Sunday Times South Africa

Walmart throws down the gauntlet

SAPA & REUTERS

Six days after giant US retailer Walmart completed its acquisition of a controlling stake in Massmart, it is trying to woo South Africans with price cuts and promises of “new business opportunities”.

An eight page colour advertisement in the Sunday Times yesterday was South Africa’s first introduction to the Walmart brand.

The advertisement included a letter from “the people” of Massmart and Walmart announcing the merger and price cuts by the group’s retailers Game, Dion Wired, Makro and Builders’ Warehouse.

Massmart also said it intended creating 15 000 jobs in the next five years.

“While there are other exciting promotional campaigns planned, this offering so soon after the finalisation of the Walmart merger is a clear demonstration of Massmart and Walmart’s intent to save people money to live better,” said Massmart chief executive Grant Pattison.

He told the newspaper there were no plans to open Walmart-branded shops as the local brands had “plenty of value”, and there were plans to open 40 more of them in the next financial year.

However, these brands would be advertised under Walmart’s blue and yellow logo.

Walmart completed a R16.5 billion conditional transaction to buy a 51 percent stake in Massmart last Monday.

Pick n Pay chief executive officer Nick Badminton said competition was great for the consumer and the retailer welcomed it.

“As far as Massmart is concerned, we’d like to say ‘welcome to the low margin business’.

“As far as their Sunday promotion is concerned, specials are run across lines throughout the year and many of the lines we’re carrying at the moment are well below that of Massmart,” said Badminton.

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The Zimbabwe Review: What was the real reason for Jameson Timba's ...

Jameson Timba is the latest of several MDC senior officials to be arrested on dubious pretexts and then released when the state's case was found to be too weak to sustain. Plain old-fashioned generalised harrassment and intimidation of the MDC in the run up to an election cannot be ruled out as the reason for Timba's troubles, as many have speculated, but there could be another specific factor at play. Even by the low standard of the mean-spirited partisanship with which Zimbabwe's laws are applied, Timba's arrest seems particularly shabby. He is said to have accused the president of being a 'liar' over what happened at the recent SADC summit on Zimbabwe. But the 'liar' term seems to have been a newspaper's description of his stated views, rather than a word that came out of his mouth. It was the South African newspaper the Sunday Times of June 19 which screamed, 'Mugabe a liar' ( http://www.timeslive.co.za/sundaytimes/2011/06/19/mugabe-a-liar ), citing Timba's comments but not claiming to have talked to him, nor that it was he who used the word 'liar,' and specifically in regards to Mugabe's comments about the summit. If anything it looks like The Sunday Times merely read Timba's published views and sexed them up. ZANU-PF busybody and agent provocateur Jonathan Moyo reacted not to Timba's published views, but to the Sunday Times' interpretation of them, by deciding to get angry on behalf of the president. He called for Timba's conduct to be 'looked into.' ( The Herald; http://www.herald.co.zw/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13035:investigate-timba-says-moyo&catid=38:local-news&Itemid=131 .) "It is impossible to believe that Minister Timba was sober when he uttered such an outrageous statement attributed to him by the Sunday Times," sputtered Moyo. "When President Mugabe came back from South Africa he never involved himself in the debate... yet Timba tries to attribute those words to him. If this is not addressed it will set a wrong precedent, where we can have Cabinet ministers not respecting the President. It is unacceptable for a Cabinet minister to call his boss a liar, whether from Zanu-PF, MDC or from the moon. What Timba said is worse than hate speech. This must never be condoned," Prof Moyo said. Not long afterwards Timba was arrested, on a late Friday afternoon, as seems to be the norm for 'opposition' politicians deemed evil-doers. He normally would have spent at least the whole weekend in jail. A combination of fast-acting lawyers, the predictably bad international publicity and the weakness of the case had him unusually brought before a judge on a Sunday and then released, though not without the police doing everything to humiliate Timba in the way even his release was handled. Even if this were true, is the 'intention' to do something a crime if it is not actually done, since Timba did not mention Mugabe's name at all as being the 'liar?' If Moyo really wanted to stir up some trouble, should his accusation of intent to 'tarnish' Mugabe's name not have been made against the Sunday Times that made the 'liar' accusation, rather than Timba who it paraphrased?    The whole sordid saga 'tarnished' the reputation of the police, as well as that of the government of Robert Mugabe far more than either Timba's comments or the Sunday Times' characterisation of them. The shock of Jonathan Moyo's pettiness and mean-spiritedness is perhaps only exceeded by the willingness of the  police and prosecuting authorities to go along with them.  The article began, "The Prime Minister’s Office which allegedly received 3 million pounds from Britain to fund Zimbabwe’s media to denigrate the person of Cde Robert Mugabe, has opened offshore accounts for two senior journalists from the private media with reports indicating that other journalists are currently getting their dues in cash. Investigations by ZBC News into the ...project being managed by Minister of State in the Prime Minister’s Office Mr. Jameson Timba to tarnish the image of President Mugabe and Zanu PF show..." The over-reaction to Timba's views of the SADC summit and the statements by other state players show that ZANU-PF is particularly worried about how opinion is shaped. In recent weeks in particular, it has been on the losing end of the on-going propaganda battle with the MDC to influence opinion on which of them is most to blame for the impasse in the coalition government that is forcing SADC to spend so much time on Zimbabwe. ZANU-PF is worried that sections of the private media are receiving foreign funds which they believe are part of the West's anti-Mugabe 'regime change' agenda. If the ZANU-PF hierarchy believe that Timba is the conduit for those foreign media funds, as suggested by the ZBC article, that could be the real explanation for his messy arrest and ill-treatment.

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