With the Wallabies lying prostrate on the canvas, South Africa and New Zealand head to the chilly surrounds of Dunedin to contest the unofficial final of the 2005 Tri-Nations series.
First Blood: So’oialo and Pretorius tussle in Cape Town
The Boks, unbeaten in their last five Tri-Nations encounters, need only a draw or a win to retain the crown they won in 2004.
A New Zealand win will leave the All Blacks needing only to beat Australia in the last round to pocket the spoils.
For those with a penchant for mathematics, yes - there are other permutations at play, but Saturday’s protagonists won’t be doing any number-crunching just yet.
For the moment, a win at Carisbrook is the be all and end all - the ABs are out to avenge their defeat in Cape Town; the Boks are determined to decide their own fate.
Bok coach Jake White has been keen to play the ‘final’ card in the build-up to this encounter, and why not? The All Blacks have proved themselves to be slightly suspect when faced with a knock-out situation, and White is well within his rights to pick at a raw nerve if he happens to chance on one - he won’t find too many!
Having said that, White could poke at New Zealand’s 22-16 defeat at Newlands - a result that took some of the gloss off the aura that the All Blacks had picked up during their annihilation of the much-vaunted British & Irish Lions.
And then there’s the absence of ABs first-choice halfbacks, Dan Carter and Byron Kelleher, which has left a few New Zealanders expecting the worst come Saturday.
But despite these potential collywobbles, the locals remain firm favourites - and with good reason.
Their demolition of Australia in Sydney appears to indicate that the result in South Africa was nothing more than a blip in an otherwise upward trajectory.
And then there’s the location of Saturday’s encounter. The All Blacks don’t make a habit of losing at home - they have suffered just two defeats on their own turf in the last seven years (England in 2003 and Australia in 2001).
The Boks, for their part, have managed just one win over the All Blacks in New Zealand in the past 24 years and have never won at Dunedin’s Carisbrook.
S.Africa’s Johnnic recommends rejecting HCI bid
South African casino and hotel company Johnnic Holdings urged shareholders on Tuesday to reject a hostile takeover bid by rival HCI, which it said undervalued the firm.
“The board believes that the offer by HCI does not fully value Johnnic and therefore recommends that you take no action in relation to the offer,” Johnnic said in a circular to shareholders.
Hoskens Consolidated Investments (HCI), which already owns 40 percent of Johnnic, has bid 10.70 rand in cash per Johnnic share or one of its own shares for 2.57 Johnnic shares, valuing the company at roughly 1.8 billion rand.
But Johnnic, which was one of South Africa’s first black-owned companies, said on Tuesday financial advisers had estimated Johnnic was worth 11.36-12.67 rand per share, assuming it was successful in a dispute over a stake in gaming firm FIH.
The company said certain institutional shareholders had also indicated the offer was too low and noted it was below the current share price, which stood unchanged at 11 rand by 1204 GMT.
More: za.today.reuters.com
Food shortage looms in southern Africa despite harves
Despite a harvest of cereals in 2005, nearly 10 million Southern Africans could face food shortage and need humanitarian assistance in the next year, it was revealed ahead of a regional summit in Gaborone from Wednesday.
Leaders of 14 member states of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) will gather at Botswana’s capital for an annual meeting to assess challenges of the region’s development. Food security will be on top agenda, officials said.
The SADC region harvested around 26 million tons of cereals in 2005, which is almost identical to the 2004 harvest and 10 percent above the past five-year average, said a document circulated at the meeting.
However, distribution of the harvest remained uneven among the SADC countries. While South Africa is enjoying an overall cereal surplus, other members have deficits ranging from 100,000 tons in Zambia to 1.62 million tons in Zimbabwe, said the document.
“The region may therefore be facing serious food security needs in some of member states, such as Botswana, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia and Zimbabwe,” it said.
More: english.people.com.cn
Actress Angelina Jolie takes part in MTV documentary on poverty in Africa
US music broadcaster MTV has announced that it will show a documentary The Diary Of Angelina Jolie And Dr. Jeffrey Sachs In Africa next month.
This is a part of the network’s new pro-social initiative Think MTV. The half an hour special episode of the Diary series follows UN goodwill ambassador Jolie and UN advisor/economist Dr. Jeffrey Sachs as they travel to Sauri, a remote group of villages in Western Kenya, where Sachs’ UN Millennium Project team is working to end poverty, hunger and disease afflicting the area.
With cameras in tow, Jolie and Sachs experience first-hand the effects of the devastation unique to Africa – and provide hope as they highlight hopeful progress in this Millennium village.
MTV states that its initiative Think MTV aims to inform and empower its audience on the issues that matter to them most, including education, sexual health, discrimination, and the environment. It will examine international poverty, Aids, the effects of war, and other issues of global concern to young people.
