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/ 13 February 2004

Setting hearts a-glow

National reconciliation is so much easier when one doesn’t have the capacity to vaporise one’s former oppressor at the touch of a button. No nukes has been good news for our little country. Which is why I was perturbed to receive a letter from a major insurance company informing me of a change to the terms of their policies.

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/ 13 February 2004

Treasury must cough up

Public health care has been chronically underfunded for the past five years and gross provincial disparities in spending persist, a government report now confirms. As a result, the Treasury’s claims that health budgets have increased significantly in the same period are under renewed fire.

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/ 13 February 2004

Budget ‘to hold line on spending’

Next week’s Budget will increase state spending on social and economic development programmes and job-creation initiatives while trying to ease the country’s personal tax burden — despite a shortfall in the revenue it is expected to receive in the coming year. This is the key prediction for Manuel’s 2004 government spending plan, due to be unveiled in Parliament on Wednesday.

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/ 13 February 2004

African football stands still

As the African Cup of Nations comes to an end it is time for the continent to take off its rose-tinted glasses and be brutally honest about admitting that the game has not progressed since the last tournament. Commercially, tactically and in overall appeal, we are where we were at the end of the last century.

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/ 13 February 2004

North vs North

The tragedy about this weekend’s African Cup of Nations is that if its North African contenders Tunisia and Morocco are indeed the best on the continent, only one of them will be in the 2006 World Cup finals in Germany as both are in the same group in the qualifying stages.

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/ 13 February 2004

End of Elland Road?

With two-thirds of the season gone, Leeds are second from the bottom of the Premiership. Their chances of avoiding relegation were helped when they beat Wolves 4-1 on Tuesday. However, they may still be relegated. And on Friday Leeds are expecting to hear from their creditors, to whom they owe about £100-million.

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/ 13 February 2004

Be my valentine -– share my STD

The British government launched an explicit advertising campaign on Monday as part of a drive to reduce the rates of sexually transmitted diseases (STDs). Radio advertisements warn of the risk of developing genital warts, and spoof Valentine cards are being distributed in clubs, student unions and other social haunts of young people.