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Blogs replacing blackboards

Blogs are replacing blackboards as Singapore moves high-technology into its classrooms as teaching tools, newspapers reported Wednesday.

Under the FutureSchools@Singapore programme, blogs, video-conferencing, tablet PCs, podcasts, 3-D software and interactive whiteboards will be available for learning, The Straits Times reported.

Five schools in the city state have been selected to pioneer the use of innovative teaching methods that harness info-communication technologies (ICT), the education ministry confirmed in a press release.

Tech-savvy Singapore, one of Asia’s most wired nations, aims to set up 15 such schools at primary and secondary levels by 2015.

"ICT tools such as immersive virtual environments and educational games will be used to enhance learning," the ministry statement said.

"These schools will push the frontiers of teaching and learning practices by harnessing ICT at a school-wide level," it added.

The first five schools, including a new primary that will start its student intake next year, will integrate ICT into their curriculum over four years.

Despite the new tools, the schools will stay focused on the core goals of education, planning lessons around the national curriculum and preparing students for national exams, the ministry said.

The selected schools will also study how the use of technology affects the students’ cognitive, emotional and social development, it said.

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Elective genitoplasty on the rise

One of the world’s most prestigious health journals has lashed a fast-growing trend in the United States and Britain for "designer vaginas," the tabloid term for cosmetic surgery to the female genitalia.

The fashion is being driven by commercial and media pressures that exploit women’s insecurities and is fraught with unknowns, including a risk to sexual arousal, the British Medical Journal (BMJ) says.

Known as elective genitoplasty, the surgery usually entails shortening or changing the shape of the outer lips, or labia, but may also include reduction in the hood of skin covering the clitoris or shortening the vagina itself.

Anecdotal evidence suggests that the practice is spreading fast in the United States as well as in Britain, but the picture is unclear, the BMJ says.

Not only is there a disturbing lack of data about the phenomenon, there has been negligible assessment about surgical after-effects — and almost zero reflexion as to whether a labial "problem" exists in the first place, the BMJ says angrily.

In 2004-5, 800 "labial reductions" were conducted by Britain’s state-run National Health Service (NHS), more than a doubling of the figure of six years earlier. Other operations were carried out by the private sector, although the full figures are unknown.

The authors of the article, London gynaecologist Sarah Creighton and clinical psychologist Lih Mei Liao, conducted their own small-scale probe into why women sought this surgery.

"Our patients sometimes cited restrictions on lifestyle as reasons for their decision," they say.

"These restrictions included inability to wear tight clothing, go to the beach, take communal showers or ride a bicycle comfortably, or avoidance of some sexual practices.

"Men, however, do not usually want the size of their genitals reduced for such reasons. Furthermore, they find alternative solutions for any discomfort arising from rubbing or chaffing of the genitals."

Patients who sought genitoplasty "uniformly" wanted their vulvas to be flat and with no protrusion, similar to the prepubescent look of girls in Western fashion ads, they found.

"Not unlike presenting for a haircut at a salon, women often brought along images to illustrate the desired appearance," say Creighton and Liao. "The illustrations, usually from advertisements or pornography, are always selective and possibly digitally altered."

Plastic surgery to the labia carries risks, for this zone carries nerve fibres that are highly sensitive and are a key pathway of sexual arousal, the article warns sternly.

"Incision to any part of the genitalia could compromise sensitivity," it says.

The BMJ piece suggests genitoplasty is a classic example of where commercial, media and social pressures artificially create a problem, fuel concern over it and then put forward a solution for it.

"There is nothing unusual about protrusion of the labia," it says.

"It is the negative meaning that makes it into a problem — meanings that can give rise to physical, emotional and behavioural reactions, such as discomfort, self-disgust, perhaps avoidance of some activities and a desire for a surgical fix."

The Sampson Option

‘All the world’s a stage," observes Jacques in As You Like It, "and all the men and women merely players." No sphere of human life is more theatrical than politics. And seldom has the world’s political stage seemed more Shakespearean than it does today. To judge by the number of bodies that currently litter it, we appear to be nearing the end of Act V of The Tragedie of King George.

By the concluding scenes of Shakespeare’s greatest political tragedies – Hamlet, Julius Caesar, King Lear and Macbeth – nearly all the principal characters lie dead. So it is with King George, the tragic tale of a simple, unworldly fellow who ascends the throne of a great empire, responds heroically to an unprovoked attack, but then wreaks havoc by turning from retaliation to pre-emption.

The latest corpse to slump lifeless beneath the proscenium arch is that of Paul Wolfowitz, who last week finally resigned as president of the World Bank. As one of the principal architects of the Iraq War when he was United States deputy secretary of defence, Mr Wolfowitz was always going to be subjected to intense scrutiny in his new job.

His decision to award his girlfriend, Shaha Riza, promotion and a pay-rise was, to say the least, ill-judged, especially in the wake of his own vociferous campaign against Third World corruption.

Another central character has taken the political equivalent of slow-acting poison. Tony Blair, King George’s most loyal foreign ally, is not quite dead yet – indeed, he appears intent on delivering his final monologue in all the major capitals of the globe – but he is not long for the political world.

Think back to 2003, when the decision to invade Iraq was taken. One after another, the politicians who most strongly supported the decision have been ousted from office. The Spanish premier José Maria Aznar was one of the earliest casualties in March 2004. Leszek Miller, the man who took Poland into the war, did not last much longer. Their Italian counterpart Silvio Berlusconi went down this time last year.

As in Julius Caesar, the fault is not in the central characters’ stars, but in themselves. George W Bush’s dominant character traits, his decisiveness and tenacity, at first appeared to be strengths. But once he had been convinced by his advisers that the attacks of 9/11 furnished a pretext for the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, these became weaknesses.

As in Macbeth, King George was soon "in blood stepp’d in so far" that turning back seemed no more attractive than wading onward. Remember: the corpses that litter this stage can already be counted in the tens, if not the hundreds, of thousands.

And, as in King Lear, the whole catastrophe has stemmed from a fatal confusion at the outset between the true and the false, enemy and friends. Lear succumbs to the flattery of the ugly sisters, Regan and Goneril, and casts out the blunt but honest Cordelia (not to mention the straight-talking Kent). The mistaken identity in the tragedy of King George was that of the real enemy in the post-9/11 War on Terror.

