Close allies of President Thabo Mbeki have bid for an influential South African media group which includes a newspaper critical of the government.Well... not exactly.
His personal adviser and a foreign ministry official are in a consortium offering R7bn (£1bn, £500m) to buy Johncom, which owns the Sunday Times.
Chief foreign ministry spokesman Ronnie Mamoepa said suggestions that President Mbeki or the government were behind this deal was "ludicrous and laughable".
This is a purely private initiative funded commercially," he told Sapa news agency.
However, the consortium, Koni, are reported to be seeking funding from the Public Investment Corporation (PIC), which is wholly owned by the government.**********
An opposition spokesman said government denials stretched credulity.
RELATED: Yeah, that Thabo Mbeki
Fiercely intellectual and curious, Mbeki encountered dissident AIDS research while surfing the Web late one night. He read the scientific papers and now talks confidently about "toxicities" and "the phosphoral relation."
He portrays himself as an educated skeptic about AIDS. But his late night Web-trolling, credulity about what he read online, and $10 scientific phrases smack less of skepticism than obsession.
The president of South Africa is acting like a nutter.
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