31.   The seven ruling party Senators resigned on Monday, and the government said new elections for the seats would happen before the end of the year.

32.   The president was simply using race to distract his voters from more serious issues in advance of local government elections in November, Leon said.

33.   Trade union leader Ibrahim Mayaki said they were angry about the government financing elections when clinics have no medication and workers have not been paid for months.

34.   Violence has increased in the traditional Zulu homeland in recent months, blamed on renewed tension linked to the local government elections.

35.   Under the constitution, local government elections are due every three years.

36.   First results began trickling in Thursday from local government elections in the politically volatile KwaZulu-Natal province but no trends were evident yet, officials said.

37.   HAMAS, opposed to the autonomy agreement with Israel, has said it would not run in elections to a parliament, but would join local government elections.

38.   A local government election on non-party basis was held throughout Nigeria last March.

39.   A night curfew in the district of Ratnapura was lifted at dawn to allow politicians to file nomination papers for the forthcoming local government elections, officials said.

40.   Algeria has suffered three years of violence since the government cancelled elections the fundamentalists were poised to win.