many have dismissed the process as "selections" organised by King Mswati and key advisers in his sizeable court.

Whatever the outcome of voting for the House of Assembly, the king and his co-monarch, Queen Mother Ntombi, will retain power for the time being over their 1.2-million subjects.

The real question, analysts say, is how long Swaziland’s unique brand of governance can withstand the worsening economic storms that beset it.

A new report about the landlocked kingdom certainly does not make encouraging reading for the king, or his 14 wives.

Swaziland is on a nonsustainable trajectory, according to the analysts at Chatham House in London. They go on to say that revenues have been poorly managed with most of the money spent on the country’s huge public-sector wage bill and on the royal household.

The report puts real unemployment at 40%. Swaziland has in the world’s highest rate of HIV/Aids infection.