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/ 11 February 2005
African Rainbow Minerals (ARM) expects Harmony Gold’s bid for rival Gold Fields to take its "natural course", ARM executive chairman Patrice Motsepe said this week. ARM has a 16,2% stake in Harmony Gold. Motsepe noted that exciting opportunities would emerge from Harmony’s bid. "We are really supportive of the initiative in terms of the huge synergies that will be unlocked when the two companies work together".
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/ 11 February 2005
January: President Zuma is inaugurated at the Union Buildings. He announces that the buildings will henceforth be called the Fikile Mbalula Buildings after the spirited campaign put up by the Youth League leader. Later in the month Schabir Shaik is appointed the Minister of Finance (Deputy: Brett Kebble); Mo Shaik is Minister of Intelligence; Yunus Shaik becomes the Minister of Justice … The <i>M&G</i> provides its month-by-month forecast.
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/ 11 February 2005
When the leader of a powerful gang in the oil-rich Niger Delta, Alhaji Dokubo Asari, threatened to declare "all-out war" last September, global oil prices hit historic highs of more than $50 a barrel. The threat and its immediate consequences underscored how a purely local conflict over control of relatively small amounts of oil can have immediate global consequences.
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/ 11 February 2005
I do hope that when next the English cricket team grace our fields they leave their cherished Barmy Army behind. The Englishman abroad is seldom a pleasant sight, but when he’s a crowd of drunken rowdies intent on bringing to cricket all the taste and reserve of English soccer hooligans, then he’s better left at home. And congratulations to the managers of local stadiums for banning the dreaded vuvuzela.
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/ 11 February 2005
The Central Bank of Kenya has secretly removed the South African Bank Note Company, a subsidiary of the South African Reserve Bank, from a shortlist of international security printing firms in line to win a tender worth almost R800-million to print "new generation" currency for the East African country over the next five years.
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/ 11 February 2005
Saudi Arabia, one of the world’s most traditional absolute monarchies, took a tentative step towards democracy on Thursday when male citizens went to the polls in the first municipal elections the country has witnessed for 40 years. Candidates have splashed out money on advertising and laid on feasts for potential voters, but the authorities’ ”progressive step” has left reformers disappointed.
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/ 11 February 2005
Almost two-thirds of money promised by governments to help the millions of people affected by the Indian Ocean tsunami has not yet been received by the United Nations, confirming fears that many countries would try to wriggle out of their commitments. Speaking in Geneva this week, a UN official urged governments to pay up.
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/ 11 February 2005
New Togolese President Faure Gnassingbe could yet weather the political storm that surrounds his controversial appointment, thanks to his strong support from the army, analysts said this week. Decisive action by former colonial ruler France will be needed to reverse parliament’s decision to install Faure as president following the death of his father Gnassingbe Eyadema.
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/ 11 February 2005
Malawian President Bingu Mutharika’s tenure is becoming increasingly tenuous after the largest opposition, the Malawi Congress Party, joined the ruling United Democratic Party (UDF) in demanding that he step down. Mutharika resigned from the UDF last Saturday after a bitter nine-month stand-off with his predecessor and current party chair Bakili Muluzi over his tough stance on corruption.
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/ 11 February 2005
Benon Sevan, the UN Under-Secretary General who headed the Iraq oil-for-food Programme, was suspended last Friday after the Independent Inquiry Committee, appointed last year by UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, released an interim report on the scandal-plagued humanitarian programme