Despite Vodacom’s six-month head start, MTN says it is happy it delayed its third-generation (3G) offering because it was waiting for the right handsets and user experience. During the launch this week, MTN was at pains to defend its much publicised choice of a 2,5G data service called Edge.
In the 1970s and 1980s Paul Boateng was a prominent figure in Britain’s tumultuous era of political and racial struggle. He was wiry and animated, the firm set of his mouth and chin a hallmark of his articulate, legally trained passion for social justice, especially in the black cause.
Is it an act of racism to despise members of one’s own race? There’s not one of us who hasn’t indulged in racist feelings. But whatever I might have disliked, condemned or pitied in races other than my own, it comes nowhere near the flawless contempt I have felt for some of my fellow whites.
The Zimbabwean government has agreed to allow aid groups to offer humanitarian assistance to people who have been displaced in its controversial urban clean-up drive. Local Government Minister Ignatius Chombo announced that the government would allow donors to provide assistance, mainly in the capital, Harare, and Zimbabwe’s second city, Bulawayo.
Indonesian security forces and local militia leaders responsible for crimes against humanity in East Timor in 1999 should face an international tribunal if Jakarta does not prosecute them effectively, a United Nations panel of legal experts has recommended.
Land Claims Commissioner Tozi Gwanya has threatened ”halstarrige [obstinate] boere” in Limpopo with expropriation several times. The threat highlights the deep mistrust between farmers, the land authorities and even claimants in the province, where a startling 85% of farmland is under claim.
Many South Africans are paying more on their monthly phone and Internet bills than on bond repayments, according to Doug Reed, CEO of Data-Pro, an AltX-listed company that competes with Telkom by providing voice telephony over the Internet. A study by the Link Centre at Wits University says the telecoms sector generated an annual revenue of R74-billion last year.
For a month now, the BBC, CNN, ITV and others have been reporting what has been portrayed as one of the greatest humanitarian and human rights disasters in years. At least 200 000 people are said to have been forcibly evicted from slum areas of Harare in Zimbabwe. The figure peaked last week at 1,5-million.
There’s more to healthy living than buying the odd slice of organic carrot cake, and our lackadaisical attitude to health is making bosses think more laterally about how to keep productivity up and absence levels down. Last year, United Kingdom businesses lost £12,2-billion through absence.
The announcement of Jan Ullrich’s team for the Tour de France, which starts on Saturday, is a telling illustration of the way Lance Armstrong has upped the stakes during his six-year domination of the race. Alongside Ullrich as he attempts to beat Armstrong for the first time in the five Tours that the pair have ridden head-to-head.