It is almost certain that the 19 hijackers hailed from Saudi Arabia (15), the United Arab Emirates (2), Egypt (1) and Lebanon (1). The chief architect of the plot, Osama bin Laden, was also a Saudi. Contrast this list of countries with the list of members of the "Axis of Evil" identified by President Bush in his famous speech of January 2002 as "regimes that sponsor terror [and] threaten America… with weapons of mass destruction": North Korea, Iran and Iraq. President Bush was quite right to target Afghanistan in the immediate aftermath of 9/11, since the Taliban regime was sheltering al-Qaeda’s leadership. But the decision to overthrow Saddam was one of history’s great non sequiturs.

The real enemy in the Global War on Terror is not the Axis of Evil but the Axis of Allies. Today, the countries most likely to produce another 9/11 are not Iran, much less North Korea, but countries long regarded as (after Israel) America’s most reliable allies in the Greater Middle East. Step forward Saudi Arabia (almost certainly still the biggest source of funding for radical Islamists) and Pakistan (very definitely their one-stop shop for nuclear weaponry).

There is, in short, a twist in this tale. Before the curtain can fall on The Tragedie of King George, we need at least three more scenes to decide the fates of three crucial characters – the only principals still left standing aside from King George himself.

First, we need a scene in Israel. Since the failure of the war against Hezbollah in Lebanon, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s popularity has been in free fall. His current approval rating is around 2 per cent, by comparison with which King George is a pop idol. Somehow, despite the resignation of his foreign minister, Mr Olmert is still clinging to political life. But he surely cannot last much longer. What happens next will be crucial, for if Binyamin Netanyahu returns to power, the probability of a military confrontation with Iran goes up above 50 per cent.

Remember, Mr Netanyahu is on record as comparing the Iranian President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, with Hitler. "It is the year 1938," Netanyahu recently declared, "and Iran is Germany." I suspect his private views are not so very far removed from those of the renowned Israeli military historian Martin van Creveld, the professor of military history at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem.

Van Creveld is deeply pessimistic about Israel’s future, menaced on one side by an increasingly violent and fissiparous Palestinian population and on the other by a would-be nuclear Iran. But he expects his country at least to go down fighting.

"We possess several hundred atomic warheads and rockets and can launch them at targets in all directions," van Creveld declared in an interview in September 2003. "We have the capability to take the world down with us. And I can assure you that this will happen before Israel goes under."

Then we need a scene in Saudi Arabia. Here the key figure is Prince Bandar bin Sultan bin Abdul Aziz al Saud who, as Saudi ambassador to the United States, was one of the leading advocates of the attack on Iraq. Since October 2005 he has been back in Riyadh as Secretary-General of the National Security Council, where he is said to be lobbying hard for another attack: this time (you guessed it) on Iran.

Finally, the action needs to shift eastwards to Pakistan, where it is the future of General Pervez Musharraf that hangs in the balance. Eight days ago, 40 people died in rioting in Karachi, apparently as a result of attempts by pro-government forces to discourage a rally by disgruntled lawyers, who have been incensed by Musharraf’s decision to oust the head of the Supreme Court.

After eight years of his military dictatorship, Pakistan’s democratic forces are stirring. But watch out: these include the Islamist coalition known as the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal. And the recent violence also has an ethnic dimension, pitting Mohaijirs against Pashtuns.

You thought this play was nearly over. Like many an audience at Stratford, you were starting to shift in your seat. But in truth Act V has only just begun. With war looming between Iran and Israel, and Pakistan on the brink of an upheaval that could well end with Islamists in power in Islamabad, the worst bloodshed has yet to come.

I fear, in the words of the immortal Bard, that you have not yet had your fill:

"…Of carnal, bloody, and unnatural acts,

Of accidental judgements, casual slaughters,

Of deaths put on by cunning and forc’d cause,

And, in this upshot, purposes mistook

Fall’n on the inventors’ heads

Niall Ferguson is Laurence A Tisch Professor of History at Harvard University

US named unknown Dutch company

Foreign Minister Maxime Verhagen has said in a letter to parliament that Vlemmo NV does not exist as far as he knows. This company was named by US authorities as a link between Iraq and Osama bin Laden.

On or around 25 July 2002, the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy (OUSDP) of the US gave a briefing entitled ‘Assessing the Relationship Between Iraq and al-Qaida’. This alternative intelligence report wrote that Osama Bin Laden’s al-Hijra Company had contacts with the Netherlands-based company Vlemmo NV, which was allegedly involved in the purchase by Iraq of military equipment, Verhagen confirmed.

But "the company Vlemmo is unknown in the Netherlands," according to the minister. "The company has never been registered with the Chamber of Commerce in the Netherlands and is also not known to the tax service. That the company may have served as a front for illegal arms trade with Iraq is equally unknown to me."

The 2002 OUSDP report was made public last month by the chairman of the US Senate’s defence committee, Carl Levin. "The contents of the intelligence report has only become known to me following the recent publication of the document," said Verhagen.

The minister had been asked to react by Socialist Party (SP) MP Harry van Bommel. Verhagen has now sent the OUSDP report to the Lower House. Parts of it have been rendered illegible by the US authorities.

Verhagen comments that apparent differences of opinion between US authorities on the possible connections between Iraq and Al Qa’ida "are an internal US matter." Apart from this, he wishes to "once again stress that the justification for intervention in Iraq for the Netherlands did not lie in the possible involvement of Iraq in terrorism, but in non-compliance with the UN Security Council resolutions."

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FW de Klerk nou bekommerd oor grondhervorming

FW… bekommerd

’n Verslag van die FW de Klerk-stigting, wat gister bekendgestel is, waarsku dat mislukte grondhervormingsprojekte voedselproduksie in Suid-Afrika bedreig.

Die dokument is getiteld Grondhervorming : ’n kontekstuele analise. Volgens die verslag het Suid-Afrika tien jaar gelede landbouprodukte ter waarde van R2,40 uitgevoer vir elke R1,00 van produkte wat ingevoer is. Nou staan dit op R1,40 uitvoere teenoor elke R1,00 wat ingevoer word. Die land kan gevolglik nie onderbenutting of wanbenutting van landbougrond bekostig nie.

Die boodskap agter die versigtige formulering en lomp sinne is duidelik:

“Grondhervormingsprojekte wat misluk, bedreig voedselsekuriteit…’n grondhervormingsbeleid ingevolge waarvan grond pro-aktief deur die regering verkry word en net aan swart Suid-Afrikaners oorhandig word wanneer potensiële boere geïdentifiseer is, kan selfs meer landbougrond buite die sfeer van die kommersiële landbousektor plaas.“

Die verslag meld verder dat volgens Agri-SA 71 landbouhervormingsprojekte in die Limpopo-provinsie reeds misluk het as gevolg van die “onvoldoende ondersteuning“ wat aan opkomende boere verskaf word. In die Wes-Kaap misluk soortgelyke projekte dikwels omdat die “vaardighede“ van die opkomende boere “nie betyds opgegradeer word nie.“

Volgens ’n studie wat deur die Universiteit van Pretoria uitgevoer is met betrekking tot plase wat aan swart boere oorhandig is, is dit duidelik dat produksie in 44% van die gevalle drasties afgeneem het en dat daar op 24% geen produksie hoegenaamd plaasvind nie.

