London bans protest meetings after three terror murders

Plans for large-scale demonstrations in central London are being scrapped by the London Metropolitan Police after the recent terror attacks in Northern Ireland. Two UK soldiers and a policeman were shot dead in terror-attacks, the first in eleven years.

London's estimated 600,000 expat South Africans had planned to march through downtown London on March 14 in support of their their voting rights abroad, planning to mass near the South African embassy in Trafalgar Square. They have been asked to postpone their plans upon the request of the Metropolitan Police, says organiser SA Youth Forum Abroad. SAYCO still wants to publicise the fact that the vast majority of South Africans forced to live and work abroad aren't able to cast their votes at their foreign embassies but, said its spokesman, they would postpone it to a later date 'for the safety of London'. see The new British security measures follow three terror murders in Northern Ireland: on March 7, two thus far unidentified UK soldiers were shot dead at Massareene barracks in county Antrim in Northern Ireland. The next day, at the Drumbeg estate in Craigavon, County Armagh, police constable Stephen Carroll was shot dead by a sniper. see. The officer was just two years from retirement after serving 24 years as a policeman in Northern Ireland, much of it through the worst of the violence when the IRA's campaign was at its height. He is the first member of the Police Service of Northern Ireland to be murdered since it was formed eight years ago. Due to the tightened security measures, London's next large-scale gathering will be its annual Horse Guards parades from Buckingham Palace from March 27 through 30. South African expats waiting for voting-rights ruling

SAYCO London

Some 2million South African expats working abroad demand voting facilities at foreign legations. They held a protest march at the SA Embassy in London in December 2008. Their planned protest on March 14 2009 was cancelled by the London Metropolitian police because of terror attacks in Northern Ireland.

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Meanwhile in South Africa, a Constitutional Court decision over the voting-rights battle is still being awaited. Three political parties and a civil-rights organisation are still waiting to hear the Constitutional Court verdict in Johannesburg about the issue. see The Constitutional Court was asked to rule on the constitutionality of these voting-rights demands launched Friday March 6 by the Freedom Front Plus, the Democratic Alliance and the Inkatha Freedom Party, as well as by civil-rights organisation AfriForum for the voting rights of South Africans working overseas in the election on April 22. Last month, the Freedom Front Plus party, on behalf of expat South African teacher Willem Richter (in the UK) had obtained a successful ruling from the Pretoria High Court, stating that the South African government and its Electoral Commission (IEC) were infringing on the country's equal-voting rights provisions in the Constitution by refusing voting rights to some 2-million expats through its foreign legations. Election date rushed through before court decision: The country's next election date has meanwhile hurriedly been announced by the caretaker-ANC government for April 22. The ANC-regime opposes the Pretoria High Court ruling and does not want to make foreign legations available on polling day for anyone except their own staff and their relatives. To allow the estimated 2-million South Africans abroad to still be allowed to register for voting at the embassies and legations on April 22, the court was also asked to order that special provisions be made to extend the legal deadline for the registration for this group: normally, under the rules laid down by the Independent Electoral Commission, no new voters may be registered after the election date has been ratified in Parliament. ANC opposes voting rights for 2-m expats: The ANC-government fears that the large number of South Africans working abroad will upset the electoral apple-cart to much and is doing everything in its power to prevent citizens living and working abroad, from being able to vote. It is actively opposing the application in court. The South African government's Home Affairs Department and the Independent Electoral Commission have submitted arguments against the application -- claiming it 'would be "a logistical nightmare to ensure that all citizens could cast their ballots overseas.' They were allowed to vote before - why not now? However it's been done before without any kind of 'logistical problems": the last time all South Africans working and living abroad were able to vote was in the first democratic election in 1994 - and many hundreds of thousands then voted from foreign embassies and legations, mainly in the United Kingdom. The British Broadcasting Corporation said in a separate report earlier this month that there are least 600,000 often highly-skilled South Africans living and working in the UK alone - mostly educators and medical staff -- and that there are at least 2-million expats living in some 46 other countries including the UK. Most were forced abroad by the high crime rate, and also to seek work because of South Africa's own black-economic-empowerment job reservation laws, which bar most 'whites' from working in the country of their birth. Since the 1994 election which put ANC-leader Nelson Mandela into power, foreign voting facilities have however been denied to all but just an elite few - temporary travellers and embassy personnel and their dependants. Meanwhile, South Africans abroad are urged to submit their names to a register at the Freedom Front Plus party - in case the Constitutional Court rules in their favour, here