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/ 10 December 2007
As interest rate hikes tighten consumer purse strings, retailers are bracing themselves for a disappointing festive season. Large merchandisers, such as the JD Group and Woolworths, are reconciling themselves to a slowdown in festive season activity as volatile fuel prices and consumer indebtedness compounds the effects of interest rate increases on their customers.
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/ 10 December 2007
One small corner of the retail market is seeing business as usual at this time of year. Wholesale markets providing goods to informal traders, spaza shops and small businesses across South Africa are booming. Trade unions would blow a gasket if they went shopping on the outskirts of the Johannesburg CBD where developments such as China Mart and Dragon City provide goods ”off the boat” from China.
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/ 10 December 2007
It takes one bad leader, or leader turned bad, to destroy a country. It takes generations to rebuild. To add to Archbishop Desmond Tutu’s words of wisdom, it is not just about choosing a leader who we will not be ashamed of, it is about us choosing a leader who will not roll back the fragile gains that we have made, including gender equality, writes Colleen Lowe Morna.
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/ 10 December 2007
The ANC and its alliance partners have often been described as a family. Families can evoke the deepest love from which courage can emerge against great danger. They can also cause bitter feuds and vengeful hatred. This month, when Polokwane is on our minds, it is also the time of Christmas holidays, family gatherings and the worst period of domestic violence and suicides.
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/ 10 December 2007
In a class action suit that recalls the Treatment Action Campaign’s battle to access free antiretrovirals, the residents of Phiri in Soweto have instituted legal proceedings against the City of Johannesburg. They are challenging the installation of prepaid meters in March 2004 and the decision of the city on the amount of water allocated free to the city’s poor residents.
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/ 10 December 2007
Yet another of my pens has just disappeared from where I swear I just left it and is probably already with my smug doppelganger in a parallel universe. We all have our favourite take on the existence of parallel worlds; it’s a subject that has been fodder for science-fiction writers for quite a while now. The question is whether the idea has a place in serious scientific discourse.
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/ 10 December 2007
Growing up in New York City, I took the subway to school like most of my peers. I remember not quite understanding, as a 13-year-old, the looks I received from men my father’s age — or why they kept ”accidentally” brushing up against me. What was all that about?
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/ 10 December 2007
Reserve Bank Governor Tito Mboweni announced yet another interest rate hike of 50 basis points on Thursday, in an unwelcome blow to consumers. This brings the repo rate — the rate at which the Reserve Bank lends to other banks — to 11% and prime to 14,5%.
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/ 9 December 2007
In the early 1970s, when the ANC underground machinery was exposed and threatened with decimation and outstanding leaders such as Harry Gwala and others were sentenced to Robben Island, the ANC instructed Jacob Zuma to go into exile and lead a team to revive structures in KwaZulu-Natal
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/ 9 December 2007
As ANC members seek to convince one another on presidential and other choices, it is critical to weigh the implications of our preferences. Needless to say, we are duty-bound to accept the outcome; and we should today psychologically also accept that one or the other candidate will win, writes Joel Netshitenzhe.