Former South Africa president Mandela admitted to the hospital

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) – Former South African president Nelson Mandela was admitted to hospital on Saturday for medical tests, although the government said there was no cause for alarm.

A statement from President Jacob Zuma‘s office gave no details of the condition of the 94-year-old anti-apartheid leader.

“Former President Mandela will receive medical attention from time to time which is consistent with his age,” the statement said.

“President Zuma assures all that Madiba is doing well and there is no cause for alarm,” it added, referring to Mandela by his clan name.

Mandela, who became South Africa‘s first black president after the country’s first all-race elections in 1994, was admitted to hospital in February because of abdominal pain but released the following day after a keyhole examination showed there was nothing seriously wrong with him.

He has since spent most of his time in his ancestral home in Qunu, a village in the impoverished Eastern Cape province.

His frail health prevents him from making any public appearances in South Africa, although in the last few months he has continued to receive high-profile visitors, including former U.S. President Bill Clinton.

(Reporting by Ed Cropley; Editing by Andrew Heavens)

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Extreme Franchising: RadioShack in Afghanistan

The next time you stroll through downtown Kabul, you might be able to buy batteries from a RadioShack (RSH) outlet, the result of a new effort by the U.S. to shore up Afghanistan’s economy: selling American franchises to Afghan entrepreneurs.

The U.S. has set a 2014 deadline for troops to withdraw from Afghanistan and turn security over to Afghan military and police. That is prompting capital flight, depressing property values, and triggering other economic pain. That’s where franchising might fit—and an initial foray into the country proved promising, U.S. executives say.

“I didn’t have huge expectations going there that we would consummate an agreement, but after being there on the streets and seeing some fairly sophisticated [retail] operators in a very difficult climate, I’ve walked away with the fact that we would do business in Afghanistan,” says Martin Amschler, a RadioShack vice president who joined several American franchise executives to participate in a five-day matchmaking event in Kabul this week.

Organized by the U.S. Department of Commerce, the U.S. Agency for International Development, and the International Franchise Association (IFA), the event gave franchising brass a chance to explore the market and meet with Afghan businessmen and U.S. and Afghan officials. Outside of mostly fast-food chains on bases, there aren’t any American franchises in Afghanistan, says Beth Solomon, a vice president at the IFA who led the trip. “There is a vast culture of young [Afghans] who are very tech savvy, Internet savvy. Everyone’s got the latest Samsung or iPhone,” she says, “and there is disposable income.”

The big idea behind the effort is the “knowledge transfer” of infrastructure-building and business services expertise to locals to help rebuild the country, says Solomon, who recruited participants from RadioShack, Hertz Equipment Rental (HTZ), Tutor Doctor, and AlphaGraphics. “Franchising can be a very useful transitional economic development strategy, because the challenges of security and so forth can be minimized because it’s Afghan business leaders who are going to run these businesses,” says Solomon.

Of course, with more than one-third of Afghanistan’s 30 million people living below the poverty line, according to the CIA’s World Fact Book, much of the population can’t afford to buy an American franchise.

Bill Edwards, a seasoned franchising consultant who specializes in exporting American franchise brands such as Build-A-Bear Workshop (BBW) and Denny’s (DENN), and was on the trip for AlphaGraphics, doesn’t see a lack of Afghan investors. “There’s a lot of money there” willing to invest in American franchises, Edwards says. “There’s a need for Western business. There’s a market, there’s consumers, there’s funding, there’s capital. But there’s all the other challenges, of course.”

Apart from security, the biggest challenge would be vetting prospective buyers, says RadioShack’s Amschler. “But at the end of the day there are private contractors over there today that provide those services … and then, of course, we would have our own list of requirements in terms of net worth and what types of business experience they have,” he says.

Approved Afghan buyers would attend RadioShack University at corporate headquarters in Fort Worth and get “support on the ground” from RadioShack employees for about two weeks when a store opens, plus training visits throughout the year, Amschler says.

