<p>ABUJA &#8211; Nigeria&#8217;s central bank will try to eliminate the currency black market, where the naira trades about 40 percent below the official rate against the dollar, Nigeria&#8217;s finance minister said on Tuesday.</p>
<p>Africa&#8217;s largest economy, dependent on oil exports, is in its first recession in 25 years as low global crude prices take their toll.</p>
<p>The central bank scrapped a 16-month-old peg of 197 naira to the dollar in June, but it continues to trade in the official market, so that the naira remains far stronger against the dollar there than on the parallel market. The government has blamed that black market for damaging the already shaky economy.</p>
<p>The central bank (CBN) &#8220;has been directed to do this and CBN has promised to do something by putting a system in place to eliminate the black market because it&#8217;s damaging the economy&#8221;, Finance Minister Kemi Adeosun told a conference.</p>
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<p>A CBN spokesman, Isaac Okorafor, said the central bank was working towards &#8220;ensuring that the forex market operates as effectively as we would envisage&#8221;.</p>
<p>He said the aim was to &#8220;ensure there is no black market&#8221; but did not give details of how this would be achieved.</p>
<p>The naira has traded around 305.5 naira to the dollar on the official interbank market since August, while it was quoted at 487 to the dollar on the parallel market on Monday.</p>
<p>(Reporting by Felix Onuah and Alexis Akwagyiram; Writing by Ulf Laessing and Paul Carsten; Editing by Kevin Liffey; Editing by Andrew Heavens)﻿</p>
<p> </p>


Nigeria Fin.Min attempts to eliminate naira black market

<p>JOHANNESBURG(Reuters) &#8211; South African private hospital firm Life Healthcare is planning a rights issue of up to 10.7 billion rand ($757 million) to fund an acquisition and reduce debt, it said on Tuesday.</p>
<p>Life Healthcare said in November it will acquire 95 percent of Alliance Medical for up to 10.4 billion rand through a temporary loan from Barclays Plc, and South Africa&#8217;s Rand Merchant Bank.</p>
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<p>The company, the country&#8217;s third largest private hospital company, said the equity cash call would represent at least 30 percent of its issued shares and some of its proceeds would be used to pay down the company&#8217;s 8.5 billion rand debt.</p>
<p>Demand for private healthcare has risen in South Africa as the fast-growing black middle class take up medical insurance, but concerns about the costs of healthcare has prompted authorities to launch an inquiry and companies to diversify into other markets.</p>
<p>Life Healthcare, which vies for with Mediclinic International and Netcare, said the rights issue would put it on a sound financial footing to pursue expansion and continue paying dividends.</p>
<p>Shares in Life Healthcare were up 0.63 percent to 31.87 rand by 0859 GMT.</p>
<p>($1 = 14.1324 rand)</p>
<p>($1 = 0.8081 pounds)</p>
<p>(Reporting by Nqobile Dludla, editing by Louise Heavens)﻿</p>
<p> </p>


South Africa introduces $260 a month national minimum wage

Life Healthcare plans R10.7bn capital raise

<p>PARIS &#8211; France&#8217;s foreign ministry called for the European Union to re-examine its relations with Democratic Republic of Congo after President Joseph Kabila failed to step down when his mandate expired on Monday.</p>
<p>&#8220;After the constitutional mandate of President Kabila ended, France is concerned by reports of arrests as well as violence in Kinshasa and Lubumbashi,&#8221; spokesman Romain Nadal said in a daily briefing. &#8220;The seriousness of the situation justifies that the European Union re-examines its relations with Congo,&#8221; he added.</p>
<p>Similar sentiments were echoed in former colonial power Belgium, according to a seperate Reuters report.</p>
<p>&#8220;As there is no inclusive agreement, relations between Belgium and the Democratic Republic of Congo will be re-examined, with the greatest circumspection for any new engagement with the current authorities,&#8221; the statement said.﻿﻿</p>
<p>Kabila, who has ruled since 2001, was required by constitutional term limits to leave office but his government says the presidential election to replace him cannot take place until 2018.</p>
<p>﻿﻿</p>


Europe to re-examine ties with Congo

<p>JOHANNESBURG &#8211; South African police fired rubber bullets on Tuesday at scores of protesters outside the Democratic Republic of Congo embassy (DRC) in Pretoria demanding President Joseph Kabila step down, a spokesman said.</p>
<p>Several protesters were wounded and seven were arrested for public order offences, provincial police spokesman Kay Makhubela said. Kabila&#8217;s mandate as DRC president expired at midnight, with no elected successor in place. </p>
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<p>(Reporting by Ed Cropley; Editing by Ed Stoddard)﻿</p>


Police fire rubber bullets at anti-Kabila protestors in SA

<p>LUSAKA &#8211; Konkola Copper Mines (KCM), owned by Vedanta Resources, has been ordered by a London court to pay the Zambian government more than $100 million for a claim related to the copper price, a state-owned company involved in the dispute said.</p>
<p>The claim relates to outstanding payments under a 2013 copper price participation settlement agreement between KCM and Zambia Consolidated Copper Mines Investments Holdings (ZCCM-IH), the latter said late on Monday.</p>
<p>In June this year, ZCCM-IH filed the claim with the English High Court to recover over $100 million it said was owed to it from KCM in terms of the 2013 agreement.</p>
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<p>&#8220;We now advise that ZCCM-IH has been successful in its application for default judgment. KCM has been ordered (on 16 December 2016) to pay all sums owed to ZCCM-IH,&#8221; the state company said.</p>
<p>&#8220;The total amount to be paid by KCM amounts to approximately $103 million. KCM has also been ordered to reimburse ZCCM-IH 80 percent of the costs it has incurred in pursuing its claim.&#8221;</p>
<p>A ZCCM-IH spokeswoman said the company and KCM planned to issue a joint press statement on Tuesday to give further details of the ruling.</p>
<p>(Reporting by Chris Mfula; Editing by Ed Cropley)﻿</p>
<p> </p>