Volgens die FW de Klerk-stigting se verslag is een van die uitdagings waarmee grondhervorming tans te make het die feit dat kennis al belangriker geword het om suksesvol te kan boer. Onervare boere behoort hulp van die staat of mentorskap van bestaande boere te kan geniet. Toegang tot lenings vir nuwe boere is ook belangrik. Die verslag meld verder dat daar ’n “kapasiteitsprobleem“ binne die Department van Landbou en Grondsake bestaan en dat die beamptes van die departement met blanke boere behoort saam te werk. Daar word voorgestel dat bonusse gebied word aan blanke boere wat swart opkomende boere help, maar terselfdertyd meld die verslag dat ”gegewe die huidige politieke klimaat, dit onwaarskynlik is dat so ’n inisiatief positief oorweeg sal word.”

Die verslag meld verder dat die regering behoort te besef dat landbou oor beperkte kapasiteit as katalisator vir sosio-ekonomiese ontwikkeling beskik. Die klem behoort eerder op stedelike hervorming te val.

Die regering beoog om teen 2014 ’n derde van landbougrond in Suid-Afrika in die hande van swart boere te plaas. Net sowat 4% is tot op hede al oorgedra.

Tydens die bekendstelling van die publikasie het Dave Steward van die FW de Klerk-stigting gesê dat grondhervorming “emosioneel en gekompliseerd“ is. “Dit is belangrik dat ons saam daaraan werk – hervorming ’saam met’ in plaas van ’teen’,” het hy opgemerk.

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Annanias Mathe se pa met moetie gevang

Annanias Mathe (middel)

Die Departement van Korrektiewe Dienste het gister bevestig dat Annanias Mathe se 80-jarige vader ondervra is nadat hy probeer het om moetie in Pretoria se C-Max-gevangenis in te smokkel.

Beamptes het deur middel van ’n skandeerder ’n bottel met swart inhoud opgemerk binne die brood wat Mathe se vader vir sy seun saamgebring het. Volgens die bejaarde man het iemand in Alexandra die moetie aan hom oorhandig om dit by Mathe uit te kry. Die brood en swart inhoud van die bottel sal nou in ’n polisielaboratorium ontleed word. Gedurende die ondervraging het dit verder geblyk dat Mathe senior se besoekpermit verval het en dat hy dus nie meer sy seun kon besoek nie.

Mathe het in Desember verlede jaar uit C-Max ontsnap. Hy staan op 76 aanklagte tereg, wat sewe aanklagte van verkragting, vier van poging tot moord, vyf van inbraak en verskeie ander van roof met verswarende omstandighede insluit.

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Carl Niehaus staan darem by wat hy glo

Carl Niehaus is vir my ’n besonderse klein plesiertjie. Hy het sulke vakerige leepogies, wat hy so stadig en sagmoedig toemaak voor hy sy iets sê, asof hy eers wil seker maak van sy gedagte. Dan kom daardie ou beheerste, amper bewerige stemmetjie uit. Veral as hy in Engels iets kwytraak, klink sy konsonante soos dié van ’n tipiese selfbewuste Afrikaner, veral sy r’e wat hy probeer versag om nie te boers te klink nie, en dit is die laaste ding op aarde wat onse Carl mee geassosieer wil word. Maar ons hoor dit al te duidelik, en maak nie saak hoeveel hy in Engels skryf nie, dit wil net nie soos ’n regte Engelsman s’n klink nie. Dit is deel van hom soos die soet smaak van ’n koeksister.

Die lees van sy onlangse lofsang op Litnet aan sy surrogaatmoeder, Mamma Winnie, het my met ’n welkome maagpynlekkerkrysessie beloon. Die gedagte aan n bleekwit baba Kareltjie wat aan die bors van Mamma Afrika speen, is een wat my altyd sal bybly.

Carl Niehaus is erg getraumatiseer en ons moet dit nóóit vergeet nie, want hoogverraad het ’n aweregse betekenis vir hom. Sy eertydse comrade en kamermaat wat hom help foto’s neem het van die Brixtonse gasaanleg, was toe al die tyd van Nasionale Intelligensie. Lekker fototjies geneem, jong Kareltjie, en dit was nie vir sy monochroom- industriële fotografieprojek nie; dit was meer bedoel as ’n anargistiese oefening in stedelike terrorisme. Baie stout, die eertydse aspirantpredikantjie, en ek kan my skaars die yskoue gevoel in sy bors indink die oomblik toe hy gearresteer is.

Ek het eens ’n TV-onderhoud met hom gesien en hy lyk vir my na die tipe wat maklik huil. En ek bedoel nou nie uit egte hartseer nie, maar eerder op die ingewing van die oomblik, byvoorbeeld wanneer dit die dramatiese effek van die boodskap kan vergroot, soos die regte musiek op die regte oomblik in ’n liefdesverhaal. En soos ’n tienerseun se onvanpaste liefdesbriefie aan sy hoërskoolonderwyseres, klink sy lofsang aan mamma ook. Hy sing sy woorde teen haar vas, hy bring sy hele lewe in ’n tas.

Maar ek moet toegee, hy het ten minste sy integriteit deur die jare behou. Hy staan by wat hy glo, anders as daardie amateurstoeispannetjie van die Broederbond by KODESA in die vorm van Roelf Meyer en FW de Klerk wat so maklik omgerol en vir die ANC pensie gewys het.

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Cheney is weer oupa

Ouma en oupa Cheney

Mary, die lesbiese dogter van die Amerikaanse vise-president Dick Cheney, het Woensdag ‘n seun ryker geword. Hy sal Samuel David Cheney heet.

Die baba het 3,8kg by geboorte geweeg en is die sesde kleinkind van die vise-president. Sy kantoor het ‘n foto van die vrolike ouma, Lynne Cheney, wat die baba vashou en haar glimlaggende man vrygestel. Altwee lyk hoog in hul noppies met die nuweling.

Dat ‘n groot deel van die Bush-regering se steeds krimpende steun uit die sogenaamde konserwatiewe Bybelgordel kom wat tradisionele waardes verdedig, het blykbaar nog nie enige werklike lastigheid vir Cheney of sy dogter veroorsaak nie.

