THE INDIAN OCEAN NEWSLETTER # 701 - 13/01/1996

COMOROS ISLANDS DOWN IN THE DRAIN Faced with two rival governments, a de facto head of state in exile on Reunion Island, about fifteen presidential runners for a ballot set back till at least March (though many would like it further off), the archipelago's future looks distinctly uncertain and its economy has already gone down the drain. (...). [Total : 610 Words]. (8,2USD)

UGANDA SMUGGLING ZAIRE COFFEE According to information obtained by The Indian Ocean Newsletter from officials of the Office Zaïrois du Café, a quantity of between 1,000 tons and 2,000 tons of Zaire coffee from the region of Goma (North Kivu) alone was smuggled into Uganda during the year 1995. (...). [Total : 151 Words]. (4,7USD) MADAGASCAR SWEET-SMELLING PROBLEMS Biolandes, a company in south-western France which specializes in aromatic oils and supplies high-class French perfumers such as Chanel, sent director De Fransse and Madagascar manager Franck Ramarosaona to the island on January 9 to carry out an urgent investigation into a problem at Ambanja, in north-west Madagascar. (...). [Total : 245 Words]. (4,7USD) TANZANIA NBC HAS PROBLEMS Tempers flared suddenly last month in the National Bank of Commerce, the largest state-owned bank, when Idris Rashid, governor of the Bank of Tanzania, the country's central bank, announced that "basically, NBC is bankrupt". (...). [Total : 351 Words]. (4,7USD) ETHIOPIA EU AID ANALYZED Three researchers (Paul Collier, Jacky Mathonnat, Israel Kidane-Miriam) who last year drafted a report on the European Union's structural adjustment aid for Ethiopia have raised several positive aspects but spotted some black spots too. (...). [Total : 340 Words]. (4,7USD) FRANCE/AFRICA THREE CFD LOANS The parastatal Caisse Française de Développement (CFD) last month announced the grant of its last loans for 1995, with one each going to Ethiopia, Mozambique and the Republic of South Africa. (...). [Total : 223 Words]. (4,7USD) MOZAMBIQUE / EUROPEAN UNION BALANCE OF PAYMENT AID The European Union has granted Mozambique 15 million ECU (US$19 million) from its Lome IV national programme to support the structural adjustment programme for the country's balance of payments. (...). [Total : 324 Words]. (4,7USD) ETHIOPIA AMBITIOUS ROAD BUILDING The Ethiopian government is planning to organize a meeting of international fund donors for the end of this month to discuss financing for an Ethiopian road building programme which is projected to cost a total of US$2. (...). [Total : 209 Words]. (4,7USD) SOUTH AFRICA INVESTMENT AGENCY The head of South Africa's department of trade and industry, Zavareh Rustomjee, announced in Johannesburg on January 9 that an investment promotion agency would soon be set up. (...). [Total : 225 Words]. (4,7USD)

COMOROS ISLANDS CONFERENCE SET BACK The conference initiated by Organization of African Unity to prepare the conditions for a return home of the Comoros Islands head of state Said Mohamed Djohar and planned for Antananarivo this week, has been set back to January 20 and 21. (...). [Total : 368 Words]. (4,7USD) KENYA DE FACTO SCISSION FOR FORD-KENYA A scission within the opposition group FORD-Kenya has been predictable ever since Raila Odinga, a Luo and son of the party's founder Oginga Odinga, self-proclaimed himself chairman in December 1995, ousting incumbent Michael Kijana Wamalwa, a Luhya. (...). [Total : 203 Words]. (4,7USD) SEYCHELLES CONTROVERSIAL LAW CONTESTED United Opposition is going to the Seychelles constitutional court in an attempt to overturn the Economic Development Act, which grants immunity from prosecution in return for investments of US$10 million (ION N° 694). (...). [Total : 204 Words]. (4,7USD) SUDAN VIOLENCE GETTING OUT OF HAND A commando of about twenty members of an Egyptian Islamic extremist group Al Takfir Wa'l Hijra (Secrecy and Retrenchment) currently unknown in Sudan attacked a farmworkers' compound on the Gezira irrigated plantation, not far from Wad Medani, on December 31. (...). [Total : 323 Words]. (4,7USD) MAURITIUS MUSICAL CHAIRS FOR AMBASSADORS The foreign affairs portfolio recently attributed to MMM leader Paul Berenger will undoubtedly see the ministry's powers increased as it now includes regional and international development. (...). [Total : 233 Words]. (4,7USD) SUDAN NEW POWER STRUCTURE Islamic officials in the Khartoum regime decided at a special congress last week to set up a new hegemonic political structure, the Mutammar Ash-Shabyi Al-Watani (Popular Patriotic Congress). (...). [Total : 381 Words]. (4,7USD) DJIBOUTI GUNS OR KHAT At the conclusion of her recent missions to Djibouti at the head of an International Monetary Fund delegation, Mrs. Rosa Valdivieso, an economist on the IMF's Middle East desk, left the country impressed by the determination of the chief of general staff of the national police force, general Yacine Yabeh Galeb, to resist reforms aimed at reducing some of his men's perks. (...). [Total : 446 Words]. (4,7USD) MADAGASCAR ZAFY CABINET REJIG Head of state Albert Zafy some time ago asked one of his personal counsellors, Naivo Marius Rakotozofindrabe, the man who introduced Israeli businessmen with a plan to supply police assistance to Madagascar (ION N° 677), to work out a project to remodel the president's cabinet. (...). [Total : 347 Words]. (4,7USD)

