{"id":5934,"date":"2012-02-11T15:35:09","date_gmt":"2012-02-11T15:35:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=5934"},"modified":"2012-02-11T15:50:32","modified_gmt":"2012-02-11T15:50:32","slug":"new-mandela-banknotes-announced","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/trending\/5934\/new-mandela-banknotes-announced\/","title":{"rendered":"New Mandela banknotes announced"},"content":{"rendered":"

New South African banknotes will bear the image of former president Nelson Mandela, President Jacob Zuma announced in Pretoria on\u00a0Saturday.<\/p>\n

The notes would make South Africans remember their achievements,\u00a0Zuma told reporters at a press briefing attended by dignitaries including SA Reserve Bank Governor Gill Marcus and Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan.<\/p>\n

Zuma said the gesture was “a befitting tribute” to Mandela who was a symbol of the country’s struggle for freedom, human rights and democracy.<\/p>\n

“With this humble gesture, we are expressing our deep gratitude, as the South African people, to a life spent in service of the people of this country and in the cause of humanity worldwide,” Zuma said.<\/p>\n

The banknotes would make South Africans remember and appreciate their achievements in order to continue the journey towards a more prosperous society, Zuma said.<\/p>\n

Saturday marks the 22nd anniversary of Mandela’s release from prison.<\/p>\n

Marcus said the new notes would enter circulation later in the year.<\/p>\n

She said coins would not be affected at this stage.<\/p>\n

The current banknotes, that feature the Big 5 animals, had been in circulation since 1992.<\/p>\n

Marcus said officials consulted widely on the notes, speaking to a wide range of people including Mandela’s former wife Winnie Madikizela-Mandela.<\/p>\n

Gordhan said the new notes would “help South Africa to remember Mandela” and “institutionalise the memory of where we come from”.<\/p>\n

Earlier on Saturday, German international news agency DPA reported lack of details about the nature of the announcement which briefly spooked markets.<\/p>\n

The rand tumbled about 2.5 per cent versus the dollar.<\/p>\n

“Traders worried that the central bank of Africa’s largest economy was about to make a drastic policy or personnel change while markets were closed,” DPA said.<\/p>\n

However, the Mail and Guardian cited sources suggesting the announcement would likely be of a celebratory nature and possibly related to Mandela.<\/p>\n

Following reassuring remarks from bank officials, who indicated that the news would not be about interest rates or resignations, the rand made a quick rebound.<\/p>\n

\"Mandela<\/a>

Mandela bank notes<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

New South African banknotes will bear the image of former president Nelson Mandela, President Jacob Zuma announced in Pretoria on Saturday<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":5936,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[1492,26,83,1491,84],"class_list":["post-5934","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-trending","tag-gill-marcus","tag-headline","tag-jacob-zuma","tag-nelson-mandela","tag-pravin-gordhan"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5934","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5934"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5934\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5938,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5934\/revisions\/5938"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5936"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5934"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5934"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5934"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}