Among other efforts to stabilize Afghanistan’s economy, how significant could franchising be? A statement from the Commerce Department’s International Trade Administration about the conference notes “franchising has proven to be an ideal market vehicle for both employment and economic growth.” Edwards says he thinks franchising is “the model” because “it brings a business model that’s proven. It brings training, which is the thing they need; the skill set is just really not good there.”

Education is crucial to Afghanistan, says Rogelio Martinez, vice president of international franchise development at 30-employee Tutor Doctor, a “supplementary education” business that has sold about 400 franchises in 14 countries. “It’s something that everybody was talking about. [Afghan] business owners wanted to develop Afghan employees to take mid-level, senior-level management positions. Families want their kids to learn and attend good universities in Afghanistan or abroad.”

The Van Nuys (Calif.) company, which Martinez says charges franchisees about $ 57,000 to get started, provides training and an online tool that uses a Skype-like interface for tutors and students to communicate online. He expects to sell about seven franchises in Afghanistan in 2013. “They can’t be importing expats all the time; they need to have the local talent to have a sustainable model,” says Martinez.

David Riker, franchise development director for Hertz, is also optimistic about his company’s prospects in Afghanistan. Unlike fellow participants on the Kabul trip, he already has franchises on two military bases there, renting heavy machinery used in building roads and construction projects. “As the military draws down, Afghanistan is going to have to support more of its infrastructure, so that’s where the opportunity comes in,” Riker says. Depending on what kind of equipment a franchise buyer wants, getting started is “probably in the $ 3 million range.”

Aiding Afghanistan through franchising certainly won’t be quick, says Edwards. “Let’s not be too Pollyannaish. This is going to be a challenge, but it’s definitely an opportunity.”

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Protesters surge around Egypt’s presidential palace

CAIRO (Reuters) – Tens of thousands of Egyptian protesters surged around the presidential palace on Friday and the opposition rejected President Mohamed Mursi‘s call for dialogue to end a crisis that has polarized the nation and sparked deadly clashes.

The Islamist leader’s deputy said he could delay a December 15 referendum on a constitution that liberals opposed, although the concession only partly meets a list of opposition demands that include scrapping a decree that expanded Mursi‘s powers.

“The people want the downfall of the regime” and “Leave, leave,” crowds chanted after bursting through barbed wire barricades and climbing on tanks guarding the palace of Egypt‘s first freely elected president.

Their slogans echoed those used in a popular revolt that toppled Mursi’s predecessor Hosni Mubarak in February 2011.

Vice President Mahmoud Mekky said in a statement sent to local media that the president was prepared to postpone the referendum if that could be done without legal challenge.

The dialogue meeting was expected to go ahead on Saturday in the absence of most opposition factions. “Tomorrow everything will be on the table,” a presidential source said of the talks.

The opposition has demanded that Mursi rescind a November 22 decree giving himself wide powers and delay the vote set for December 15 on a constitution drafted by an Islamist-led assembly which they say fails to meet the aspirations of all Egyptians.

The state news agency reported that the election committee had postponed the start of voting for Egyptians abroad until Wednesday, instead of Saturday as planned. It did not say whether this would affect the timing of voting in Egypt.

Ahmed Said, leader of the liberal Free Egyptians Party, told Reuters that delaying expatriate voting was made to seem like a concession but would not change the opposition’s stance.

He said the core opposition demand was to freeze Mursi’s decree and “to reconsider the formation and structure of the constituent assembly”, not simply to postpone the referendum.

The opposition organized marches converging on the palace which elite Republican Guard units had ringed with tanks and barbed wire on Thursday after violence between supporters and opponents of Mursi killed seven people and wounded 350.

Islamists, who had obeyed a military order for demonstrators to leave the palace environs, held funerals on Friday at Cairo’s al-Azhar mosque for six Mursi partisans who were among the dead. “With our blood and souls, we sacrifice to Islam,” they chanted.

