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/ 4 February 2005
The Pope remained ”stable” in hospital on Thursday as his illness raised the question of what the Catholic church would do if he were to become permanently incapacitated — and reopened debate over whether popes should retire instead of reigning for life.
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/ 4 February 2005
The United Nations suffered grave damage to its international reputation on Thursday after it emerged that the official who headed the oil-for-food programme for Iraq sought and obtained bribes from Saddam Hussein’s regime. Benon Sevan was rebuked for actions which were ”ethically improper and seriously undermined the integrity of the UN”.
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/ 4 February 2005
The Congress of South African Trade Unions’s (Cosatu) expulsion from Zimbabwe this week has triggered a wave of protest among South African civil society organisations, church groups and youth organisations riled by the African National Congress’s policy of "quiet diplomacy".
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/ 4 February 2005
The most devastating prosecution documents handed in at court this week are two affidavits from businessman David Wilson, the former MD of the Renong Overseas Corporation — the Malaysian company that won the rights to develop Durban’s Point Waterfront.
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/ 4 February 2005
The newly appointed national director of public prosecution, Vusi Pikoli, this week spoke out on a number of controversial issues, from the perceived "preferential" treatment of MPs involved in the Travelgate scam to speculation that the Scorpions unit would be moved from the National Prosecuting Authority to the South African Police Service. On Travelgate, he told the <i>M&G</i> the law would take its course
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/ 4 February 2005
The Cape Town council has slashed hundreds of millions of rands from its capital budget — effectively halting scores of its own township-based infrastructure projects — while redirecting about R246-million to the flagship N2 Gateway Project, the government’s pilot initiative to eradicate shacks. About 12 000 families will be relocated as part of the development.
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/ 4 February 2005
De Beers Consolidated Mines will most certainly start its planned job cuts in Koffiefontein. The <i>Mail & Guardian</i> reported three weeks ago that the diamond miner planned to cut 1 400 jobs in its South African operations. The Koffiefontein mine is located in the southern Free State and employs 795 people.
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/ 4 February 2005
The wry Jo’burg adage "save face, not money" is again coming true as Harmony Gold extricates itself from its fast-failing bid for Gold Fields. The conundrum that Harmony now faces is how to put a positive spin on the expensive and embarrassing consequences of what promises to become an abortive bid.
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/ 4 February 2005
In the week that the African National Congress Youth League again endorsed Deputy President Jacob Zuma to succeed President Thabo Mbeki, a raft of new evidence concerning the allegedly corrupt relationship between Zuma and Durban businessman Schabir Shaik emerged at the Shaik trial.
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/ 4 February 2005
Hundreds of thousands of hectares belonging to the elite lie fallow and unused, while impoverished Kenyans kill one another for access to tiny parcels of overworked land and muddy trickles that were once rivers. The flames of rebellion have been fanned by a drought, failed harvests and increasing competition between crop and cattle farmers.