5 important things happening in South Africa today
·21 Feb 2019
Here’s what is happening in and affecting South Africa today:
- Moody’s says that the budget presented by finance minister Tito Mboweni yesterday showed that South Africa’s economy has deteriorated since October last year, and that there is no more room for flexibility. The group is expected to make a ratings decision in March. [Reuters]
- Government’s Eskom bailout will amount to R150 billion over the next 10 years. On top of the R69 billion budgeted for the next three years to help Eskom restructure, Treasury has made put further R23 billion bailouts for each of the 7 years after that. Amortised, that totals R150 billion in 2019 rands. [Business Day]
- Unions have slammed Mboweni’s budget speech, and protested outside parliament against the plans to split Eskom. Unions are pushing back against job losses at the power utility, and have threatened to shut the country down over the plans. [eNCA]
- Listed ICT group EOH made a sharp turnaround on the JSE, after it announced that a host of its executives, including founder Asher Bohbot resigned from the group’s board. [Moneyweb]
- South Africa’s rand was largely flat in afternoon dealings on Wednesday, recouping the bulk of losses suffered after finance minister Tito Mboweni presented the annual national budget. On Thursday the rand was at R14.01 to the dollar, R18.27 to the pound and R15.89 to the euro.
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