More: indiantelevision.com
S.Africa’s Johnnic recommends rejecting HCI bid
South African casino and hotel company Johnnic Holdings urged shareholders on Tuesday to reject a hostile takeover bid by rival HCI, which it said undervalued the firm.
“The board believes that the offer by HCI does not fully value Johnnic and therefore recommends that you take no action in relation to the offer,” Johnnic said in a circular to shareholders.
Hoskens Consolidated Investments (HCI), which already owns 40 percent of Johnnic, has bid 10.70 rand in cash per Johnnic share or one of its own shares for 2.57 Johnnic shares, valuing the company at roughly 1.8 billion rand.
But Johnnic, which was one of South Africa’s first black-owned companies, said on Tuesday financial advisers had estimated Johnnic was worth 11.36-12.67 rand per share, assuming it was successful in a dispute over a stake in gaming firm FIH.
The company said certain institutional shareholders had also indicated the offer was too low and noted it was below the current share price, which stood unchanged at 11 rand by 1204 GMT.
More: za.today.reuters.com
ANALYSIS-Economic success, human disaster in southern Africa
Mozambique stock and bond exchange chief Jussub Nurmamad has seen the value of his fledgling market increase 50 times since 1999 – the result, he says, of southern Africa’s stability and economic growth.
“For people to invest their money, you have to have stability,” he says. “Political stability is here. With the main exception of Zimbabwe – and that problem will not last forever – we have democracy. It’s a region of opportunity.”
Some analysts already speak of the region as forming an “economic subcontinent” increasingly attractive to foreign investors, with a decade of democracy in regional superpower South Africa reassuring investors.
In Maputo, construction materials sell out as private and corporate building booms. Mozambique’s economy grew by almost 8 percent in 2004 – the fastest growth in the region, and one of the best in the world – boosted by a string of major foreign funded industrial projects and debt relief.
More: alertnet.org
S Africa condemns Kadirgamar killing
South Africa has joined other countries in condemning the killing of Sri Lankan Foreign Minister Lakshman Kadirgamar in Colombo.
Foreign Minister Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma said in a statement: “The South African government joins the international community in expressing its shock and outrage at the callous murder of Foreign Minister Lakshman Kadirgamar.”
“The government of South Africa condemns without equivocation the use of assassinations as a means to achieve political ends.”
The foreign minister said Friday night’s assassination was clearly aimed at derailing the current peace process in Sri Lanka where the Tamil Tigers have been fighting a liberation struggle for decades now.
“Both the Sri Lankan government and the Tamil Tigers owe it to the people not to allow extremists to derail the peace process by renewing their commitment to efforts aimed at bringing about lasting peace.
“Those of us who knew Minister Kadirgamar personally will sorely miss his positive contribution in the multilateral fora, especially his invaluable contributions to the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), Commonwealth Heads of Government Meetings (CHOGM) and Indian Ocean-Rim (IOR).”
More: eians.com
SA to boost rugby in Africa
SA Rugby has named a squad of 24 to participate in the International Rugby Board/Confederation of African Rugby Under-18 tournament to be held in Windhoek, Namibia, from August 24 - September 3.
The tournament will determine which country, except South Africa, will qualify for the IRB Under-19 World Championships in Dubai next year. As defending world champions, South Africa has already qualified.
Players representing South Africa were selected from the Under-18 Academy Week tournament held in Upington in July. The squad assembles in Cape Town on August 21.
Other than the home team and South Africa, other contestants in Windhoek will be: Tunisia, Morocco, Cote d’Ivoire (Ivory Coast), Uganda, Kenya, Madagascar and Zimbabwe.
More: news24.com
Africa must win the food fight
A bellwether report has found that the number of malnourished people in Africa has increased from 88-million in 1970 to 200-million today, 35% of the continent’s population, as a result of ill-conceived agricultural policies and trade barriers imposed by wealthy countries.
This makes the Millennium Development Goals – to halve the proportion of people who suffer from hunger in Africa by 2015 – inconceivable unless there is a turnaround in both domestic and international policy choices and investments.
The new research by the Inter-national Food Policy Research Unit (IFPRU) notes: “Policy choices and investments made now could substantially improve, or further worsen, the prospects for food security in Africa over the next two decades.”
More: mg.co.za
South Africa’s sacked deputy gains popular support
A popular groundswell is building behind Jacob Zuma, the former South African deputy president who was recently dismissed amid corruption allegations.
Leftwing supporters of Mr Zuma on Tuesday launched a fund to pay his legal and other costs when he goes on trial to face two counts of corruption. The launch came a day after Cosatu, South Africa’s main trade unions federation and the ruling African National Congress’s partner in government, called on president Thabo Mbeki to reinstate his former deputy and prevent what it called a “political trial”.
The backlash represents the biggest internal political challenge yet to Mr Mbeki, who was elected to a second five-year term last year. It has highlighted discontent within the ruling camp with the president’s political style and economic policies, as well as many South Africans’ distrust of their new democratic institutions.
More: news.ft.com