“ARM-TWISTING”

In a speech late on Thursday, Mursi had refused to retract his November 22 decree or cancel the referendum on the constitution, but offered talks on the way forward after the referendum.

The National Salvation Front, the main opposition coalition, said it would not join the dialogue. The Front’s coordinator, Mohamed ElBaradei, a Nobel peace laureate, dismissed the offer as “arm-twisting and imposition of a fait accompli”.

Murad Ali, spokesman of the Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party (FJP), said opposition reactions were sad: “What exit to this crisis do they have other than dialogue?” he asked.

Mursi’s decree giving himself extra powers sparked the worst political crisis since he took office in June and set off renewed unrest that is dimming Egypt’s hopes of stability and economic recovery after nearly two years of turmoil following the overthrow of Mubarak, a military-backed strongman.

The turmoil has exposed contrasting visions for Egypt, one held by Islamists, who were suppressed for decades by the army, and another by their rivals, who fear religious conservatives want to squeeze out other voices and restrict social freedoms.

Caught in the middle are many of Egypt’s 83 million people who are desperate for an end to political turbulence threatening their precarious livelihoods in an economy under severe strain.

“We are so tired, by God,” said Mohamed Ali, a laborer. “I did not vote for Mursi nor anyone else. I only care about bringing food to my family, but I haven’t had work for a week.”

ECONOMIC PAIN

A long political standoff will make it harder for Mursi’s government to tackle the crushing budget deficit and stave off a balance of payments crisis. Austerity measures, especially cuts in costly fuel subsidies, seem inevitable to meet the terms of a $ 4.8-billion IMF loan that Egypt hopes to clinch this month.

U.S. President Barack Obama told Mursi on Thursday of his “deep concern” about casualties in this week’s clashes and said “dialogue should occur without preconditions”.

The upheaval in the most populous Arab nation worries the United States, which has given billions of dollars in military and other aid since Egypt made peace with Israel in 1979.

The conflict between Islamists and opponents who each believe the other is twisting the democratic rules to thwart them has poisoned the political atmosphere in Egypt.

The Muslim Brotherhood’s spokesman, Mahmoud Ghozlan, told Reuters that if the opposition shunned the dialogue “it shows that their intention is to remove Mursi from the presidency and not to cancel the decree or the constitution as they claim”.

Ayman Mohamed, 29, a protester at the palace, said Mursi should scrap the draft constitution and heed popular demands.

“He is the president of the republic. He can’t just work for the Muslim Brotherhood,” Mohamed said of the eight-decade-old Islamist movement that propelled Mursi from obscurity to power.

(Additional reporting by Omar Fahmy; Writing by Edmund Blair and Alistair Lyon; Editing by Giles Elgood)

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“American Idol” producer Nigel Lythgoe signs with Shine America

LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) – “American Idol” and “So You Think You Can Dance” executive producer Nigel Lythgoe has entered a multi-year production deal with Shine America.

Under the exclusive deal between Nigel Lythgoe Productions and Shine, Lythgoe will jointly develop and produce entertainment franchises for the global television marketplace with the Shine Group, Shine America CEO Rich Ross said Thursday.

Nigel Lythgoe Productions will continue to be based in Los Angeles. The agreement begins January 1, 2013.

“I am thrilled to be teaming up with Shine to develop new shows for a global audience,” Lythgoe said. “We live in one world and need to create content for that market. I cannot think of a more exciting company to partner with in order to face that challenge.”

“Nigel is clearly one of the world’s leading television producers, with an un-matched track record in TV programming both here in the U.S. and in the UK,” Ross added. “We are thrilled to welcome Nigel and his team to the Shine family and we look forward to developing the next wave of entertainment franchises together.”