Vedanta Resources slapped with $100m settlement

<p>TEL AVIV/LONDON &#8211; Israeli authorities placed billionaire businessman Beny Steinmetz under house arrest on Monday over allegations of bribery and corruption in Africa linked to his mining company, BSG Resources (BSGR).</p>
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<p>Steinmetz, along with other Israelis living abroad, is alleged to have paid tens of millions of dollars to senior public officials in Guinea to advance their businesses, a police spokesman said in a statement.</p>
<p>The 60-year-old was detained earlier in the day for questioning and will remain under house arrest until Jan. 2.</p>
<p>BSGR said in a statement the allegations were baseless and Yuval Sasson, a lawyer for Steinmetz and BSGR in Israel, said the proceedings were &#8220;a recycling of an old process led by the government of Guinea&#8230;in order to illegally expropriate BSGR&#8217;s mining rights&#8221;.</p>
<p>&#8220;These are continuous and baseless attempts meant to conceal the corruption aimed at illegally expropriating assets,&#8221; Sasson said in a statement.</p>
<p>BSGR said in a separate statement that the investigations were initiated by the government of Guinea with international police organisations in the United States, Britain and Switzerland.</p>
<p>The Guinean government said Steinmetz&#8217;s detention was linked to an investigation it had started in 2011. The inquiry could implicate many people, but Guinea was not ready to make an extradition request, a senior government source said.</p>
<p>BSGR described Steinmetz as an adviser to the company, which is headquartered in the Channel Islands and is a mining arm of Steinmetz&#8217;s business conglomerate. </p>
<p>A BSGR spokesman told Reuters that Steinmetz does not sit on BSGR&#8217;s board or have an executive role, but &#8220;is the beneficiary of the foundation which owns BSG Resources&#8221;.</p>
<p>As part of international efforts to improve transparency, the Guinean government under President Alpha Conde, elected in 2010, launched a review of mining contracts signed before 2011.</p>
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<p>Within its review the West African nation investigated how BSGR obtained the rights to the Simandou deposit, the world&#8217;s largest untapped iron ore reserves, in 2008.</p>
<p>Anglo-Australian mining group Rio Tinto and BSGR have made legal claims against each other over the mining rights in Simandou.</p>
<p>Last week, Guinea&#8217;s former minister of mines, Mahmoud Thiam, was arrested in New York on charges he was involved in bribery payments linked to Guinea&#8217;s mining industry.</p>
<p>(Additional reporting by Ari Rabinovitch in Jerusalem and Saliou Samb in Conakry; Editing by Alexander Smith)﻿</p>
<p> </p>
<p>﻿</p>
<p> </p>


Israeli billionaire under house arrest in Guinea

<p>ACCRA &#8211; Ghana&#8217;s incoming government could give the country&#8217;s $2 billion cocoa industry a boost if it installs a more transparent executive at industry regulator Cocobod and implements reforms, industry sources said.</p>
<p>The New Patriotic Party (NPP) said its priority is to push annual cocoa output in the world&#8217;s second-biggest producer above 1 million tonnes when it takes power in January under President-elect Nana Akufo-Addo using a series of fresh measures.</p>
<p>A big issue is the role of Cocobod chief executive. Industry officials said CEO Stephen Opuni&#8217;s position is vulnerable because he publicly supported President John Mahama who lost the Dec. 7 election.</p>
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<p>Traders and buyers credit the regulator for maintaining the premium quality of Ghana&#8217;s cocoa and increasing the guaranteed minimum price paid to farmers to 70 percent of net free-on-board but they say greater access to Cocobod is crucial.</p>
<p>&#8220;For the last two years, it has been very closed and very difficult to meet with Cocobod,&#8221; one senior Ghana cocoa operative said in a comment echoed by several others.</p>
<p>Cocobod plays a unique role both regulating the sector and exporting beans through its Cocoa Marketing Company as well as distributing fertilizer, pesticides and seedlings.</p>
<p>Few were willing to speak openly for fear of antagonizing Cocobod and some said that in itself reduced accountability. Buyers said they were unwilling to challenge the regulator for fear of damaging business relationships.</p>
<p>&#8220;Nobody dares to stand up to Cocobod,&#8221; said one buyer, who declined to be named.</p>
<p>Cocobod CEO Opuni did not respond to requests for comment.</p>
<p>Ghana accounts for up to 25 percent of global cocoa supply and the industry also contributes around 7 percent of GDP as well as up to one quarter of the country&#8217;s export earnings.</p>
<p>The NPP has established a transition team but is yet to name a finance minister, one of whose statutory roles is to oversee Cocobod.</p>
<p>Its manifesto outlines policies including re-activating mass spraying, replanting farms with high yield trees, improving local processing and compensating farmers for diseased trees.</p>
<p>The party will &#8220;ensure that farmers receive increased producer prices plus bonuses high enough to encourage them to produce more cocoa for export (and) ensure that the value that farmers receive for their produce is not diluted by depreciation of the cedi against the dollar&#8221;.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>FINANCIAL TRANSPARENCY</p>
<p>Industry sources calculate Cocobod controls around half a billion dollars in funds per year, and must therefore increase its financial transparency and move towards depoliticising its dealings with farmers.</p>
<p>Several farmers said supporters of the outgoing National Democratic Party government gained better access to seedlings and inputs in the run-up to the vote than supporters of the opposition. Cocobod denied this.</p>
<p>At the same time, the regulator&#8217;s promise of free fertilizers, pesticides, spraying and seedlings had discouraged private sector participation and made farmers unhealthily dependent on free products rather than buying on the market.</p>
<div class="related-content group-one">Also In Commodities</p>
<p> </p>
<ul>
<li><a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-global-oil-idUSKBN149023">Oil eases as traders start winding down positions in run-up to holiday season</a></li>
<li><a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-global-grains-idUSKBN1490AY">Wheat rebounds from eight-day low on colder U.S. weather</a></li>
</ul>
</div>
<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s not an effective system. It&#8217;s expensive and in the end not all farmers have access to these kinds of products. Because of the free elements the farmer has no opportunity to buy if he would have wanted to,&#8221; one senior market source said.</p>
<p>Others said it would be better if Cocobod&#8217;s role was reconfigured to focus solely on regulation, opening space for the private sector.</p>
<p>Ghana&#8217;s cocoa production peaked in the 2010/11 season at more than 1 million tonnes, dipped to under 750,000 tonnes in 2014/15 season before rebounding slightly last season.</p>
<p>One senior cocoa analyst said current production was running around 10,000 tonnes higher than the same point in the previous season. It would fall back in January and February but the mid-crop was expected to be strong, the analyst said.</p>
<p>However, the country needs to improve productivity per hectare. A step towards this is to map the size of each farm and count the number of farmers to get a more precise figure than the 800,000 that is often mentioned.</p>
<p>&#8220;We are looking forward to seeing all the things they (the NPP) have been promising,&#8221; Nana Johnson Mensah, a chief farmer of Western region south, told Reuters.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>(Editing by Susan Thomas)﻿</p>


