No image available
/ 20 February 2004
The general secretary of the National Council of Trade Unions (Nactu), Cunningham Ngcukana, is expected to leave the federation to assume a senior position in the secretariat of New Partnership for Africa’s Development (Nepad) at the beginning of April.
No image available
/ 20 February 2004
Local government must implement new financial reporting measures from July. These include submitting quarterly reports to the National Treasury and posting them on their council websites, to better track revenue and spending. Municipalities spend too much on salaries and not enough on services.
No image available
/ 20 February 2004
When former MP Pregs Govender first proposed a gender-responsive budget a decade ago, she warned that without ongoing political commitment to this initiative, it would be wiped out as yet another "public relations exercise". While the government is committed to social spending, it continues to gloss over protection against gender inequalities.
No image available
/ 20 February 2004
Budget 2004 was "growth-friendly", without necessarily acting as a direct spur to economic growth, a key economic analyst said on Thursday. Iraj Abedian, chief economist of Standard Bank, observed that growth was ultimately driven by forces like the global economy.
No image available
/ 20 February 2004
Although the Budget provides for an increase of 5% in further education and training (FET) spending per province, independent researchers believe that the money remains inadequate to deal with the challenges facing the sector. Details of the education vote suggest that most of the increased support will benefit schools, not colleges.
No image available
/ 20 February 2004
Over the past few years the Treasury and the government have improved in making information on the Budget, the allocation of state resources and programmes available to the public timeously and in detail. However, we should not confuse this effusive sharing of information with public participation in the Budget and fiscal policy formulation.
No image available
/ 20 February 2004
The government will be hard pressed to meet its land restitution deadline of 2005 with the Cinderella budget Minister of Finance Trevor Manuel awarded to the Department of Land Affairs, a land reform expert told the <i>Mail & Guardian</i>.
Ruth Hall, from the Programme for Land and Agrarian Studies at the University of the Western Cape, called the allocation disappointing.
No image available
/ 20 February 2004
The implementation of South Africa’s inflation policy needs a more pragmatic approach by the National Treasury and the South African Reserve Bank and should be coupled to growth and employment targets for the country. Only then can we talk about the inflation targeting policy being good for the poor, argues Lumkile Mondi.
No image available
/ 20 February 2004
About 10% of those who play golf worldwide are women. This is a favourite statitistic of the men who have controlled the sport for decades. This week Laura Davies became the first woman to play on the European men’s tour. But can golf shed its sexist image?
No image available
/ 20 February 2004
Kaizer Chiefs and Ajax Cape Town made a statement of intent this week, in more ways than one. Both teams began the task of garnering points from the backlog of games they have to play by beating their opponents Golden Arrows and Jomo Cosmos respectively on Wednesday night.