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/ 23 February 2005

Poor vs poor in housing crisis

Simphiwe Mbalula’s home was saved last month when a runaway fire razed about 3 200 shacks in the Joe Slovo informal settlement outside Cape Town. Instead of relief, he feels unlucky, as all the victims of the fire have been fast-tracked to the front of council housing lists. They will receive houses as part of the first phase of the N2 Gateway Project.

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/ 18 February 2005

Big Bay deal reversed

Cape Town mayor Nomaindia Mfeketo has reversed the controversial award of prime beachfront property to black economic empowerment companies — three with links to the African National Congress or its youth league — after a forensic audit found the tender process was ”flawed”. The Big Bay deal was an out of hand sale of 65 plots in Bloubergstrand.

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/ 11 February 2005

Manto’s man to head MCC

The appointment of a top Department of Health official as acting registrar of the Medicines Control Council (MCC) has raised alarm about a potential conflict of interest. Humphrey Zokufa, a chief director whose tasks included the implementation of the new medicine pricing regulations, has been named temporarily to fill the post vacated by Precious Matsoso.

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/ 28 January 2005

ANC Youth League in dodgy new deal

Two companies with strong links to the African National Congress Youth League and the ANC in the Western Cape have emerged as beneficiaries of a disputed deal involving prime beachfront land. The City of Cape Town has sold the land to a hand-picked group of 17 empowerment companies, at least two of them either directly owned by the youth league or by major donors to the provincial ANC.

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/ 21 January 2005

Ideology at core of drug price war

Lawyers for the South African Pharmaceutical Society claim the Department of Health has embarked on a campaign to discredit pharmacists and marshal public sentiment before the Constitutional Court hears the society’s appeal against new drug pricing regulations. The accusation came last week it was alleged that pharmacists were charging three times more than regulations allowed for medicines that cost less than R50.

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/ 17 December 2004

Drop prices, Brazil warns drug giants

The Brazilian government is on a collision course with three multinational drug companies. It has threatened to declare HIV/Aids a national health emergency, enabling it to manufacture patent drugs. Brazilian Health Minister Humberto Costa told journalists last week the government would break patent laws if negotiations with Rocha, Merck and Abbott failed to reduce the prices of Aids drugs used in a treatment cocktail.

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/ 19 November 2004

Not such a flawless gem

George W Bush’s second term as United States President is good news for Africa, says Tony Leon, Democratic Alliance leader. He bases this judgement on the views of a notorious diamond merchant allegedly linked to supporting undemocratic and corrupt regimes in Africa. However, Leon’s new friend, Maurice Tempelsman,
has a dodgy record when it comes to Africa.

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/ 19 October 2004

Missing the mark

A year after the Cabinet approved an Aids treatment plan progress is patchy, with seven of the nine provinces lagging behind in meeting patient targets. Provinces also underspent their conditional Aids budgets in the first quarter of this financial year. This month the Department of Health said about 12 000 patients are on anti-retroviral treatment. The M&G‘s calculations show the figure is closer to 14 000.

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/ 24 September 2004

Pills without frills

"We have been going to universities to tell them ‘you must understand that 2 500 pharmacists service seven million South Africans’." The <i>M&G</i> spoke to Dr Anban Pillay, the Department of Health’s director for pharmaceutical economic evaluation, about implications of the new pricing regulations for consumers.

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/ 17 September 2004

‘Geraldine must go nurse the patients’

”Moleketi you chicken shit!” read one of the hundreds of posters denouncing Minister of Public Service and Administration Geraldine Fraser-Moleketi for her failure to meet demands of striking public service unions. Lydia Briedenhann (61), a clerk in the Department of Safety and Security, said the fact that civil servants of all races marched together showed workers were truly united.