Ghana's $2bn cocoa industry to gain from fresh reforms

<p>The last board member at South Africa&#8217;s state broadcaster, the SABC, has quit after a parliamentary investigation into the board&#8217;s failure to look into allegations of misspending and censorship, the presidency said on Monday.</p>
<p>Professor Mbulaheni Maguvhe, who was subjected to stiff questioning by a cross-party panel of MPs last week, had been the sole board member following the resignation of his colleagues this year in the wake of a string of scandals.</p>
<p>The SABC is the primary news source for South Africa&#8217;s 54 million people but has been mired in controversy throughout most of President Jacob Zuma&#8217;s seven years in office.</p>
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<p>At the parliamentary inquiry, journalists spoke of an unofficial SABC focus on &#8220;sunshine news&#8221; that included a ban on airing footage of violent protests ahead of August elections in which the ruling African National Congress (ANC) lost control of three cities.</p>
<p>A court ruled this month that former SABC chief operating officer Hlaudi Motsoeneng, who introduced the ban on airing violent protest footage, should not hold any position at the broadcaster and barred him from entering the premises.</p>
<p>The court ruling was one of the latest examples of an ally of Zuma being called to account for allegations of mismanagement of South African public bodies.</p>
<p>Communications Minister Faith Muthambi denied last week that she had tried to get the SABC to suppress news of protests and discontent, when she testified to the investigation.</p>
<p>ANC chief whip Jackson Mthembu, who is among leading ANC figures to have called for Zuma&#8217;s resignation, said Maguvhe&#8217;s decision to go was better late than never and would enable the SABC to start repairing its tarnished reputation.</p>
<p>&#8220;We are confident that his exit will speed up the process of addressing the leadership crisis at SABC,&#8221; Mthembu said in a statement.</p>
<p>In its statement, Zuma&#8217;s office gave no reason for Maguvhe&#8217;s decision. At the parliamentary hearing, Maguvhe defended his time in charge of the board, saying he had done a &#8220;sterling job&#8221;.</p>
<p>The parliamentary inquiry is due to deliver its findings at the end of February.</p>
<p>(Reporting by Ed Stoddard; Editing by Ed Cropley)﻿</p>


