Newspaper Page Text
2A
JANUARY 1, 1998
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AFRICAK S
Zambian official
says Kaunda is
suspect in failed coup
®Former president arrested in
Christmas day raid.
LUSAKA, Zombia
(AP) Former President Kenneth Kaunda's ar
rest on Christmas Day was linked toa failed coup in
this southern African nation, state television re
ported Friday.
In abriefing to the diplomatic corps broadcast on
state television, Foreign Minister Kelli Walubita
confirmed widespread suspicions that Kaunda was
a suspect in the Oct. 28 coup attempt.
Kaunda appeared in court earlier Friday, but the
government refused to release or charge the vet
eran politician, who has repeatedly denied any
involvement in the coup attempt.
“The state intends to torture me as they have
done to others,” Kaunda, 73, said in a sworn state
ment.
After the hearing, a helicopter flew Kaunda to an
unknown destination, raising fears among his sup
porters for his safety in detention.
Earlier Friday, about 300 supporters demon
strated outside the Kamwala holding prison where
Kaunda wasdetained. Paramilitary police patrolled
most main intersectionsin the capital and closed of f
most of the approaches to the High Court.
The detention of Zambia’s founding father, who
led the nation to independence from the British in
1964, came four days after he returned to the
country from a lengthy lecture tour.
He was away in October when soldiers seized
control of the state radio station and broadcast that
they had overthrown President Frederick Chiluba.
Loyal troops quickly crushed the rebellion.
Kaunda was served with a 28-day detention order
Thursday under a state of emergency declared after
the Oct. 28 failed coup. The order gave no reasons
for his arrest.
Judge James Mutale adjourned the special High
Court hearing to Monday after Kaunda's lawyers
objected to the presence of 20 plainclothes security
men tightly surrounding him inside the Lusaka
courthouse.
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residences, new
businesses, fax machines, modems, cell phones and
pagers, the 404 and 770 area codes cannot support
the demand for new numbers.
Beginning January 1, 1998, metro Atlanta will be
adding the new 678 area code. If you already have a
404 or 770 area code, your number will not change.
Metro Atlanta will soon add
a third area code: 678.
Mystery disease killing
scores of Kenyans in north
By Krvoje Hranjski
ASSOCIATED PRESS Writer
MAIROBI, Kenya
A mysterious disease in remote, flooded
of northeastern Kenya appears to be
m‘ both humans and livestock, scien
tists said Friday.
Medical experts were testing dozens of
blood samples from both humans and
animals to determine the nature of the
disease, which has killed scores of Kenyans
by causing bleeding from the nose and
mouth. Red Cross officials say 42 people
have died in neighboring Somalia, and
specimens were sent to Nairobi for analy
sis.
“At this point, we're concerned it may be
something that affects both animals and
people,” said Douglas Klaucke, a World
Health Organization representative in
Kenya.
If animals are affected, then malaria,
which is endemic in the region, is not the
cause.
“But we just don’t know at this point,”
Klaucke added.
Local reports say up to 217 people have
died from the disease in flooded villages
around Garissa, 140 miles northeast of
Nairobi. Doctors have been able to confirm
only three deaths.
Twelve possible diseases were being in
vestigated, including yellow fever and den
gue. Ebola, which also causes its victims to
bleed from the mouth and other orifices,
Nigeria uncovers coup plot
ABUJA, Nigeria
(AP) Nigeria's military government has
revealed recordings that reportedly sup
port its accusations that 12 high-ranking
officials plotted to overthrow Gen. Sani
Abacha.
The video and audio recordings were
played last week (Dec. 24 to a meeting of
Nigeria's traditional chiefs, called in from
across the country for a meeting in Abuja,
the capital.
The junta has been under pressure at
home and abroad to provide evidence that
there was an actual plot.
The recordings “showed that those ar
rested had the intention of staginga coup,”
Oba Rufus Aradesowen, a traditional chief
from southwestern Nigeria, said after the
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Yellow fever and dengue may be
cause of mysterious iliness. AP Photo
tentatively has been ruled out.
Experts have speculated that flooding
brought on by El Nino may have contami
nated drinking water and allowed pests
that breed in floodwaters to flourish.
The outbreaksin both countries occurred
along rivers, the Ewaso Nyiro River in
Kenya and the Shabelle River in Somalia.
Published reports describe high fever,
diarrhea, vomiting and bleeding from the
nose and mouth as symptoms experienced
by the human victims.
four-hour briefing with Abacha. “We wish
to condemn the dastardly act conceived
and attempted by those already arrested.”
