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/ 24 December 2007
For many in inflation-riddled Zimbabwe this year, Christmas isn’t quite what it used to be. In a glitzy department store on Harare’s main First Street, there are no customers at the almost bare perfume counters. Upstairs in the toy department, Santa has disappeared from his grotto. Outside, about 500 weary customers queue for cash at a bank.
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/ 24 December 2007
Santa Claus will have to slide down slippery chimneys on Christmas Day as thunderstorms are expected in most parts of South Africa on Tuesday. Rain and thunderstorms across several parts of the country have been predicted by the South African Weather Service.
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/ 24 December 2007
Gauteng drownings are a cause for concern, as the province’s number of instances of drowning is higher than on the coast, provincial minister of local government Qedani Dorothy Mahlangu said on Monday. Mahlangu said 15 more people have recently drowned in Gauteng than at the coast.
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/ 24 December 2007
Campaigners say they are eyeing legal action ”sooner rather than later” to block a bid to change Grahamstown’s name to iRhini. ”All such name changes have to be fully motivated and must reflect the views of the community,” one of the coordinators of the Keep Grahamstown Campaign said in a statement on Monday.
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/ 24 December 2007
Several hundred people who have occupied homes at Delft on the Cape Flats were on Monday on their way to the Cape High Court in a bid to block their impending eviction, a spokesperson said. The occupiers had been unable to secure an interdict at the Bellville Magistrate’s Court earlier in the day.
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/ 24 December 2007
The gold mining index added some cheer to the JSE ahead of Christmas celebrations, helping the bourse to close 0,59% firmer on Monday. The JSE closed at midday ahead of the two-day Christmas holiday and will reopen on Thursday. The gold mining index ended 2,95% higher, while resources added 0,81% and the platinum mining index recovered 0,62%.
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/ 24 December 2007
Two heavyweights of Kenya’s post-independence politics square off in a presidential vote on Thursday whose run-up has seen the opposition hold a small lead in opinion polls over President Mwai Kibaki. But the closeness of the vote has raised fears fraud and intimidation may be used to try to swing the result.
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/ 24 December 2007
Cristiano Ronaldo scored an 88th-minute penalty to give Manchester United a 2-1 victory over Everton at Old Trafford on Sunday. A lazy trip by Steven Pienaar on Ryan Giggs allowed Ronaldo to score his second of the day from the spot and extend United’s home league winning streak to nine games.
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/ 24 December 2007
Jacob Zuma, the new leader of the African National Congress said on Sunday that he would look at inflation targeting, a key monetary policy tool used by the Reserve Bank to reign in inflation. The country adopted the policy in 2000 as a framework through which the central bank estimates a ”target” inflation rate.
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/ 24 December 2007
The conduct of some African National Congress delegates at its conference in Polokwane last week showed they did not understand what the party stood for, President Thabo Mbeki has told the South African Broadcasting Corporation. He was disappointed at how little some people understood of the ANC’s political workings and policy implementation.