SABC without a board after chairman quits

<p>United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said on Monday he feared genocide was about to start in South Sudan unless immediate action is taken, renewing his plea for the Security Council to impose an arms embargo on the world&#8217;s newest country.</p>
<p>&#8220;If we fail to act, South Sudan will be on a trajectory towards mass atrocities,&#8221; Ban told the 15-member Security Council. &#8220;The Security Council must take steps to stem the flow of arms to South Sudan.&#8221;</p>
<p>Noting that his special adviser on the prevention of genocide, Adama Dieng, has described genocide as a process, Ban said: &#8220;I am afraid that process is about to begin unless immediate action is taken.&#8221;</p>
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<p>Political rivalry between South Sudan President Salva Kiir, an ethnic Dinka, and his former deputy Riek Machar, a Nuer, led to civil war in 2013 that has often followed ethnic lines. The pair signed a shaky peace deal last year, but fighting has continued. Machar fled in July and is now in South Africa.</p>
<p>Ban said reports suggested Kiir and his loyalists &#8220;are contemplating a new military offensive in the coming days&#8221; against Machar-allied opposition troops, while &#8220;there are clear indications that Riek Machar and other opposition groups are pursuing a military escalation.&#8221;</p>
<p>Dieng told the council last month that he had seen &#8220;all the signs that ethnic hatred and targeting of civilians could evolve into genocide,&#8221; and the head of a U.N. human rights commission said the country was on the brink of an all-out ethnic civil war.</p>
<p>&#8220;How many more clues do you, do we all need to move from our anxious words to real preventative action?&#8221; U.N. aid chief Stephen O&#8217;Brien asked the council on Monday.</p>
<p>U.S. PRESSES TO &#8220;STOP ATROCITIES&#8221;</p>
<p>South Sudan&#8217;s U.N. ambassador, Akuei Bona Malwal, on Monday said the descriptions were exaggerated and did not &#8220;reflect the reality on the ground.&#8221;</p>
<p>&#8220;There have been no attempts, that we are aware of, on the part of the South Sudanese masses to turn against each other,&#8221; he told the Security Council.</p>
<p>Following an outbreak of deadly violence in Juba, the capital, in July, the Security Council in August authorized a 4,000-strong protection force as part of a U.N. peacekeeping force already on the ground and threatened an arms embargo if Kiir&#8217;s government did not cooperate. None of the new troops have yet deployed.</p>
<p>&#8220;Obstruction and defiance,&#8221; the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, Samantha Power, said of Kiir&#8217;s government.</p>
<p>U.N. peacekeepers have been in South Sudan since it gained independence from Sudan in 2011. There are currently some 13,700 U.N. troops and police on the ground.</p>
<div class="related-content group-one">The United States has been struggling to secure the minimum number of votes needed for the Security Council to impose an arms embargo on South Sudan. To be adopted, a resolution needs nine votes in favor and no vetoes.</div>
<p>Diplomats have said that so far only seven members were in favor, with the remaining eight planning to abstain or vote no. While veto powers Russia and China are skeptical whether an arms embargo would achieve much in a country awash with weapons, diplomats did not expect them to block the measure.</p>
<p>Power said she wants to put a resolution to impose an arms embargo on South Sudan to a vote before the end of the year.</p>
<p>&#8220;The situation is not getting better, it&#8217;s getting worse, and we&#8217;re sitting on our hands as a council,&#8221; Power said. &#8220;We have to try to stop atrocities in South Sudan.&#8221;</p>
<p>(Reporting by Michelle Nichols; Editing by James Dalgleish and Leslie Adler)﻿</p>


Genocide feared in South Sudan

<p>Gunfire could be heard in several districts of Kinshasa early on Tuesday as demonstrators demanded that President Joseph Kabila step down after his mandate expired at midnight, and measures to curb dissent fanned fears of more violence.</p>
<p>Reuters witnesses in various parts of the Democratic Republic of Congo&#8217;s capital city heard repeated gunshots, and one saw youths burning tires in the street. Protesters also set off fireworks and cheered, a Reuters witness said.</p>
<p>Demonstrators in the districts of Kalamu, Matete and Lingwala as well as at Kinshasa University blew whistles to signal to Kabila that it was time to leave. Students at the university also burned tires, multiple witnesses said.</p>
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<p>Kabila faces potentially one of his biggest challenges since he took power after his father was assassinated in 2001. Critics accuse him of clinging to power by letting his term run out with no election to name his successor expected until 2018.</p>
<p>Kabila has rarely spoken about the issue in public, but his allies say the election was delayed because of logistical and financial problems. The constitutional court has ruled that Kabila can stay on until the election takes place.</p>
<p>Some opposition leaders agreed Kabila can remain in office. But opponents, especially in Kinshasa, a city of 12 million, are not buying it. Diplomats have urged Kabila to step down to avoid triggering a massive crisis and possibly another civil war.</p>
<p>In what appeared to be an attempt at soothing opposition grievances, Kabila&#8217;s administration announced on state TV an expansion of the government by 17 ministerial posts to 65, many of them reserved for opposition members.</p>
<p>The main opposition coalition, which refused to accept the deal enabling Kabila to stay on, is unlikely to be appeased.</p>
<p>Scores of protesters have been arrested in the past 24 hours, mostly in the eastern city of Goma, according to human rights groups.</p>
<p>Authorities have blocked most social media and outlawed protests in Kinshasa. Those measures have raised fears of more violence in a nation that has suffered near constant war and instability in the two decades since the fall of kleptocrat Mobutu Sese Seko.</p>
<p>Western powers are nervous of a repeat of the conflicts between 1996 to 2003 that killed millions, drew in half a dozen neighboring armies and saw rebel fighters rape women en masse.</p>
<p>(Reporting by Tim Cocks and Aaron Ross; Additional reporting by Amedee Mwarabu in Kinshasa; Editing by G Crosse and Leslie Adler)﻿</p>


