Mbeki's Approval Rating
We're not a country used to political polling, so when polls do come out, they are rather usually intersting. President Mbeki has just been given an approval rating of 59% amongst the adult voting population in metropolitan areas. Given that South Africa has such a deluge of socio-economic problems that we are trying to tackle, a 59% approval is very high, and Mbeki should be well pleased.

As expected, only 11% of respondents supported Mugabe's regime in Zimbabwe (alarm bells, Mr President?), and interestingly, respondents were well split about the Israel-Palestine issue.

"On the conflict between Israel and Palestine, 26 percent agreed that South Africa should impose sanctions on Israel because of what it was doing in the Palestinian territories, 36 percent disagreed and 38 percent did not know."