Shine America, the U.S. arm of the Shine Group, the production company chaired by Rupert Murdoch‘s daughter Elisabeth Murdoch, produces and distributes a variety of scripted and unscripted programs. Past and current shows include “The Biggest Loser,” “The Office,” “Ugly Betty,” “Tabatha Takes Over,” and adaptations of Shine Group formats “MasterChef” and “Minute to Win It.”

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Uncircumcised boys and men may face more UTIs

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – Infections of the kidney, bladder and urethra happen in uncircumcised baby boys at ten times the rate of circumcised boys, and over a lifetime uncircumcised men are four times more likely to experience one, according to a new analysis of past research.

Urinary tract infections (UTIs) are most common in boys’ first year of life, and circumcision was already known to make a difference in their risk, but how much and whether that carried through to adulthood was unclear, Australian researchers say.

They found that circumcision “provides considerable protection and over the lifespan makes about a three- to four-fold difference by our prediction, which is quite striking in public health terms,” lead study author Brian Morris, professor of molecular medical science at the Sydney Medical School, University of Sydney, told Reuters Health.

Morris and a colleague examined 22 studies published between 1987 and 2012 that included a total of 407,902 males across the globe, a quarter of whom were uncircumcised.

Breaking down the results by age, they calculated that the likelihood of a UTI between birth and one year of age is 9.9 times higher in uncircumcised boys compared to circumcised boys. Between ages 1 and 16, uncircumcised boys are at 6.6 times higher risk, and after age 16 their risk is 3.4 times that of uncircumcised men.

Based on those findings, the researchers projected that doctors could prevent one UTI with every four circumcisions, “which is astronomical,” Morris said.

The younger the infant, the more serious a UTI can be, the researchers note in their report, which is published in the Journal of Urology. Side effects of a UTI in infants can include kidney scarring, fever, pain and blood infections.

Health experts have mostly framed circumcision as a public health preventive measure focused on HIV and other sexually transmitted diseases.

In August, the American Academy of Pediatrics for the first time stated that the health benefits of circumcision outweigh the risks, but added that the decision to circumcise a child remains with parents.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is currently evaluating the potential health impact of circumcision, according to a spokeswoman, but any recommendations that come of that will also be voluntary, she said.

The estimated health benefit Morris and his colleague found was several times larger than what was projected in two previous studies, which suggested 111 or 195 circumcisions would be needed to prevent one case of UTI in the first year of life.

One expert questioned the new findings based on the methods Morris’ team used.

Zbys Fedorowicz, director of the Bahrain branch of the UK Cochrane Centre, a non-profit organization that evaluates medical studies, said that the 22-study analysis combined different types of studies and the researchers failed to assess their quality.

“It doesn’t mean to say that these guys are necessarily wrong, it’s just that we don’t know because the methodological approach that they used isn’t thorough enough, it’s not transparent, it’s not reproducible and it’s not clear,” Fedorowicz said.

In November, Fedorowicz and colleagues published a report concluding that no existing study that examined the risk of urinary tract infections and circumcision was of high enough quality for any recommendation.

Dr. Robert Van Howe, clinical professor of pediatrics at the Michigan State University College of Human Medicine and vocal critic of circumcision, also found the new study problematic.

Van Howe said that diagnostic criteria for urinary tract infections differ between researchers and that the cost/ benefit analysis of circumcision as a preventive tool for infections doesn’t add up.

At $ 200 each circumcision, preventing one urinary tract infection would cost $ 40,000, “which you can treat with an $ 18 antibiotic; it’s overkill,” Van Howe said.

“You would think we have long lists for dialysis in men because they’re not circumcised, but it just isn’t a problem, it’s fear mongering,” Van Howe told Reuters Health.

A middle ground might be to let boys decide for themselves at age 14 or 16 to become circumcised, Van Howe suggested. “You can leave this choice up to the person who has to live with the consequences,” Van Howe said.

Morris maintains that the study sends “a really strong signal for advocacy of circumcision as a public health intervention in reducing these various – and in many cases very serious – conditions over the lifetime.”