Gun shots fired in Kinshasa as Kabila clings to power

<div id="article-byline">KINSHASA &#8211; Protests erupted in several neighborhoods of the Congolese capital Kinshasa late on Monday and police fired tear gas to disperse them, witnesses said, just before President Joseph Kabila&#8217;s mandate expires at midnight.</div>
<p>Demonstrators in the districts of Kalamu, Matete and Lingwala and at Kinshasa University blew whistles to signal to Kabila that it was time to leave, and students at the university burned tires, multiple witnesses said.</p>
<p>Hundreds of anti-Kabila demonstrators earlier defied a ban on marches against the president&#8217;s plans to stay in office past the end of his term, and security forces faced off against groups waving red cards saying &#8220;Bye, bye Kabila.&#8221;</p>
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<p>Opposition activists have accused Kabila of trying to cling to power by letting his term run out without an election to chose the next leader of Congo, which has not witnessed a peaceful change of power since independence in 1960.</p>
<p>&#8220;Kabila&#8217;s mandate finishes at 1159. &#8230; Tomorrow (Tuesday) it will be chaos,&#8221; said Hugue Ilunga, 21, as dozens of soldiers deployed nearby in the capital, an opposition stronghold of 12 million people.</p>
<p>Shops shut in other parts of Kinshasa, and streets in the capital were largely empty.</p>
<p>At least 80 protesters were arrested in the eastern city of Goma, the U.N. human rights office in Congo said, mostly activists who were simply wearing red shirts, an opposition color. Police said nine opposition demonstrators were detained.</p>
<p>Kabila&#8217;s elite Republican Guard also arrested prominent opposition activist Franc Diongo in Kinshasa, Kikaya said, after Diongo&#8217;s private guards beat up three of them.</p>
<p>Militia fighters raided a jail in eastern Congo&#8217;s Butembo trying to free prisoners, triggering clashes that killed a South African U.N. peacekeeper and a police officer.</p>
<p>Seven attackers were also killed, Kabila&#8217;s chief diplomat, Barnabe Kikaya, told a news conference in Kinshasa.</p>
<p> &#8220;FLIRTATION WITH DISASTER&#8221;</p>
<p>The government and elections officials have blamed logistical and financial problems for the delay in the vote, currently scheduled for April 2018.</p>
<p>Some opposition leaders agreed Kabila can remain in office until then. The constitutional court has also ruled that Kabila, leader since his father was assassinated in 2001, can stay on.</p>
<p>But the main opposition bloc rejects the deal as a ploy, though it said it would not call protests. Talks mediated by the Roman Catholic church failed to reach a compromise.</p>
<p>&#8220;Joseph Kabila will remain in office tomorrow,&#8221; Kikaya said.</p>
<p>Authorities have blocked most social media and outlawed protests in Kinshasa, raising fears of more violence in a nation that has been plagued by war and instability for two decades since the fall of kleptocrat Mobutu Sese Seko.</p>
<p>Diplomats fear any escalation could trigger a conflict like the 1996 to 2003 wars that killed millions, sucked in neighboring armies and saw armed groups clash over Congo&#8217;s mineral wealth and the use of mass rape as a strategic weapon.</p>
<p>U.S. Great Lakes envoy Tom Perriello on Thursday said that Kabila&#8217;s hanging on was &#8220;an entirely unnecessary flirtation with disaster,&#8221; in a speech at the United States Institute of Peace.</p>
<p>Youth activists say they have taken inspiration from Burkina Faso in West Africa, where protests ousted Blaise Compaore in 2014 as he was trying to extend his 27-year rule.</p>
<p>As in Burkina, protests in Congo are in part driven by economic desperation. Congo is Africa&#8217;s biggest miner of copper and metals used in gadgets, like cobalt and coltan, but a slowdown linked to falls in commodity prices has triggered steep budget cuts and a 30 percent fall in the Congolese franc.</p>
<p>However, the country of 70 million people and more than 200 ethnic groups is fragmented. Previous protests achieved little.</p>
<p>Former colonial master Belgium advised its citizens to leave before Monday. The United States warned against non-essential travel, telling expatriates who remain to stay indoors.</p>
<p>Outside Congo, South African police used stun grenades to disperse anti-Kabila protesters in Cape Town.</p>
<p>(Additional reporting by Ed Cropley in Johannesburg and Amedee Mwarabu in Kinshasa; Editing by Tom Heneghan and Leslie Adler)﻿</p>


