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African press review 30 September 2014

South Africa is spurning foreign healthcare workers, while Kenya will finally publish the Gross Domestic Product figures that have been undergoing review for several months … These are some of the stories in today’s African papers

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South Africa is spurning foreign healthcare workers according to the main story in this morning's Johannesburg-based financial paper Business Day.

The report says the country is failing to train enough doctors and nurses to keep pace with its needs.

Yet, red tape, hostile bureaucrats and ambivalent government policies all stand in the way of foreign healthcare professionals willing to fill in the gaps.

At best, says Business Day, it will take a foreign-qualified doctor or nurse two or three years to get a job in South Africa but it can take up to 10 years.

To make matters worse, the report goes on, a legal loophole has created "an economy of corruption", in which healthcare professionals pay bribes to obtain refugee status.

People who have been granted refugee status are not affected by government restrictions on hiring foreigners from developing countries.

Only 2,640 of South Africa’s public-sector health workforce of 173,080 are foreigners.

South Africa's ruling African National Congress will not discuss a change of leadership at its national general council next year, according to the party’s head of policy, Jeff Radebe. This story also features in Business Day.

President Jacob Zuma’s presidency has been under increasing pressure following a recent series of controversies.

They include state-financed upgrades to his private residence in Kwazulu-Natal, the "spy tapes" which formed the basis for dropping corruption charges against him and reports that in 2000 he accepted a bribe from the French arms company Thales.

Radebe accepts that corruption claims are damaging the ANC’s integrity and says that the performance of the party leadership will be reviewed. The national general council has no power to change a decision made by the party's national conference which elected the ANC leader.

Over at The Sowetan, the front page is dominated by the news that the corruption trial of Julius Malema, leader of the vehemently anti-graft Economic Freedom Fighters, gets underway in the Polokwane Magistrate's Court today.

Malema faces charges of fraud, corruption, money-laundering, and racketeering. It is alleged that he made nearly 300,000 euros from corrupt activities.

If convicted, Malema would lose his seat in the South African parliament.

Also on the Business Day front page is the news that the US-Japanese nuclear power company Westinghouse yesterday upped the ante in its legal battle with the South African electricity supplier, Eskom.

The company requested a judicial review of the power utility’s decision to award a contract worth 300 million euros for the replacement of steam generators at Koeberg nuclear power station to French competitor Areva.

Slideshow Mandela

Westinghouse claims there were “fundamental breaches” of the tender process.

According to Business Day, this legal battle over the refurbishment of Koeberg is a foretaste of the squabbling likely to take place, should South Africa finally go ahead with the procurement of eight new nuclear reactors.

According to the Nairobi-based The Standard newspaper, Kenya will later today finally publish the Gross Domestic Product figures that have been undergoing review for several months.

The Standard says the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics has completed the process of rebasing the country’s National Accounts statistics. Up to now, the paper explains, the GDP has been based on figures from 2001.

The new statistics will be rebased to a new reference point of 2009 to present an accurate reflection of Kenya’s economy, mainly to take account of the emerging oil and mining sectors.

Kenya’s economy grew by 4.7 per cent in 2013, up from 4.6 per cent the previous year, a pace slower than that of neighbouring Uganda at 5.6 per cent, Tanzania at seven per cent and Rwanda at 7.5 per cent.

Economists are divided on the question of whether the GDP figures will expand or shrink when the new calculations are announced.

 

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