SOURCE: http://bit.ly/TJjLqA The Journal of Urology, online, November 28, 2012.

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Oil prices fall slightly after US jobs report

The price of oil ended the week lower after the latest U.S. jobs report offered a mixed picture of the economy.

Benchmark oil dropped 33 cents to finish at $ 85.93 per barrel in New York Friday, which marked the fourth consecutive day of price declines. Oil fell 3.4 percent this week.

The Labor Department said 146,000 jobs were created in November, which was more than economists had anticipated. The unemployment rate fell to 7.7 percent from 7.9 percent in October, but that was largely because more people stopped looking for work and weren’t counted as unemployed. And job gains for September and October were revised lower.

Meanwhile, in another bad sign for energy demand in Europe, Germany’s central bank lowered its expectation for economic growth next year.

At the pump, the average price for gasoline fell nearly a penny to $ 3.37 per gallon, according to AAA, Wright Express and the Oil Price Information Service. That’s nearly 9 cents more than a year ago.

In other energy futures trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange:

Heating oil fell 2.79 cents to finish at $ 2.9153 per gallon.

Wholesale gasoline rose less than a penny to end at $ 2.5974 per gallon.

Natural gas fell 11.5 cents to finish at $ 3.551 per 1,000 cubic feet.

On the ICE Futures exchange in London:

Brent crude, which is used to price international varieties of oil, fell 1 cent to $ 107.02 per barrel.

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Toronto mayor to stay in power pending appeal of ouster

TORONTO (Reuters) – Toronto Mayor Rob Ford can stay in power pending an appeal of a conflict of interest ruling that ordered him out of his job as leader of Canada’s biggest city, a court ruled on Wednesday.

Madam Justice Gladys Pardu of the Ontario Divisional Court suspended a previous court ruling that said Ford should be ousted. Ford’s appeal of that ruling is set to be heard on January 7, but a decision on the appeal could take months.

Justice Pardu stressed that if she had not suspended the ruling, Ford would have been out of office by next week. “Significant uncertainty would result and needless expenses may be incurred if a by-election is called,” she said.

If Ford wins his appeal, he will get to keep his job until his term ends at the end of 2014. If he loses, the city council will either appoint a successor or call a special election, in which Ford is likely to run again.

“I can’t wait for the appeal, and I’m going to carry on doing what the people elected me to do,” Ford told reporters at City Hall following the decision.

Ford, a larger-than-life character who took power on a promise to “stop the gravy train” at City Hall, has argued that he did nothing wrong when he voted to overturn an order that he repay money that lobbyists had given to a charity he runs.

Superior Court Justice Charles Hackland disagreed, ruling last week that Ford acted with “willful blindness” in the case, and must leave office by December 10.

Ford was elected mayor in a landslide in 2010, but slashing costs without cutting services proved harder than he expected, and his popularity has fallen steeply.

He grabbed unwelcome headlines for reading while driving on a city expressway, for calling the police when a comedian tried to film part of a popular TV show outside his home, and after reports that city resources were used to help administer the high-school football team he coaches.

The conflict-of-interest drama began in 2010 when Ford, then a city councillor, used government letterhead to solicit donations for the football charity created in his name for underprivileged children.

Toronto’s integrity commissioner ordered Ford to repay the C$ 3,150 ($ 3,173) the charity received from lobbyists and companies that do business with the city.

Ford refused to repay the money, and in February 2012 he took part in a city council debate on the matter and then voted to remove the sanctions against him – despite being warned by the council speaker that voting would break the rules.

He pleaded not guilty in September, stating that he believed there was no conflict of interest as there was no financial benefit for the city. The judge dismissed that argument.

In a rare apology after last week’s court ruling, he said the matter began “because I love to help kids play football”.

Ford faces separate charges in a C$ 6 million libel case about remarks he made about corruption at City Hall, and is being audited for his campaign finances. The penalty in the audit case could also include removal from office.