Chaos feared as Kabila stays past term

<div id="article-byline">BRUSSELS &#8211; Apple has launched a legal challenge to a record $14 billion EU tax demand, arguing that EU regulators ignored tax experts and corporate law and deliberately picked a method to maximize the penalty, senior executives said.</div>
<p>Apple&#8217;s combative stand underlines its anger with the European Commission, which said on Aug. 30 the company&#8217;s Irish tax deal was illegal state aid and ordered it to repay up to 13 billion euros ($13.8 billion) to Ireland, where Apple has its European headquarters.</p>
<p>European Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager, a former Danish economy minister, said Apple&#8217;s Irish tax bill implied a tax rate of 0.005 percent in 2014.</p>
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<p>General Counsel Bruce Sewell and Chief Financial Officer Luca Maestri outlined in an interview with Reuters at Apple&#8217;s global headquarters in Cupertino the company&#8217;s plans for its appeal against the Commission&#8217;s ruling at Europe&#8217;s second highest court.</p>
<p>The iPhone and iPad maker was singled out because of its success, Sewell said.</p>
<p>&#8220;Apple is not an outlier in any sense that matters to the law. Apple is a convenient target because it generates lots of headlines. It allows the commissioner to become Dane of the year for 2016,&#8221; he said, referring to the title accorded to Vestager by Danish newspaper Berlingske last month.</p>
<p>Apple will tell judges the Commission was not diligent in its investigation because it disregarded tax experts brought in by Irish authorities.</p>
<p>&#8220;Now the Irish have put in an expert opinion from an incredibly well-respected Irish tax lawyer. The Commission not only didn&#8217;t attack that &#8211; didn&#8217;t argue with it, as far as we know &#8211; they probably didn&#8217;t even read it. Because there is no reference (in the EU decision) whatsoever,&#8221; Sewell said.</p>
<p>SHELTERING PROFITS</p>
<p>The European Commission accused Ireland in 2014 of dodging international tax rules by letting Apple shelter profits worth tens of billions of dollars from tax collectors in return for maintaining jobs. Apple and Ireland denied the accusation.</p>
<p>On Monday the Commission published the detailed version of its decision which may provide clues as to how the Commission will deal with similar tax cases in future.</p>
<p>It cited, for example, notes of a meeting in 1990 between Apple&#8217;s tax adviser and the Irish revenue service discussing an appropriate level of profits Apple&#8217;s Irish unit would pay tax on &#8211; Apple&#8217;s adviser suggesting a ceiling of $30-40 million.</p>
<p>&#8220;[Apple’s tax adviser] confessed there was no scientific basis for the figure. However the figure was of such magnitude that he hoped it would be seen to be a bona-fide proposal,&#8221; the excerpt read.</p>
<p>Ireland’s tax treatment has allowed Apple to avoid tax on tens of billions of dollars of non-U.S. profit. Over the past 10 years, the company has paid tax at a rate of 3.8 percent on $200 billion of overseas profits, filings show. This is a fraction of the tax rate in the countries where Apple’s products are designed, made and sold.</p>
<p>The low rate is achieved by Apple telling U.S. tax authorities that the profits are earned by Irish units. Meanwhile it tells Ireland the profits are not earned in Ireland.</p>
<p>Some lawmakers in the United States and in countries where Apple has large sales have criticized the arrangement.</p>
<p>Ireland says if it’s not fair, it’s other countries&#8217; fault for not closing loopholes. On Monday Ireland accused the Commission of exceeding its powers and interfering with EU member states&#8217; national sovereignty over tax affairs.</p>
<p>Apple also intends to challenge the EU enforcer&#8217;s basis for its case, arguing that what Sewell called the &#8220;crazy notion of non-residency&#8221; was chosen on purpose to produce a punitive amount.</p>
<p>Other arguments the EU could have used could have been based on transfer pricing &#8211; the pricing strategy between a company&#8217;s units &#8211; or the &#8220;arm&#8217;s length&#8221; principle adopted by companies to sell and buy from affiliates as if they were unrelated firms.</p>
<p>&#8220;Both of those other two theories at least could be fleshed out, but they produced much lower numbers,&#8221; Sewell said.</p>
<p>He added it was not possible for Apple to comply with the EU decision because it would mean Ireland violating its own past tax laws setting different rules for residents and non-resident companies.</p>
<p>Apple plans to tell the court that the Commission erred when it ruled that the head office of Irish-registered units Apple Sales International (ASI) and Apple Operations Europe existed only on paper, with no justification for the billions of euros it posted in untaxed profits.</p>
<p>Sewell said the fact that an entity was a holding company with no employees on its books did not mean it was inactive and it could be actively managed by employees of its parent company.</p>
<p>&#8220;So when Tim Cook, who is the CEO of our company, makes decisions that impact ASI, the Commission says we don&#8217;t care because he is not an ASI employee, he is an Apple Inc employee. But to say that somehow Tim Cook can&#8217;t make decisions for ASI is a complete mis-statement of corporate law, it&#8217;s a misunderstanding of how corporations operate,&#8221; he said.</p>
<p> &#8220;ABSURD THEORY&#8221;</p>
<p>Maestri said the Commission over-estimated the importance of the company&#8217;s European headquarters in Cork in the south of Ireland.</p>
<p>&#8220;(Vestager) is arguing that the base on which we should pay taxes in Ireland is essentially all the profits we generate outside the United States &#8230; in a place that doesn&#8217;t do any engineering, doesn&#8217;t generate any intellectual property for us,&#8221; he said, adding it was an &#8220;absurd theory.&#8221;</p>
<p>The company hopes U.S. president-elect Donald Trump will enact tax reforms, Sewell said.</p>
<p>The U.S. tax system, Sewell said, was a worldwide system while the rest of the world had territorial systems.</p>
<p>&#8220;The difference between those two creates exactly the kind of loophole that the Commission has now been able to exploit,&#8221; he said.</p>
<p>(Reporting by Foo Yun Chee; additional reporting by Julia Fioretti in Brussels and Tom Bergin in London; editing by Philip Blenkinsop and Adrian Croft)﻿</p>


Apple challenges EU's record $14bn tax penalty

<p>French judges on Monday found IMF chief Christine Lagarde guilty of negligence for failing to challenge a 400 million euro ($417 million) state arbitration payout to a business tycoon in 2008 when she was French finance minister.</p>
<p>Despite the ruling the judges did not hand down any sentence in the case on her decision to allow the rare out-of-court arbitration payment. She has denied the negligence charges.</p>
<p>Her lawyer said immediately after the ruling that his team would look into appealing the decision.</p>
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<p>The ruling risks triggering a new leadership crisis at the International Monetary Fund after Lagarde&#8217;s predecessor Dominique Strauss Khan resigned in 2011 over a sex assault scandal.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>(Reporting by Chine Labbe; writing by Leigh Thomas; editing by Andrew Callus)﻿</p>
<p>﻿</p>


