Round about stamps

South Africa honours Mandela with coin and stamp

Thursday, 17 July 2008 12:15 p.m.

Johannesburg. sda/dpa. The month-long festivities celebrating the 90th birthday of Nelson Mandela, South Africa's national hero, are being crowned this Friday with the issue of a coin and a stamp bearing his likeness. The 5 rand coin displays a smiling Mandela and is being issued at a volume of roughly 5 million copies. According to bulletins from the media, the postal service is additionally issuing a stamp on the special day honouring the country's first black president.
Mandela is going to spend his birthday on Friday with a circle of friends and relatives in Qunu, his rural home town in the Eastern Cape province. The ceremonies honouring his 90th already began months ago with parties, lectures, presentations and concerts. The popular statesman and Nobel prize-winner - venerated by his fellow countrymen respectfully with the name "Father" ("Madiba") - celebrated in advance last week with several hundred children.

In Johannesburg's Alexandra township, around 2000 other children gathered to form a living picture that showed a waving Mandela from a bird's-eye perspective. On Friday Mandela is also going to celebrate his 10th wedding anniversary with Mozambique's former first lady, Graça Machel. Mr Mandela spent nearly a third of his life in prison due to his struggle against racial segregation. "The Elders", a council of senior citizens founded on his birthday last year to solve conflicts worldwide, is also supposed to meet in Johannesburg.

© Baseler Zeitung online, www.baz.ch

Josephine Baker on US stamp

The US Post Office is honouring Josephine Baker, the legendary dancer and actress, with a stamp. The dark-skinned star in revues of yore is seen on a movie-theatre poster for her film "Princess Tam-Tam" (1935). Josephine Baker was born in St. Louis in 1906 and took on French citizenship in 1937. The poster with Baker is one of five being portrayed on a new stamp series featuring the African-American cinema.

© Berliner Morgenpost

Thursday, 17 July 2008 4:00 a.m.

5 million Knut stamps

Berlin (dpa/bb) - Knut, Berlin's darling polar bear, is supposed to be spread among the population 5 million times via postal mail routes. The stamp bearing the likeness of this crowd-drawing magnet from the Zoological Gardens can be bought as of April 10th. According to its own figures, the Deutsche Post reckons with long queues storming the counters. According to information from dpa, not one but two members of the federal cabinet, Peer Steinbrück, minister of financial affairs, and Sigmar Gabriel, minister of the environment (both from the SPD party), want to present the stamp officially at a press conference near the zoo on April 9th. The postage stamp costs 80 cents: 55 cents are for postage, 25 cents are for the benefit of environmental protection.

© Die Welt

Published on 28 March 2008 at 2:33 p.m.