S. African political rivals accuse each other of attacks
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DURBAN, South Africa (Reuters) -- South Africa's bitter political rivals traded accusations on Sunday that their members had been shot at as they campaigned for support in this year's election, raising fears of a violence-plagued poll.
In the Zulu heartland of KwaZulu-Natal, one man died and another was injured when gunmen fired at a small group of people returning from a rally of the ruling African National Congress (ANC), police said. Two men were arrested, one with stab wounds.
"Three people were shot at when they got off a bus returning from an ANC rally. One was killed and another one was hurt -- we've arrested two people. We don't know for sure if the motive was political," Police Director Bala Naidoo told Reuters.
Concerns about trouble between the ANC and the Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP) -- which launched its election manifesto in KwaZulu-Natal on Sunday -- are already starting to cloud the poll. It is expected to be held during March or April.
Earlier on Sunday, the IFP said its campaigners had been attacked by ANC supporters as they drove in a car convoy with loudspeakers inviting people to attend a rally near Durban.
The ANC countered that IFP members had provoked the incident on Saturday by driving into Claremont, an ANC stronghold, shooting in the air and shouting insults against President Thabo Mbeki and former President Nelson Mandela.
ANC KwaZulu-Natal provincial spokesman Mtholephi Mthimkhulu said there was shooting from all sides. "People ran amok trying to take cover... Miraculously no one was injured," he said.
At Sunday's rally, IFP leader Mangosuthu Buthelezi urged about 20,000 supporters -- many wearing traditional Zulu clothes and carrying spears or shields -- to heed a call by Mbeki to refrain from violence and intimidation ahead of the election.
"I'm very concerned. The tension is very high between our two parties here...if not handled well it may be a threat to a peaceful election," he told Reuters just ahead of the event.
Buthelezi's speech was interrupted by IFP supporters who told the crowd they were going home because they had heard their houses in the Umlazi area, where an ANC rally was taking place, were being ransacked. Police said they had no confirmation.
In a statement condemning the violence, IFP national spokesman Musa Zondi said "our members were shot at, insulted and warned never to set foot (in the area) again ... by angry bands of ANC supporters."
A week ago the ANC unveiled its manifesto in the region.
That event was peaceful. But before the end of apartheid rule in 1994, the parties were engaged in bloody conflict that killed thousands when the ANC accused the IFP of collaborating with the white government.
The IFP has only 32 seats out of a total of 400 in the national parliament, but is expected to give the ANC a run for its money in the east coast province.
The IFP, the country's third largest party, vowed on Sunday to tackle the HIV-AIDS epidemic, bring down the high rate of violent crime and quash what it described as the ANC's attempts to build a one-party state.
"Our democracy is facing a grave risk. A democratic alternative is needed to win the war against HIV-AIDS, unemployment, crime, poverty and corruption...," Buthelezi told Reuters.
"We are on a slippery road to a one-party state and autocracy," he added.
In its manifesto, the IFP said it wanted to see "real development now" -- pointing to the fact that despite the headway made in South Africa in the past decade, a third of the workforce was still jobless and wide income disparity remained.
The IFP runs KwaZulu-Natal -- home to 7.2 million Zulu speakers -- in a coalition formed in 2003 with the historically liberal-white Democratic Alliance (DA) party, which holds 46 seats in parliament.
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