He declined to provide any details, in
cluding whether the recordings were of
confessions or if they showed the suspects
plotting the coup.
On Sunday (Dec.2l), the government
reported that the deputy head of state, Lt.
Gen. Oladipo Diya, had been arrested along
with 11 other people for planning to over
throw Abacha.
It was the second alleged coup plot intwo
years. The government also showed video
clips of alleged plotters' confessing after
-the 1995 coup, but Abacha’s critics say he
invented the plot as an excuse to clamp
down on opposition figures.
However, your area code will become part of your
local number. So every time you make a call, even
within your area code, you will need to dial the area
code plus the seven-digit phone number (all ten
digits). It is not necessary to dial a “1” or “0” on these
ten-digit local calls.
Since your current area code and telephone num
ber will not change, there is no need to reprint checks,
stationery or any other printed materials. What is important
is that you start getting used to dialing ten digits for all of your
Zimbabwe land reform
threathens a life’s work,
a family’s future
By Angus Shaw
ASSOCIATED PRESS Writer
BROMLEY, Zimbabwe
From his hilltop farmhouse,
Mike Cullinan looks out at his
life’s work — a lush vista of irri
gated tobacco, citrus and corn that
his family created out of virgin
bush.
In other years, the 61-year-old
would be a proud and contented
man, He fears, however, that the
upcoming harvest may be his last.
Cullinan’s 4,000-acre farm —
named Xanadu, after the mythical
paradise — is on a list of 1,500
properties, most of them owned by
whites, targeted for takeover in
Zimbabwe’s controversial land
reform program.
President Robert Mugabe. has
pledged to rectify an imbalance
inherited from the colonial era: In
this nation of 11 million people,
about one-third of the land is
owned by some 4,000 white farm
ers, mostly the descendants of
British and South African settlers.
The government wants to re
settle tens of thousands of black
peasants on the properties.
Cullinan’s parents, immigrants
from South Africa, bought their
land in 1939 from the colonial ad
ministration of Rhodesia, as Zim
babwe was known before achiev
ing independence in 1980.
He long had planned to pass on
the land to his son Rory, 28, who
grew up on the farm 30 miles east
of Harare. He never expected the
government would tell him it was
taking away his life’s work, and
his family’s security.
“I just couldn’t believe it,” he
said when asked how he learned
the news last month. “I wasnumb,
incredulous. It took a long time to
sinkin. Everything we had worked
for, for four generations of our
family, was being taken away.”
The government for 17 years
has been promising to resettle
black families on state-recovered
land. By 1992, it had bought about
local calls now, because as of January 1, 1998, dialing ten
digits will be mandatory. You will also need to reprogram
PBX equipment, automated dialers, fax machines,
modems, cell phones, and optional features such as
call forwarding and speed calling to accommodate
ten-digit dialing.
Call us with any questions or problems you may
have getting ready for the new 678 area code. The
special toll free number is 1-800-964-7941. Or visit us at
www.bellsouth.com/areacode for more information.
@ BELLSOUTH®
Nobody knows a neighbor like a neighbor.”
1,800 farms from willing white
sellers.
The program, however, was
plagued by mismanagement, lack
of money and corruption. It re
settled only about a third of the
;221.000 families it had set as its
In 1992, the government passed
alaw empowering it to nationalize
commercial farms. This year,
Mugabe said the government
couldn’t afford to buy any more
properties and would take them,
paying compensation only for in
frastructure improvements _ not
the land itself.
Cullinan sees no reason why he
and his family should have to pay
the price for history’s injustice. “I
don’t think we should hark back
to the past,” he said. “People on
the land now are not responsible
for what happened.”
Furthermore, his family mem
bers are not the only ones who will
be hurt, he said. Cullinan employs
236 people, and another 370 chil
dren and family dependents live
on his property, where there’s a
school, a clinic and a rest home for
retired workers and their families.
Theland reform program makes
no provision for the thousands of
farm laborers who will bedisplaced
when their white employers lose
their farms.
Cullinan estimates hisland could
support about the same number of
resettled families, but their real
income would fall dramatically.
Under land reform, the prop
erty would belong to the state.’
That would mean that the resettled
families would have nothing to
use as collateral for loans to buy
needed fertilizer and equipment.
“So where is the gain? The soil
here has to be carefully conserved
through rotation. It won’t take
mono-cropping year after year,”
Cullinan said of the common farm
ingmethod of peasant agriculture.
His citrus orchards, which will
See FARMS, page 5A