Die manier waarop die baba verwek is, is nie bekend nie en die betrokke partye swyg in alle tale. Mary Cheney is 38 jaar oud en leef saam met haar vriendin Heather Poe, 45, ‘n eertydse natuurbewaarder. Hulle het mekaar ontmoet terwyl albei yshokkie gespeel het en in 2005 saam opgedaag by ‘n Withuis-dinee ter ere van prins Charles en Camilla.

Dit terwyl Bush aanhou om in die openbaar te verklaar dat die huwelik ‘n binding tussen man en vrou is, homoseksuele egverbintenisse verwerp en weier om wetgewing aan te pas in die verband.

Cheney self wys enige kritiek op sy dogter af deur te sê dat "vryheid vryheid vir almal is". Hy het tot dusver goed daarin geslaag om die kwessie aan geen polemiek te onderwerp nie. Mary word beskou as een van sy grootste raadgewers en was ten nouste betrokke by sy herverkiesingsveldtog in 2004.

Terwyl die Amerikaanse weermag sukkel om genoeg nuwe innames te registreer om hul militêre betrokkenheid in Irak, Afghanistan en elders vol te hou, het nie een van Cheney se kinders aangemeld vir diens nie. Cheney word nietemin as een van die prominente valke in die huidige administrasie uitgesonder.

Hy het ook reeds skerp kritiek verduur agv van sy eertydse voorsitterskap van Halliburton en in weerwil van sy verklaring dat hy geen bande met die maatskappy meer het nie, het joernaliste vasgestel dat hy steeds aandele hou. Die waarde daarvan het intussen met 3 281 persent toegeneem.

Die maatskappy het ook onlangs aankondig dat die hoofkantoor na die Midde-Ooste verskuif gaan word. Halliburton het uiters lukratiewe kontrakte met die oorlogsverklaring teen Irak losgeslaan.

Vanweë die feit dat Republikeinse wetgewing nie huwelike tussen dieselfde geslag erken nie, is dit nog nie duidelik of die nuwe aankomeling binne of buite die eg gebore is nie.

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Genoeg-CD is ‘n vonds!

Koop nou met u kredietkaart.

So nou en dan kom daar ’n vonds oor jou pad waarvan jy kwalik genoeg kan kry. Die CD wat ek ’n ruk gelede toevallig in ’n musiekwinkel raakgeloop het, is só ’n ontdekking.

Genoeg is genoeg ! heet die album. Daar is ’n prentjie van ’n weegskaal op die omslag. Die skaal trek swaar na onder met die volgende woorde daarop gebalanseer:

Bedrog

Geweld

Misdaad

Korrupsie

Diensverskaffing

Onbevoegdheid

“10 Protesliedjies deur ons land se nuwe stemme,” meld die omslag verder.

Groot was die verrassing toe ek die name van die kunstenaars agterop bekyk. Bekende sangers soos Koos Kombuis, Bok van Blerk, Klopjag en Gian Groen het bydraes gelewer.

Die boodskap in bykans al die liedjies is dieselfde : almal is moeg vir misdaad en korrupsie. Die reënboognasie oortuig nie meer nie. Afrikaners is ontnugterd. Hierdie protesmusiek gaan waarskynlik iewers deur iemand met die Voëlvrybeweging vergelyk word. Die groot verskil is egter dat die kunstenaars van Genoeg is genoeg! nie om verskoning vra nie. Die skuldgevoel is weg en is vervang met ’n strydlustige opstandigheid teen die onreg van die huidige bestel, soms met ’n weemoedige noot daarby.

Abel Kraamsaal het spesiaal ’n snit genaamd B.E.E vir dié CD geskryf – myns insiens een van die treffendste liedjies van die album :

Toe die gravy trein ontspoor

Het ons miljoene verloor

En ons politicians sing steeds voor in die koor…

Bedrieg en vermoor, dis net ons wat bly verloor

Maar daar is iets wat ons kan doen

Teen hierdie knoeiery

Ons moet hande vat en saamstaan,

Teen daai B.E.E…

Omgekeerde rassisme is aan die orde van die dag

Terwyl boere op plase wakker lê in die nag

Vir die eerste keer word die werk van Liezl Op Bladsy 5, Hanru Niemand en die Transkei Cowboys gehoor. Die nuwelinge Glaskas en Foto Na Dans maak ook hulle verskyning.

Daar is verder bydraes deur Snotkop, Zinkplaat, Die Kaalkop Waarheid, Rian Malan, Mallies le Roux, Blouklip, Die Helde en Die Melktert Kommissie.

Sommige van hierdie kunstenaars is nog nie baie bekend nie, maar gaan beslis nog vir hulleself naam maak. Een van die interessantste figure is die sanger Snotkop. Sy regte naam is Francois Henning. Op sy webwerf word sy musiek soos volg beskryf: “Die edgy ‘funk-punk-rock’ album sal jou ma laat regop sit en haar kinders laat toesluit in hulle kamers.”

Henning het in 2000 sy eerste kontrak losgeslaan as “Lekgoa” – die land se eerste wit kwaito- sanger. Hy het vinnig een van die mees gewildste kwaito-sterre in Suid-Afrika geword. Henning en sy ses dansers het dwarsdeur Afrika getoer en voor miljoene aanhangers opgetree. Hy is ook vir beide Sama en Kora All Africa-toekennings genomineer. “Lekgoa” het ’n groot impak gemaak op gehore in Frankryk en London en daar is verskeie internasionale dokumentêre programme oor hom vervaardig. Ná vier jaar as Suid-Afrika se wit kwaito-held het Henning egter besluit dat dit tyd is om eerder in sy moedertaal te sing.

Sy liedjie op die album Genoeg is genoeg! heet Ons gaan dit nie vat nie en is uitdagend strydlustig. Die musiek is natuurlik dié van Twisted Sister:

Ons gaan dit nie vat nie

Nee, ons gaan dit nie vat nie

Ons gaan dit nie vat nie, nee nee nee

Ons het die reg om te veg, ja

En dis die een ding waarvoor ons sal opstaan

Nardus du Plooy en sy Pretoria-gebaseerde groep, Die Kaalkop Waarheid, se liedjie Willem is een van die hoogtepunte van die album.

Willem, hierdie brief wat ek skryf,

Ek bid dat jy dit kry…

Die rassehaat en nyd sê vir my:

Hoeveel keer gaan ek nog probeer

Om my onskuld te bewys?

Hoeveel keer geëtiketteer, ontken, verwyt?

En wanneer kom die vrede?

