Jerry Purcell has been appointed as the new head of RAC Ireland. Purcell joined RAC Ireland last year as commercial director. Prior to that he worked with MBNA. He takes over at the head of RAC Ireland from Robert Taylor who spent 11 years with the organisation.
Swaziland's King Mswati has barred photographers from taking pictures of his growing fleet of royal limousines amid criticism that the luxury car collection is an embarassment to one of Africa's poorest countries.
Mswati stirred up a storm in December when he bought a new Maybach 62 and recently hit the headlines again when he bought new BMWs for each of his 10 wives.
The royal edict barring photos of the cars came after Mswati appeared in a new custom-built Mercedes S600 for the opening of parliament on Friday.
The 36-year-old king, sub-Saharan Africa's last absolute monarch, has long been accused of extravagant spending. More than one-fourth of the population of Swaziland needed emergency food aid in 2002 because of drought, and more than one-third of the adult population was infected by HIV/AIDS.
McLaren had the chance to sign Michael Schumacher from Ferrari five or six years
ago but decided not to, according to team boss Ron Dennis.
"We had the opportunity, but we didn't take it," Dennis told reporters when asked whether he
had ever wanted to see the seven times Formula One world champion racing one of his cars.
"The collective decision was that it wasn't the right thing for the company," he said.
A Volkswagen joint venture to build cars in Angola aims to capture up to half the local market within three years, acting as a springboard into other African countries, according to a senior official at Ancar Worldwide, VW's venture partner.
Under the deal, the German car giant will supply Ancar with car parts at cut prices for assembly at a plant in Angola.
The VW venture has not specified which models will be built at the Angolan facility. VW already builds cars in nearby South Africa, which has the continent's biggest car industry. A former Portuguese colony, Angola once assembled Renault cars and Land Rovers.