*** 
File info:
***
ogrinfo -so africa.shp africa
INFO: Open of `africa.shp'
      using driver `ESRI Shapefile' successful.

Layer name: africa
Geometry: Polygon
Feature Count: 41068
Extent: (-19.981630, -36.581970)-(58.205231, 40.249599)
Layer SRS WKT:
GEOGCS["GCS_WGS_1984",
    DATUM["WGS_1984",
        SPHEROID["WGS_1984",6378137,298.257223563]],
    PRIMEM["Greenwich",0],
    UNIT["Degree",0.017453292519943295]]
AREA: Real (15.3)
PERIMETER: Real (15.3)
NHEQ2_: Real (11.0)
NHEQ2_ID: Real (11.0)
CELLID: Integer (10.0)
PSECELLID: Integer (10.0)
OLDDATA: String (2.0)
LON: Real (12.4)
LAT: Real (12.4)
AREA_1: Real (15.3)
PERIMETE_1: Real (15.3)
SHMPOLY_: Real (11.0)
SHMPOLY_ID: Real (11.0)
LON_1: Real (9.3)
LAT_1: Real (9.3)

****
$: v.in.ogr dsn=africa/africa.shp output=africa \
min_area=0.0001 snap=-1 --overwrite

Number of centroids :   0
Number of areas     :   -
Number of isles     :   -
-----------------------------------------------------
Break polygons:
Registering points ... 41930
All points (vertices): 205339
Registered points (unique coordinates): 41930
Points marked for break: 41518
Breaks: 163859
-----------------------------------------------------
Remove duplicates:
Duplicates: 81227
-----------------------------------------------------
Break boundaries:
Intersections: 18808 (line 242525)[1]+  Killed       qgis 2 >
/tmp/qgis.log >&1
Killed


***
System
OS:
Ubuntu 8.04 (Hardy)
Hardware:
RAM: 1GB
CPU: AMD XP 2400+