En wie gaan ons kan help?

En wat was die redes?

Was dit mag? Gesag? Was dit geld? …

Ek hoor ons tyd is nou verby

Vir my was die grootste verrassing op die album die verwerking van Sarie Marais deur Hanru Niemand. Die melankoliese toon van hierdie liedjie bly mens dae lank by.

Niemand het aan die Universiteit van Stellenbosch studeer en woon tans in Bloemfontein. Sy eerste CD heet Tot Stilte. Hy is in 2005 aangewys as ’n beurshouer van die Mandela-Rhodes-stigting en was een van Maties se beste studente.

My Sarie Marais is so ver van my hart

Dalk iewers in ’n sloot

Soos Siembamba se kindjie met sy kop oopgekloof

Ja, dalk is my Sarie dood

O bring my terug na daai ou, ou land

Daar waar my Sarie woon

Waar Siembamba nog speel oor die radio

Daai land was so wonderskoon

Mineurklankies is daar wel. Die vrotsige Afrikaans van sommige kunstenaars (ag nee, Melktert Kommissie) en die swak taalversorging van die Afrikaans op die omslag ("die Afrikaans spreukende jeug“) doen ’n bietjie afbreuk aan die kwaliteit van die produk. En Rian Malan … ja, miskien moet hy hom eerder by joernalistiek bepaal.

Dit bly egter fassinerend om te sien hoe die versetbeweging in Afrikaans stadig maar seker vorm aanneem. Hierdie album is een van die opwindendste manifestasies van die protes in Afrikaanse geledere.

Sorg dat jy ’n eksemplaar bekom! Bestel dit teen R100 by inlig@praag.org of betaal per kredietkaart hier.

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Iran overstates progress

Iran has continued to make further progress on its nuclear programs in defiance of UN Security Council demands. Evidence of this progress has emerged even as a May 23 deadline looms for Tehran to comply with a March Security Council resolution.

Iranian officials have continued to express a willingness to enter into negotiations with Germany and the permanent members of the Security Council. Those officials have said, however, that they will not suspend Iran’s gas centrifuge-based uranium-enrichment program despite repeated demands from the Security Council to do so.

Resolution 1747, which was adopted in March in response to Iran’s failure to comply with previous resolutions, imposed new restrictions on Tehran and expanded the scope of existing sanctions. (See ACT, April 2007.) The most recent resolution requires Iran to comply “without further delay” with Resolution 1737, which the council adopted in December. Those requirements include a demand that Iran suspend all activities related to its enrichment program, which Iran says is for peaceful purposes but that could be used to produce highly enriched uranium for bombs. (See ACT, January/February 2007.)

The March resolution requested International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Director-General Mohamed ElBaradei to submit a report within 60 days to the Security Council and to the IAEA Board of Governors regarding Iran’s compliance. The council could adopt additional sanctions if Iran fails to comply.

Department of State spokesperson Sean McCormack told reporters April 9 that “there is [the] potential for more resolutions of [a] similar type down the road” if Iran continues to be uncooperative.

Resolution 1747 was the council’s third regarding Iran’s nuclear program. The first was Resolution 1696, which the council adopted last July. That resolution followed a June 2006 offer of incentives from Germany and permanent Security Council members China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States, that was intended to induce Iran to end its enrichment program. (See ACT, September 2006.)

Ali Larijani, secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council and Tehran’s lead nuclear negotiator, met April 25-26 with Javier Solana, the European Union’s foreign policy chief.

The meeting ended without agreement, although Larijani said that “New ideas emerged during the negotiations,” Iranian radio reported April 27. He described these ideas, however, as “undeveloped,” adding that they “need more thinking and effort to reach maturity.” The two sides “will follow up the negotiations in two weeks,” he said.

Prior to the meeting, Iranian officials had offered mixed assessments of the potential for diplomacy. For example, an April 22 report by the official Islamic Republic News Agency quoted Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mohammad-Ali Hosseini as saying Tehran does not intend to comply with the council’s suspension demand.

However, Vice President Gholamreza Aghazadeh, who also heads Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization, spoke positively about negotiations during an April 17 interview with the semi-official Iranian Students News Agency, arguing that “the conditions for negotiations for both sides are suitable more than ever before.”

He also indicated that Tehran believes that the UN sanctions will remain in effect for only a short time, explaining that Iran does not “see the discussion of the nuclear issue at the Security Council as a long-term issue, because everyone needs everyone in the world.”

Aghazadeh indicated that the government might at some point consider withdrawing from the nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT). He added, however, that Tehran currently has no plans to do so.

He also suggested that Tehran might further decrease its cooperation with the IAEA if the Security Council adopts another resolution penalizing Iran.

Iran has previously taken such measures. For example, Tehran announced the day after Resolution 1747 was adopted that it would end its compliance with a portion of the subsidiary arrangements for its IAEA safeguards agreement. That provision requires Tehran to provide design information for new nuclear facilities as soon as it authorizes construction. Previously, Iran was required to provide design information for new facilities only six months before introducing nuclear material. (See ACT, March 2003.)

IAEA safeguards agreements, which are required under the NPT, allow the agency to monitor non-nuclear-weapon states-parties’ declared nuclear activities. Subsidiary arrangements specify in detail how the procedures contained in a country’s safeguards agreement should be implemented.

Since Iran’s March decision, it has denied agency inspectors access to a heavy-water-moderated nuclear research reactor that the country is constructing at Arak. An April 13 letter from Tehran to the IAEA argued that Iran is not required to allow the inspection because the reactor’s construction is at an early stage.

An April 18 letter from IAEA Deputy Director-General Olli Heinonen criticized Tehran’s decision and stated that Iran could not refuse the inspection because the government cannot modify the subsidiary arrangements unilaterally. He also said that the relevant part of the arrangements relate “to the provision of design information,” rather than the IAEA’s verification of information already provided by Iran.

The Arak reactor has caused concern because such reactors can produce plutonium, which can also be used as fissile material in nuclear weapons. Although the IAEA has found evidence that Tehran was interested in reprocessing spent reactor fuel, Iran has said that it will not do so. Resolutions 1747 and 1737 require Iran to halt work on the reactor.

Aghazadeh said April 17 that the reactor “will be completed in the next three or four years.” A knowledgeable source told Arms Control Today the next day, however, that the reactor is five to six years from completion and would not go critical for seven to eight years.

Iran has previously said that it will complete the reactor by 2009. (See ACT, May 2006.)

