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/ 10 July 2007

Wedding on a shoestring

At the time of writing, I am a mere week and a half from joining my partner in marriage. Elopement is looking decidedly attractive. When we first started planning, nine months ago, we decided we wanted something small, intimate and, preferably, cheap. This is more or less what we are getting, but it is certainly not going to be the budget affair we thought it would be, writes Jocelyn Newmarch.

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/ 10 July 2007

Better value offshore

With the local equity market having had a spectacular run, fund managers believe that the developed offshore markets are offering better value for South African investors. But investing offshore does not mean that you have to go through the whole hassle of getting permission from the Reserve Bank to use your R2-million foreign investment allowance.

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/ 10 July 2007

Doctors’ favourite schemes

Specialists have compiled a survey of the medical schemes they would recommend. The results: Camaf, Fedhealth, Liberty and Profmed. They judged these according to the level of interference with the doctor-patient relationship, balanced billing, efficiency with accounting and pre-authorisation, co-payments, rate fixing, reversals and formularies.

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/ 10 July 2007

State pensions cannot be split

I will be resigning from the public service at the end of June 2007. Please advise me on what I should do with my pension. Should I open a retirement annuity, according to this week’s article? The article also spoke of the split, which is transferring half of the money into the annuity and cashing the rest, writes reader Phuti.

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/ 10 July 2007

The exemption headache

Small businesses find themselves in a catch-22 when it comes to BEE verification. Officially, they are exempt from the heavy red tape and costs involved in scoring a business’s BEE compliance. But, increasingly, they find that they have to submit to red tape and costs just to prove that they are indeed exempt.

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/ 10 July 2007

An ideal economic world

I was not a South African according to the South African government. Now, did I consider myself a South African after 1994 or was I always a South African in my mind? I will never know the damage that was inflicted by a system that intended to deprive me of my national identity, and saw me as nothing more than a maid in someone’s home, writes businesswoman, Wendy Luhabe.

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/ 10 July 2007

Growing empowerment

With global diversified mining major Xstrata having met its 2014 targets in respect of ownership by historically disadvantaged South Africans (HDSAs), and making good progress on employment equity, you would expect them to be happy with the status quo. Not entirely, writes Erik Ratshikhopha.

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/ 10 July 2007

How men can become partners in maternal health

What is a common factor in ensuring that women do not marry too young, do not have more children than they can cope with, do not die giving birth — and contract HIV in smaller numbers? The answer is men. That is the message for World Population Day 2007, which is being marked on Wednesday under the theme <i>Men as Partners in Maternal Health</i>.