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African press review 2 June 2011

Can South Africa end the carnage on its roads? Did broadcasting bosses negotiate in bad faith? Can a new Aids strategy save two milion lives? Has Kenya's finance minister broken the law?

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The Star in Johannesburg gives pride of place to yesterday's call from Transport Minister, Sibusiso Ndébélé, for a halt to the carnage on South Africa's roads.

Speaking during debate on his department's 2011/12 budget, he told parliament that 14,000 people were killed and tens of thousands injured on South Africa's roads every year.

Ndebele said South Africa was a participant in the recently launched United Nations Decade of Action for Road Safety, which covers the period from 2011 to 2020.

The minister said the aim was to halve the number of deaths on South African roads by 2015.

The idea is that at least half the motorists on the country's roads will be stopped by police over the next six months and checked for compliance with road traffic regulations.

There's trouble brewing at the South African Broadcasting Corporation. Unions at the SABC are threatening industrial action after salary negotiations stalled, according to the Communication Workers' Union.

The broadcaster met with three trade unions on Tuesday in Pretoria. Workers are demanding a 10.5 per cent increase across the board. The SABC has offered seven per cent.

The unions claimed the SABC had negotiated in bad faith.

They said they had left the door open for the SABC to improve on its current offer, but maintained that taking the matter to the Commission for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration, and a subsequent strike, were possible.

The Daily Monitor in Uganda reports on a new Aids strategy. The World Health Organisation (WHO) adopted a new comprehensive plan aimed at averting up to 4.2 million new infections over the next five years. The Global Health Strategy on HIV/Aids 2011-2015 will guide actions by the WHO and governments around the world in dealing with Aids.

It was adopted at the 64th World Health Assembly that concluded recently in Geneva.

Through this strategy, the WHO says some two million lives could also be saved if treatment guidelines already in place are fully implemented.

“Under the new strategy, the WHO aims to promote greater innovation in HIV prevention, treatment, testing and care services so that countries can achieve the goal of universal access to HIV services,” says a statement from the WHO.

With an estimated 7,000 people becoming newly infected with HIV every day and about 5,000 dying, the WHO says simpler and more affordable treatment and prevention are urgently needed.

The Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/Aids estimates some 33 million people are living with the virus globally.

In Kenya, MPs on Tuesday swore to block Finance Minister Uhuru Kenyatta from reading the budget next week, saying he had broken the law.

According to the Daily Nation, published in Nairobi, Kenyatta was expected to present this year’s Budget estimates to the Parliamentary Budget Committee, but did not.

The new constitution has changed the budget process, sharing budget powers between parliament and the executive.

The traditional budget reading, a Westminster tradition, has been done away with and replaced with a more low-key American-type system.

Kenyatta is scheduled to read the budget on Thursday next week, but it is no longer certain that he will be allowed to present it.

MPs, speaking at a meeting at Nairobi’s Continental House, also said that Kenyatta ought to be reprimanded for breaching the Constitution by not submitting the estimates to parliament.

They said they will ask the Speaker to force the minister to apologise to the nation and to immediately submit the budget to the House for scrutiny.

They gave the minister until Tuesday next week, after which, they said, they will tell the Speaker to force the minister to present the estimates or be banned from conducting business in Parliament.

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