Iran has moved forward with its enrichment program in recent months, although some Iranian officials have apparently overstated its progress. Tehran has a pilot facility located at Natanz that contains approximately 358 centrifuges. Iran also is constructing a larger commercial facility at the same site and has a facility for converting uranium oxide into uranium hexafluoride.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad announced in an April 9 speech that “Iran is among the countries which produce nuclear fuel on an industrial scale.” But this claim was met with widespread skepticism, given that Iran has only recently installed 1,312 centrifuge machines, far fewer than commercial enrichment facilities in other states.

Russia’s Atomic Energy Agency head Sergei Kiriyenko told the press that Russian government experts say Iran cannot yet produce fuel on an “industrial level,” RIA Novosti reported April 12. Kiriyenko pointed out that centrifuge cascades need to be linked together properly in order to enrich uranium on a large scale. Whether Iran is able to do this is unclear, a European diplomat told Arms Control Today April 30.

Iran’s technical claims may be aimed at bolstering Tehran’s diplomatic leverage. Indeed, Iranian officials have previously argued that it should use its technological achievements for that purpose. (See ACT, June 2006.) Similarly, Aghazadeh argued in an April 9 television interview that the success of Iran’s enrichment program has demonstrated the futility of Security Council pressure.

Iranian nuclear officials have not publicly specified the number of centrifuges that the country is operating. But in his letter, Heinonen said that Iran reports it has “put into operation” eight 164-centrifuge cascades at the commercial facility.

Iran is feeding an unspecified amount of uranium hexafluoride into the cascades, according to the letter. Tehran is not actually enriching uranium, a knowledgeable source told Arms Control Today April 18. Instead, Iran is injecting small amounts of feedstock into the centrifuges to ready them for operation. This process produces trace amount of uranium enriched to very low levels. The European diplomat said that Iran is being “cautious” by introducing small amounts of feedstock. Previously, the centrifuges would spin properly but would break when uranium hexafluoride was introduced into them, the diplomat explained.

Earlier, Iranian officials told agency inspectors that Iran had installed two 164-centrifuge cascades at the commercial facility and that two more such cascades “were in the final stages of installation,” according to a late February report from ElBaradei.

Based on information obtained April 7 from a diplomatic source in Vienna close to the IAEA, Iran also has two additional cascades that are near completion.

Iran told the IAEA that it intends to “continue progressively with the installation of…18 cascades” into the commercial facility and “bring them gradually into operation by May,” ElBaradei reported.

Whether Tehran can meet this target date is unclear. ElBaradei told the Financial Times in February that he did not know how long Iran would take to get 3,000 centrifuges to function properly. “It could be a year, it could be six months,” he said.

Aghazadeh said April 17 that it would take Iran up to four years to install the remaining centrifuges envisaged for the facility. Tehran has said that it eventually plans to install more than 50,000 centrifuges.

Iran has no plans to build additional centrifuge facilities “at the moment,” Aghazadeh said. However, he indicated in an April 9 television interview that the country is developing a “new generation” of centrifuges.

Tehran previously told the IAEA that it is conducting research on “different types” of centrifuges, without using nuclear material. (See ACT, October 2006.) The IAEA has long been concerned that Iran, which currently uses P-1 centrifuges, has been conducting research on more advanced centrifuges.

In the April 17 interview, Aghazadeh seemed to acknowledge that Iran’s nuclear program faces limitations, saying that Tehran “undoubtedly needs the help of other countries in order to pursue its nuclear activities.” He further explained that it cannot meet the entirety of its projected nuclear fuel demands. Aghazadeh said in the April 9 interview that Iran is planning to explore for additional uranium deposits inside the country.

The United States has argued that Iran does not have enough indigenous uranium to meet its projected fuel needs. (See ACT, September 2005.)

Similarly, the managing director of Iran’s uranium-conversion facility acknowledged in February that it is not “economically viable” for Iran to produce some equipment for its nuclear program.

Iran and the IAEA have apparently reached agreement on appropriate safeguards arrangements for the commercial centrifuge facility. The agreement, which “includes unannounced inspections and containment and surveillance…has been tested,” an IAEA official told Arms Control Today April 27. The agency is currently conducting discussions with Iran “on some of the practical implementation modalities,” the official added.

The completion date for a light-water reactor that a Russian contractor is building near the Iranian city of Bushehr has again been delayed. Moscow and Tehran agreed last fall that the reactor was to start operating in September 2007 and begin providing energy two months later. Russia was scheduled to start delivering fuel to the plant in March 2007. (See ACT, November 2006.)

The two countries are currently negotiating a revised schedule for the project, which has at least in part been delayed by a financial dispute. Atomstroyexport, the Russian contractor for the project, says that Iran has failed to make its payments on time.

But Iran and Russia appear to have made some progress in recent days. According to RIA Novosti, Atomstroyexport spokesperson Irina Yesipova said April 22 that the two sides concluded “a protocol defining a set of measures to provide stable financing” for the project. If implemented, the new agreement should resolve some but not all of the project’s financial issues, she said.

The project faces another obstacle. Kiriyenko said April 23 that third-party countries have delayed supplying some equipment for the project, RIA Novosti reported. He did not elaborate, but deputy spokesperson for the Kremlin Dmitry Peskov said that these delays were caused by Tehran’s failure to comply with the Security Council resolutions, the Financial Times reported March 21.

Iran also plans to construct additional reactors. For example, Aghazadeh reiterated that Iran is planning to construct a 360-megawatt nuclear power plant. In addition, the deputy head of the Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization, Ahmad Fayaz Bakhsh, told reporters April 15 that Tehran is issuing tenders for the construction of one more 1,000-megawatt light-water reactor and another 1,600-megawatt reactor near Bushehr, according to Agence France-Presse. Construction of the plants is expected to take “between nine and 11 years,” he said.

Swiss question counterfeiting charges

Swiss police who closely monitor the circulation of counterfeit currency have challenged the Bush administration’s assertions that North Korea is manufacturing fake American $100 bills.

President Bush has accused North Korea of making and circulating the false bills, so perfect they’re called supernotes, and in late 2005 the U.S. Treasury took measures to block that country’s access to international banking. North Korea subsequently halted negotiations over dismantling its nuclear weapons program, a process that remains in limbo because of the dispute.

The Swiss federal criminal police, in a report released Monday, expresses serious doubt that North Korea is capable of manufacturing the fake bills, which it said were superior to real ones.

The Swiss report includes color enlargements that show the differences between genuine bills and counterfeit supernotes. The supernotes are identical to U.S. banknotes except for added distinguishing marks, which can be detected only with a magnifying glass. In addition, under ultraviolet or infrared light, stripes appear or the serial numbers disappear on the supernotes.