IMF's Lagarde convicted over payout to businessman

<p style="background: white; margin: 0cm 0cm 13.5pt; line-height: 18pt;">Millionaires have a history of moving to the sidelines ahead of a presidential election, but many among America&#8217;s wealthy are now moving quickly back into the stock market, knowing that Donald Trump will be president. They told CNBC they are planning big changes to their investment portfolios and a swift change in their outlook on stock sectors.</p>
<p style="background: white; margin: 0cm 0cm 13.5pt; line-height: 18pt;">Millionaires are pouring into financial and industrial stocks and pulling back on tech and health care, which were their favorite sectors in spring 2016, according to the latest CNBC Millionaire Survey, conducted shortly after the election in November.</p>
<p style="background: white; margin: 0cm 0cm 0pt; text-align: center; line-height: 15.75pt;" align="center"> </p>
<p style="background: white; margin: 0cm 0cm 13.5pt; line-height: 18pt;">Thirty-seven percent of millionaires told CNBC that the election results will cause them to make major changes to investment choices, while 40 percent of millionaires said any tax cut will lead to increased investment in stocks.</p>
<p style="background: white; margin: 0cm 0cm 13.5pt; line-height: 18pt;">&#8220;A lot of cash sitting idle is now getting back in,&#8221; said Tom Wynn, director of research at Spectrem Group, which conducts the Millionaire Survey for CNBC. &#8220;What they are saying in this survey is that they are investing everything politically. Nothing else is triggering their investments — not age or anything else.&#8221;</p>
<p style="background: white; margin: 0cm 0cm 13.5pt; line-height: 18pt;">Twenty percent of millionaires said the election will cause them to invest more in stocks, which Wynn said is a high number compared to historical data.</p>
<p style="background: white; margin: 0cm 0cm 13.5pt; line-height: 18pt;">The largest percentage of millionaires think the S&amp;P 500 will go up between 5 percent and 10 percent in 2017, similar to millionaires&#8217; view of market potential from the last survey, in the spring. But the percentage of millionaires who think the economy will be stronger in 2017 jumped from 30 percent in the spring to 47 percent after the election.</p>
<p style="background: white; margin: 0cm 0cm 13.5pt; line-height: 18pt;">The rotation into the financial and industrial sectors among millionaires matches overall market enthusiasm since the election. Financials, as tracked by the SPDR Financial Select Sector ETF (<a href="http://data.cnbc.com/quotes/XLF" target="_blank">XLF</a>), is up 17 percent since Nov. 9. The Industrial Select Sector SPDR (<a href="http://data.cnbc.com/quotes/XLI" target="_blank">XLI</a>) is up 7.5 percent since the election.</p>
<p style="background: white; margin: 0cm 0cm 13.5pt; line-height: 18pt;">The bigger change is the pulling back from tech, which has been the most popular sector among millionaires over past surveys.</p>
<p style="background: white; margin: 0cm 0cm 13.5pt; line-height: 18pt;">Even with increased bullishness, a significant percentage of millionaires do not expect a major change in their personal rate of return compared to previous surveys, with 40 percent expecting a return between 4 percent and 6 percent. Only 27 percent of millionaires expect a return of 6 percent or greater.</p>
<p style="background: white; margin: 0cm 0cm 13.5pt; line-height: 18pt;">A huge divide based on political stripes</p>
<p style="background: white; margin: 0cm 0cm 13.5pt; line-height: 18pt;">Millionaire bullishness is up, but there is a huge divide in the survey data based on the political affiliation of millionaires. While the overall numbers speak to market confidence, Republican millionaires are heavily influencing the results with extreme bullishness compared to Democrats.</p>
<p style="background: white; margin: 0cm 0cm 13.5pt; line-height: 18pt;">Sixty-percent of millionaires overall say Trump will be good for investing, up from 36 percent in the spring. But the new data includes 92 percent of Republicans and only 18 percent of Democrats.</p>
<p style="background: white; margin: 0cm 0cm 13.5pt; line-height: 18pt;">This bifurcation is worrisome to financial advisors who work with the wealthy.</p>
<p style="background: white; margin: 0cm 0cm 13.5pt; line-height: 18pt;">&#8220;This is a bipolar market,&#8221; said Karen Altfest, principal advisor and executive vice president of client relations at Altfest Personal Wealth Management. &#8220;There is a great danger in people taking extreme positions on either side. Market outlook shouldn&#8217;t be so extreme or depend on current events.&#8221;</p>
<p style="background: white; margin: 0cm 0cm 13.5pt; line-height: 18pt;">Wynn said the current exuberance among millionaires is partly because the results of the election were so unexpected, and that could cause some excitement to dissipate. &#8220;People out there are expecting good times ahead. I think the economy is driven by more than just politics, and I think it is good to not invest politically,&#8221; Wynn said.﻿</p>
<p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"> </p>


US millionaires’ plans under Trump

<p>ACCRA (Reuters) &#8211; The ﻿World Bank Group said on Thursday two of its units would provide another $517 million to Ghana in debt and guarantees to support the $7.7 billion Sankofa oil and gas project developed by Italy&#8217;s ENI SpA and upstream trader Vitol Ghana.</p>
<p>The financing adds to a $700 million World Bank guarantee package announced in July and brings the institution&#8217;s total financing to around $1.217 billion for the offshore project, whose gas component is set to open in 2018, a statement said.</p>
<p>The bank&#8217;s commercial lending arm, the International Finance Corporation (IFC), has committed a loan of $235 million to Vitol Ghana and is arranging another $65 million in debt.</p>
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<p>Guarantees by the Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency, another bank institution, will support Vitol Ghana&#8217;s commercial borrowing needs for the project and will be issued for up to 15 years. The new pledges bring the World Bank Group&#8217;s financing share of the Sankofa project to about 16 percent.</p>
<p>&#8220;Sankofa is expected to generate $2.3 billion in revenues for Ghana&#8217;s government per year and provide a stable, long-term source of domestic gas that will solve Ghana&#8217;s chronic gas supply constraints,&#8221; an IFC statement said.</p>
<p>ENI holds a 44.4 percent stake in Sankofa, Vitol holds 35.6 percent and Ghana National Petroleum Corporation holds a combined carried and participating interest of 20 percent.</p>
<p>Ghana first began pumping oil in 2010 at the offshore Jubilee field operated by Tullow Oil Plc, a British company that this August opened a second field called TEN.</p>
<p>Sankofa is expected to generate about 1,000 megawatts of power for Ghana and, combined with gas from two other new fields, could eliminate the need for Ghana to import gas from Nigeria through the West African Gas Pipeline Co.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>(Additional reporting by David Lawder; Writing by Matthew Mpoke Bigg; Editing by James Dalgleish and Jonathan Oatis)﻿</p>
<p> </p>