SUDAN ARMED GROUPS NEAR GEDAREF At the end of last week, armed groups of an unidentified organization but believed to be made up of anti-government southern Sudanese crossed into Sudan from the region around the Ethiopian frontier town of Humera, close to the Eritrean border town of Oumm Hagger. (...). [Total : 64 Words]. (1,5USD) MAURITIUS RAMGOOLAM'S PALS During his electoral campaign for the December 20 presidential ballot, Labour Party leader (and present prime minister) Navin Ramgoolam called on the French journalist Alain Fernbach and a public relations specialist, Marc Bousquet of the Médiatique agency. (...). [Total : 37 Words]. (FREE!)

MOZAMBIQUE NEW AMBASSADORS A major reshuffle of Mozambique's ambassadors is expected shortly following nominations announced in late December. Jose Rui Mota Do Amaral leaves Moscow to become ambassador to France, while Jose Baciao Koloma, director of legal and consular affairs in the foreign ministry, becomes ambassador to the United Kingdom. (...). [Total : 134 Words]. (4,7USD) FRANCE / MAURITIUS FRANÇOIS RAFFRAY The new trade counsellor in France's embassy to Mauritius is François Raffray, who takes over on March first from Jean Eudes D'Achon, named to head budget administration in the trade missions department of the foreign ministry, in Paris. (...). [Total : 153 Words]. (4,7USD) FRANCE / HORN OF AFRICA FRANCIS GUTMANN The former principal secretary in the French foreign ministry from 1981 to 1985, Francis Gutmann, has been entrusted with an "investigative mission" on the diplomatic dispute between Eritrea and Yemen over the Hanish Archipelago in the Red Sea (ION N° 699). (...). [Total : 165 Words]. (4,7USD) ETHIOPIA / UGANDA SOLOMON KEBEDE TAFESSE The Berlin-based Solidarity Committee for Ethiopian Political Prisoners has issued an appeal to halt the extradition to Ethiopia of Solomon Kebede Tafesse, who was arrested in Kampala. (...). [Total : 202 Words]. (4,7USD)

CHINA / DJIBOUTI / SEYCHELLES QIAN QICHEN The People's Republic of China's foreign minister will make a swing through Africa which will take him, between January 11 and 20, to Tunisia, Chad, Djibouti and The Seychelles. (...). [Total : 29 Words]. (FREE!) REUNION ISLAND JACQUES CHIRAC The visit of the French head of state to Reunion Island on the occasion of the French overseas department's centenary in that statute appear to be firming up around the dates of March 18 and 19. (...). [Total : 36 Words]. (FREE!) SOUTH AFRICA / GERMANY ROELF MEYER The Republic of South Africa's minister of constitutional development, provincial affairs and local government is expected to go to Germany this week with African National Congress secretary general Cyril Ramaphosa, Democratic Party MP Colin Eglin, Freedom Front official Constand Viljoen and an "eminent personality" of the Pan-Africanist Congress. (...). [Total : 59 Words]. (1,5USD) MADAGASCAR EMMANUEL RAKOTOVAHINY Madagascar's prime minister last week went to see head of state Albert Zafy in a provincial location, where he has been staying since the end-of-year celebrations, to ask him to fire finance minister Jean Claude Raherimanjato, who went on a mission to Washington at the beginning of this month. (...). [Total : 115 Words]. (1,5USD)