The Bundeskriminalpolizei didn’t hazard a guess as to who’s been manufacturing the supernotes, but said experts agreed that the counterfeits weren’t the work of an individual but of a government or governmental organization.

The U.S. Secret Service, the lead federal agency in combating counterfeiters, declined to provide details or respond to the Swiss report. But spokesman Eric Zahren said the agency stood by its allegations against Pyongyang.

"Our investigation has identified definitive connections between these highly deceptive counterfeit notes and the North Koreans," Zahren said. "Our investigation has revealed that the supernotes continue to be produced and distributed by sources operating out of North Korea."

The Swiss report says the Secret Service has refused to provide any information about its investigations. It notes that if the United States produced concrete evidence to back up its allegations, "it would have a basis for going to war." Under international law, counterfeiting another country’s currency is considered a cause for war.

But if the U.S. has a reason to go to war, against whom?

The Swiss police noted that before charging North Korea with counterfeiting, U.S. officials had mentioned Iran, Syria and East Germany as possible manufacturers. North Korea’s capacity for printing banknotes is extremely limited, because its banknote printing press dates from the 1970s. Its own currency is of "such poor quality that one automatically wonders whether this country would even be in a position to manufacture the high-quality `supernotes,’ " the report says.

For years, analysts have wondered why the supernotes – which are detectable only with sophisticated, expensive technology – appear to have been produced in quantities less than it would cost to acquire the sophisticated machinery needed to make them. The paper and ink used to make U.S. currency are made through exclusive contract and aren’t available on the open marketplace. The machinery involved is highly regulated.

In theory, if North Korea were producing the notes, it could print $50 million worth of them within a few hours – as much as has been seized in nearly two decades, the report said.

"What defies logic is the limited, or even controlled, amount of `exclusive’ fakes that have appeared over the years. The organization could easily circulate tenfold that amount without raising suspicions," says the Swiss police report, which also says Switzerland has seized 5 percent of all known supernotes.

Moreover, it noted that the manufacturer of the supernotes had issued 19 different versions, an "enormous effort" that only a criminal organization or state could undertake. The updates closely tracked the changes in U.S. currency issued by the Federal Reserve Bank.

The fact that the Swiss are questioning the veracity of the U.S. allegations against North Korea carries special weight in the insular world of banknote printing.

"The producers of the most sophisticated products used in banknote printing are Swiss or at least of Swiss origin. That goes for the (specialty) inks and that goes for the machines," said Klaus Bender, a German foreign correspondent and the author of "Moneymakers: The Secret World of Banknote Printing."

"Can the North Koreans do it, are they doing it? The answer is couched in diplomatic language, (but) the answer is clearly no," Bender said.

—

EXCERPT FROM THE REPORT:

"According to the US Secret Service, $50 million worth of `super-fakes’ were confiscated worldwide over the past 16 years, only a small portion of them within the United States. Measured against the US annual counterfeit damage of $200 million, the damage from $50 million worth of `super-fakes’ is not that significant. The Federal Reserve Bank produces genuine $100 dollar bills mainly for the foreign market. On their return to the U.S., the issuing bank after examination can easily distinguish the `supernotes’ from originals using banknote testing equipment, due to altered infrared characteristics. For this reason, the United States over the years has hardly suffered economic damage due to the `super dollar.’

"A (banknote) printing press like the one in North Korea can produce $50 million worth of bills in a few hours. Using its printing presses dating back to the 1970’s, North Korea is today printing its own currency in such poor quality that one automatically wonders whether this country would even be in a position to manufacture the high-quality `supernotes.’ The enormous effort put into the making of the 19 different `super-fakes’ that we know of is unusual. Only a (criminal) governmental organization can afford such an effort. What defies logic is the limited or even controlled amount of `exclusive’ fakes that have appeared over the years. The organization could easily circulate tenfold that amount without raising suspicions."

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Woolworths in SEB-transaksie

Woolworths, die alles-Engels kettingwinkel gaan ‘n SEB-transaksie (Swart Ekonomiese Bemagtiging) doen, het die bestuur aangekondig. Dié winkel hou modes, kos en huisware aan en het takke oral in Suid-Afrika.

Die transaksie beloop 292 miljoen rand en sal aan swart vennote ‘n aandeel van 10% in die maatskappy verskaf. Woolworths is maar een van talle ondernemings wat nou in die rigting beweeg van die "erkenning van die sosiale en ekonomiese imperatief" van SEB. Hulle is ook van mening dat die "ongelykhede" van die "apartheid-era" aangespreek moet word en daarom moet die oordrag plaasvind.

Trevor Manuel, minister van Finansies, het reeds by geleentheid die wysheid van SEB in sy huidige vorm bevraagteken, maar dit lyk nie asof Woolworths kennis geneem het nie. Tot dusver het SEB net ‘n paar besonder welgestelde swart beleggers, die meeste ook toevallig ANC-lede, gehelp. Manuel, self ‘n lid van die ANC, het tewens verlede maand aangekondig dat SEB hersien behoort te word.

Ongeveer 90% van Woolworths se personeel is swart en daarvan is 85% vroue.

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DRC: UN traded gold for guns

Pakistani UN peacekeeping troops have traded in gold and sold weapons to Congolese militia groups they were meant to disarm, the BBC has learnt.

These militia groups were guilty of some of the worst human rights abuses during the Democratic Republic of Congo’s long civil war.

The trading went on in 2005. A UN investigative team sent to gather evidence was obstructed and threatened.

The team’s report was buried by the UN itself to "avoid political fallout".

These events took place in and around the mining town of Mongbwalu, in north-eastern Democratic Republic of Congo.

The Pakistani battalion of the UN peacekeeping mission deployed there in 2005 and helped bring peace to an area that had previously seen bitter fighting between the Lendu and Hema ethnic groups.

Locals welcomed them, but the lure of the rich alluvial gold mines proved too much to resist for some, recalls the head of the miners’ association, Liki Likambo.

"I saw a UN Pakistani soldier who came to buy gold in one of the gold negotiators here in Mongbwalu. I was there in the shop. I saw it with my own eyes."

Soon the Pakistani officers were doing deals directly with the FNI militia.

Evarista Anjasubu – a local businessman said he had known of transactions between Pakistani officers and two of the most notorious militia leaders called Kung Fu and Dragon who controlled the gold mines.

"They were already friends. I knew well. It was gold that was the basis of their friendship. So the gold extracted from the mines went directly to the Pakistanis. They used to meet in the UN camp in Mongbwalu, in a thatched house."

As the trade developed the Pakistani officers brought in the Congolese army and then Indian traders from Kenya.

