South African gold is still prey for the British lion

Johannesburg, South Africa / Monday, February 12, 2001

Dear Friend of GATA and Gold:

Today went extremely well.

First I met with the National Union of Mineworkers. Attending were
Mr. S. Zokwana, president: G. Mantashe, generalsSecretary; A. Palane,
deputy general secretary: and Gino Govender, co-ordinator of the
union's strategy unit.

Then, I headed off to Pretoria and a meeting in the board room at the
Ministry of Minerals and Energy. It was like a NASA board room, with
a huge circular table with microphones, and screens to display
material on. Attending were six officials of the ministry and two
senior officials of the South African Reserve Bank They were
Lambertus Van Zyl, general manager of the bank's International
Banking Department, and Alan R. H. Colburn, the department's
assistant general manager.

All of this came together on one day's notice, and participants
in both meetings rearranged their schedules so that we might meet.

It was stressed at both meetings that questions should be asked of
the new U.S. treasury secretary, Paul O'Neil, in the next couple of
weeks, as his department must respond in court to the Howe/GATA
lawsuit by March 15.

Two points of encouragement. After the meeting at the Reserve Bank,
the officials conferred privately and then came out and asked me that
if they were to go to the U.S. Treasury Department, what would be the
latest date they should do so. They also wanted me to know that they
would take very seriously the matters we had discussed.

This afternoon I did an interview with the South African Broadcasting
Co. that will be aired tomorrow or Wednesday and will be found on the
Internet afterward at www.sabcnews.com. The interview will be shown
on the network's nightly news program and will be accompanied by
contrary opinions.

Now to the airport and back home to Texas.

This has been a great trip. The people I met are wonderful. When a
South African says he (or she) is going to do something, it gets
done, and done very well.

All the best,

BILL MURPHY