(Reporting by Claire Sibonney; Editing by Janet Guttsman, Russ Blinch, Nick Zieminski; and Peter Galloway)

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“Breaking Bad,” dominates Writers Guild TV nominations

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Dark drug drama “Breaking Bad” dominated television nominations for the annual Writers Guild Awards on Thursday, with “Modern Family” leading the way in the comedy category.

A trio of HBO newcomers – Lena Dunham‘s “Girls,” Aaron Sorkin‘s “The Newsroom,” and political satire “Veep” – will compete in the new series category, along with network comedy “The Mindy Project” and country music drama “Nashville,” the Writers Guild of America (WGA) announced.

“Girls,” the story of three 20-somethings navigating life and love in New York City, also won a nomination in the best comedy series slot, along with established shows “30 Rock,” “Parks and Recreation,” “Louie” and Emmy darling “Modern Family.”

The Writers Guild recognizes achievements in the writing of U.S. television, radio, news and animation, rather than actors or directors. The Guild will announce its nominations in the movie field in January.

“Breaking Bad,” starring Bryan Cranston as a teacher turned drug kingpin and now in its fifth and final season, picked up five nods on Wednesday, including best drama series and four for individual episodes.

The show is likely to face stiff competition from psychological thriller “Homeland,” which won the WGA’s award for best new drama last year and has since bagged an Emmy and Golden Globe.

“Mad Men,” lavish Prohibition-era show “Boardwalk Empire,” and fantasy series “Game of Thrones,” round out the competition for best drama series.

In longer form television, miniseries “Hatfields and McCoys” – about a 100 year-old family feud – was nominated along with TV film “Hemingway and Gelhorn” and “Political Animals.”

The WGA will hand out its awards in all categories on February 17 at simultaneous ceremonies in both New York and Los Angeles.

(Reporting By Jill Serjeant; editing by Andrew Hay)

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When drugs for depression fail, talking therapies help

LONDON (Reuters) – Patients with depression who fail to benefit from antidepressant drugs may do better if they are also treated with a type of “talking” psychotherapy called CBT, according to new research published on Friday.

In the first large-scale trial to test the effectiveness of cognitive behavioral therapy, or CBT, alongside medication for depression, scientists said they found that the combination works where drug treatment alone fails.

Nicola Wiles of Bristol University‘s school of social and community medicine, who led the study, said the findings underline the need to increase the availability of therapy for depressed patients.

“While there have been initiatives to increase access to CBT in both the UK and Australia, worldwide initiatives are rare,” she said in a statement.

Wiles and colleagues recruited 469 adults from across Britain who had not responded to at least 6 weeks of treatment with an antidepressant. For the study, 235 patients continued with their usual antidepressant medication, while 234 patients got their usual care plus CBT and were followed up for 12 months.

The results, published in The Lancet medical journal, showed that after 6 months, 46 percent of those who got CBT as well as their usual care had improved – reporting at least a 50 percent reduction in their depressive symptoms. This compared to 22 percent of those who did not get CBT.

Patients treated with CBT, which involves talking through behaviors and ways of thinking with a trained psychotherapist or psychologist, were also more likely to go into remission and have fewer symptoms of anxiety, the researchers said. Similar effects were reported at 12 months.

Major depression affects around 20 percent of people at some point in their lives. The World Health Organization (WHO)predicts that by 2020, depression will rival heart disease as the health disorder with the highest global disease burden.

While there are many antidepressants on the market, including top sellers such as Prozac and Seroxat, it is widely accepted that many antidepressants work in only half of patients half of the time, and drugmakers are struggling to come up with a new generation of drugs in this field.

Willem Kuyken, a clinical psychology professor at Exeter University who also worked on the study, said its results showed that doctors and patients should be looking beyond drugs.

“This trial provides further evidence that psychological treatments like cognitive therapy can provide substantive and lasting help to people who suffer depression,” he said.

