Business

5 important things happening in South Africa today

Staff Writer

 ·27 Feb 2023

Here’s what is happening in and affecting South Africa today:

• ANC threatens De Ruyter: The ANC says it will lay criminal charges against former Eskom CEO Andre de Ruyter if he fails to report his allegations of corruption at the embattled power utility to law enforcement agencies within seven days. The ANC said that De Ruyter was legally bound to report corruption as he was head of the nation’s power utility. Members of the ANC recently attacked De Ruyter after his explosive interview with Annika Larsen last week. [News24]

• Street light chaos: The eThekwini Metropolitan Municipality is launching an investigation to figure out how the council spent R579 million on a contract to fix and maintain street lights which should have cost R91 million. Between November 2019 and December 2020, 18 companies were contracted to maintain the streetlights across the city. The matter is under investigation by the City Investigations and Integrity Unit (CIIU), and there is no date for its completion. [News24]

• Hospital exemption: Former Eskom CEO Andre De Ruyter says it will cost R365 million to stop all public hospitals from experiencing load shedding. He said the power utility received a request from the health department to stop load shedding 213 hospitals but could only exclude 25 hospitals as they were not implanted into an extensive distribution network. He added that Eskom had a plan for the remaining hospitals; however, installing the necessary infrastructure would take 12 to 36 months. [EWN]

• Greater government engagement: Business Unity SA (Busa) CEO Cas Coovadia says the private sector is highly frustrated by the government’s failure to work with it to solve the nation’s challenges. He believes South Africa has a very patriotic private sector and that investment will flow if the government creates the right environment. He said the private sector wants to help, as it has the resources and capacity to assist with the nation’s critical issues. [BusinessDay]

• Markets: South Africa’s rand weakened against a stronger U.S. dollar on Friday, as the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) added South Africa to the greylist. Being added to the list means that countries are subject to increased monitoring by the FATF on concern that they are at higher risk for money laundering and terrorist financing. On Monday (27 February), the rand was trading at R18.44/$, R19.45/€, and R22.03/£. Brent crude is trading at $82.95 a barrel. [Nasdaq]