Privatisation in southward Africa is officially dead.

Privatisation in southward Africa is officially dead, at least for the quietness of this year. Incoming public enterprises minister, Alec Erwin, finally squashed speculation about the fate of the country's much-vaunted sale of state assets by way of confirming that privatisation has been placed forward the back burner.

"Instead," announced Erwin, "we will concentrate forward concessions, joint ventures and public-private partnerships."

The design of the partnerships is to achieve higher evens of investment, overall system efficiency for the economy, improved technical capacity and management of public assets, enhanced human resource and better customer service.

As a compromise, it's probably