Wiles added, however, that even in wealthy countries such as Britain, where there has been a recent push to invest more into psychological therapies, many people who have not responded to antidepressants still don’t get the chance of trying intensive CBT that take between 12 and 18 sessions.

In the United States, only about a quarter of people with depression have received any form of psychological therapy in the last 12 months, she said.

(Editing by Sonya Hepinstall)

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Ghana election to test credentials of “model democracy”

ACCRA (Reuters) – Ghanaians choose on Friday who will run one of Africa‘s most stable democracies as a surge in oil revenues promises to boost development and economic growth.

Ghana has earned a reputation as an oasis of stability and progress in West Africa, a part of the world better known for civil wars, coups, entrenched poverty and corruption.

“These elections are important not just to Ghana, but for the growing number of states and actors seeking to benefit from increasing confidence in Africa,” said Alex Vines, Africa Research Director at Chatham House.

Incumbent leader John Dramani Mahama – who replaced the late John Atta Mills after his death from an illness in July – will face main opposition candidate Nana Akufo-Addo of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), and six others.

Opinion polls point to a tight race between the two main candidates, raising the prospect of a repeat of the near deadlock in 2008 elections, in which Mills defeated Akufo-Addo with a margin of less than one percent.

“We know it will be close, but the important thing is that Ghanaians will accept the results,” said John Mark, a shuttle bus driver in the sprawling capital Accra. “We must preserve our peace,” he said.

U.S. President Barack Obama has called Ghana a “model of democracy in Africa” for stepping back from the brink during the tight 2008 polls, when other countries in the region might have tipped into conflict.

Ivory Coast erupted into civil war last year after disputed elections in 2010, and other regional neighbors Mali and Guinea Bissau have been thrown into chaos by military coups.

“In all this, let us remember that Ghana is bigger and more important than any of us,” Mahama said late on Thursday in a radio address ahead of the poll. “The surest way to sustain and enhance our enviable image is to go to the polls tomorrow in an atmosphere of peace,” he said.

OIL REVENUES

The stakes are high this time around with rivals jousting for a chance to oversee a boom in oil revenues that has brought hopes of increased development in a country where the average person still makes less than $ 4 a day.

U.K.-based Tullow Oil, which operates Ghana’s only producing field, says it expects output to rise to 120,000 barrels per day in 2013 from between 60,000 and 90,000 bpd this year, while more big deposits have been found.

Ghana, also a major cocoa and gold producer, is expected to keep up growth of about 8 percent next year and is increasingly cited by investment bankers and fund managers as a growth gem, in contrast to the woes of Europe and the United States.

Across the capital Accra, evidence of the resource wealth abounds – brightly-lit multi-storey buildings, cranes looming over new construction sites, well-paved roads, and billboards advertising banks, cars, and mobile phones.

But many Ghanaians remain out in the cold. An influx of people from rural parts of the country, hoping for jobs in the capital, has yielded a sprawl of outlying shanty towns and many homeless on the city’s streets.

Akufo-Addo, a trained lawyer and son of a former Ghanaian president has criticized the ruling party for the slow pace of job creation and fighting poverty, and says he would use the expected uptick in oil wealth to pay for free primary and secondary education.

Mahama, meanwhile, says his party’s investments in infrastructure will bring increased prosperity over time. He said he aims to put Ghana on the path to a per capita annual income of $ 2,300 by 2017 – double that in 2009.

But in a country where campaign messages rarely influence voting choices, many believe more than half of the 14 million voters will cast their ballot based on ethnic and social affiliation, or regionalism.

Mahama is from the north, where he finds his strongest support, and Akufo-Addo, well-liked by fellow Ashanti people and favored in Ghana’s second-city Kumasi, is from the east.

On Friday, voters will also elect 275 legislators.

There are 45 more seats in parliament than during the 2008 election, in which Mahama’s National Democratic Congress (NDC) won a small majority.

(Writing by Richard Valdmanis; Editing by Louise Ireland)

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