Richard Ndilu, in charge of immigration at Mongbwalu airstrip, became suspicious in late 2005 when an Indian businessman arrived there and went to stay at the camp of the Pakistani peacekeepers.

Alerted to this illegal trade by her officials, the District Commissioner of Ituri, Petronille Vaweka, went to Bunia airport to intercept a plane from Mongbwalu.

She said her way was blocked by Congolese army officers, who refused to allow her to inspect the cargo.

"I knew they had gold because the price of gold increased when the Indians went to Mongwalu," she said.

"When we wanted to verify what was inside the plane the pilot refused to allow us to enter the plane – me who was the chief, he refused! It was a big scandal."

When the UN was alerted to the allegations of gold trading by Human Rights Watch in late 2005, they instituted a major investigation by the Office for Internal Oversight Services.

What they uncovered was even more explosive.

This is from a witness statement given to the UN by a Congolese officer engaged in the disarming of the militia in the nearby town of Nizi:

"The officer expressed his regrets over the malpractices of a Pakistani battalion under the auspices of Major Zanfar. He revealed the arms surrendered by ex-combatants were secretly returned to them by Major Zanfar thereby compromising the work they had collectively done earlier.

"Repeatedly he saw militia who had been disarmed one day, but the next day would become re-armed again. The information he could obtain was always the same, that it would be the Pakistani battalion giving arms back to the militia."

This evidence was backed up by an interpreter working with the Pakistani battalion at Mongbwalu.

On arriving at the Officer’s Mess, the interpreter found two militia leaders – known as Kung Fu and Dragon.

The interpreter said that the first question from Major Ali was to Kung Fu – asking him: ‘What about the weapons I gave you? What about the weapons Monuc gave you?’

A UN investigation team arrived in Mongbwalu in August 2006.

At first the Pakistani battalion there cooperated with them. But when they attempted to seize a computer with apparently incriminating documents on it a stand-off ensued.

The Pakistanis surrounded the UN police accompanying the investigators with barbed wire and put two armoured personnel carriers outside their living quarters at a nearby Christian mission.

Thoroughly intimidated, the investigators were airlifted out of Mongbwalu.

The Pakistani troops are replaced every six months and the BBC investigation concerns events that took place prior to the deployment of the current Pakistani battalion.

When we put the allegations of weapons trading to the head of the UN in Congo, Ambassador William Swing, he denied emphatically that any weapons have been handed by his troops to the militia.

"This I can categorically deny. What we have done is just the opposite. We have demobilised more than 20,000. We have taken in caches of arms. We have destroyed arms. We have done public burnings of these arms. And there is absolutely nothing to that allegation."

He says that the investigation into gold trading has yet to be completed.

The UN in New York has refused to explain what took place or why, nearly two years after the allegations first surfaced, the Congolese people have no idea what action – if any – has been taken to discipline the Pakistani soldiers concerned.

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Communists keep grip on Vietnam

Vietnam elects a new National Assembly on Sunday, although since only the Communist Party is allowed to field candidates the outcome is not in much doubt.

The election follows a crackdown on activists who had been calling for free elections. The BBC’s Bill Hayton, who in March was told to leave Vietnam by the government, has been investigating the prospects for democracy there.

The sight of a secret policeman forcing his hand over the mouth of a Catholic priest, Nguyen Van Ly, to prevent him shouting out an anti-communist poem during his trial seemed to sum up Vietnam’s attitude towards political dissent.

But at the same time as the country’s security forces are engaged in what Human Rights Watch has called "one of the worst crackdowns on peaceful dissent in 20 years", the Communist Party is experimenting with a degree of openness.

So what are the prospects for democracy in Vietnam?

At first sight Vietnam’s National Assembly looks like little more than a rubber-stamping body.

Ninety per cent of the members in the last session were members of the Communist Party and the 10% that were not all had to be approved by the party in order to stand for election.

The party maintains close control over what the assembly discusses and decides.

For example, although in theory the assembly elects the president and prime minister there is only ever one candidate on the ballot – the candidate previously chosen by the party.

But that is not the whole story, because the assembly is beginning to show some signs of independent thinking in the way it scrutinise laws and holds ministers to account.

In the past few sessions the grilling of officials seen to have failed in their jobs, live on television, has gripped the country.

Poor performances by the scandal-hit former minister of transport and the seemingly complacent head of the Supreme Court caused them to later lose their jobs.

However, some members believe that the current situation is not enough. Those such as Do Trong Ngoan want more.

"The vision and the knowledge of the National Assembly have to be developed," he says, "or the assembly will be left behind and if that happens we won’t be able to take the right decisions and that would lead to long-lasting backwardness of the country.

But while some parts of the communist system want greater openness – others do not.

The trials of dissidents in the past few months, including the priest Father Ly in March, was vivid proof.

Their crimes were to call for multi-party elections.

The Communist Party believes its role is to lead the country – and not necessarily to follow the wishes of the people.

This position is expertly articulated by the woman who is the assembly’s leading diplomat – often leading delegations to Washington and other countries – Madame Ton Nu Thi Ninh.

"I resist the idea that voters are always right," she says.

"I know that there are in any country enclaves of conservatism, look at what happened in South Africa with apartheid. What is right does not always coincide with majority rule."

Although any citizen can, in theory, stand for election to the National Assembly, they first have to be approved by the Communist Party.

There are two selection processes, both organised by the party’s umbrella organisation called the Vietnam Fatherland Front.

In the first hearing the prospective candidate must convince their work colleagues of their good character and in the second they must do the same with the people living in their neighbourhood.

This micro-control means that anyone with views outside what the party views as acceptable will not even get the chance to stand.

However, some parts of the party are keen to get more independents elected to widen the pool of talent in the assembly.

These would not be dissidents but something like a "loyal opposition". But even this, like other areas of political reform, is opposed by others.

No Vietnamese political analysts will comment on divisions within the party directly, but Martin Gainsborough, of Bristol University in the UK, keeps a close eye on the evolution of Vietnamese politics.

"Within Vietnam – both official Vietnam and unofficially – there’s a wide range of differing views about the speed of political change," he says.

"Some people within the system think the National Assembly should go further in asserting its role in the country. Others think that change is fast enough already and want to proceed more carefully. Part of the challenge, part of the ongoing debate in Vietnam is about working out those issues."

Political reform in Vietnam is slow but it is happening and so long as it does not challenge the supremacy of the Communist Party it is likely to continue.

Vietnam’s communist rulers are happy to experiment with openness to make the current system more efficient but any transition to a new system, a truly open and democratic system, is still a long way off.

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