Ghana gets fresh $517m World Bank loan for oil & gas

<p>MASVINGO, Zimbabwe(Reuters) &#8211; Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe was confirmed on Saturday as his party&#8217;s sole candidate for the next presidential election in 2018, when he will be 94.</p>
<p>Supporters at a party conference sang a song titled &#8220;Mugabe should rule until eternity&#8221; as the veteran leader rose to give a speech in which he called for an end to infighting within the ruling ZANU-PF over his eventual successor.</p>
<p>&#8220;We came with our problems, which we heard. We also came knowing we had differences. We agreed our differences should end and fighting should stop,&#8221; said Mugabe, who has faced unprecedented protests this year.</p>
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<p>Mugabe, the only ruler that the southern African nation has known since independence from Britain in 1980, has come under pressure from a deteriorating economy, corruption and cash shortages that have seen the central bank introducing a new &#8220;bond note&#8221; currency in November.</p>
<p>In July, he was deserted by some of his once stalwart supporters, war veterans that have backed him in previous elections.</p>
<p>Still, Mugabe retains unrivalled support in ZANU-PF, which is grappling with factional fights as party officials manoeuvre for advantage in a post-Mugabe era.</p>
<p>ZANU-PF&#8217;s various entities, including the youth and women&#8217;s wings, confirmed him as the sole candidate to contest the 2018 election at the end of a two-day conference on Saturday, which was held in Masvingo town, 300 km (186 miles) south of the capital, Harare.</p>
<p>That means potential successors who wish to challenge Mugabe for the leadership of the party would have to wait for the 2019 party congress when ZANU-PF chooses its leaders.</p>
<p>There are two camps vying to succeed Mugabe, with one with faction supporting Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa while another backs first lady Grace Mugabe.</p>
<p>In one of its resolutions, the ZANU-PF Youth League said presidential term limits should be abolished and Mugabe should be declared life president.</p>
<p>Under the constitution adopted in 2013, Mugabe can only serve one final term.</p>
<p>Political analysts say Mugabe runs an effective patronage system that rewards supporters and punishes those who seek to challenge his rule, as happened to his former vice president of 10 years Joice Mujuru in 2014.</p>
<p>(Editing by Helen Popper)﻿﻿</p>
<p> </p>
<p>﻿</p>
<p> </p>


"Zimbabwe's Mugabe should rule until eternity", sing supporters

<p>ABUJA(Reuters) &#8211; The West African regional bloc said on Saturday it would take all necessary actions to uphold the result of a Dec. 1 election in Gambia, where veteran President Yahya Jammeh says he will not step down after losing to Adama Barrow.</p>
<p>ECOWAS leaders said in a communique marking the end of a summit in the Nigerian capital that they would attend the Jan. 18 inauguration of Barrow, &#8220;who must be sworn in&#8221;, and guarantee the safety of the president-elect.</p>
<p>Barrow&#8217;s surprise victory and Jammeh&#8217;s initial decision to step down was seen across Africa as a moment of hope.</p>
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<p>Jammeh announced on Dec. 9 that he would reverse that position and called for a fresh vote. That move was widely condemned, including by ECOWAS leaders who say it violates the principle of democratic accountability.</p>
<p>Jammeh&#8217;s party is now challenging the result in Gambia&#8217;s Supreme Court.</p>
<p>ECOWAS agreed to &#8220;respect the will of the Gambian people&#8221; and said the group had nominated Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari to mediate.</p>
<p>&#8220;The authority (ECOWAS) shall undertake all necessary actions to enforce the result of the election,&#8221; the group added, calling on all stakeholders inside and outside the country to show restraint.</p>
<p>&#8220;(ECOWAS) calls on the Gambian defence and security to perform their role in a nationalistic manner and protect lives and property,&#8221; the final communique said.﻿</p>
<p>A Gambian delegation led by Works Minister Bala Garba Jahumpa had arrived while the summit was already in progress to affirm Jammeh&#8217;s stance, diplomats said.</p>
<p>ECOWAS measures could include sanctions, which could hurt Gambia because ECOWAS member Senegal is the country&#8217;s only neighbour.</p>
<p>Jammeh&#8217;s 22 years in power have been marked by allegations of human rights abuses and repression against perceived political opponents.</p>
<p>ECOWAS chairwoman Ellen Johnson Sirleaf went to Gambia this week accompanied by the leaders of several West African countries including Nigeria and Ghana, whose President John Mahama lost a Dec. 7 election and said he would step down.</p>
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<p>(Additional reporting by Paul Carsten; Writing by Matthew Mpoke Bigg; Editing by Catherine Evans)﻿</p>
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