5 important things happening in South Africa today
Here’s what is happening in and affecting South Africa today:
100 MW untouched: Mozambican energy minister Carlos Zacarias has expressed his frustration and wants to know why Eskom did not finalise the acquisition of the 100MW of electricity his country committed to South Africa. A well-placed source at the Mozambican national utility company, Electricidade de Moçambique (EDM), said South Africa’s agreement with Mozambique would have immediately lifted one load shedding stage. However, Eskom seems uninterested in engaging with EDM even though South Africa is currently in the throes of stage 6 load shedding. [News24]
Big Pharma ‘bullied’ SA: The Health Justice Initiative (HJI) has made damning findings on the Covid-19 vaccine contracts between the Department of Health and pharmaceutical giants Johnson & Johnson (J&J), Pfizer and the Serum Institute of India, and the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunisations (Gavi), an international alliance established to improve equitable access to vaccines. South Africa was found to have paid between 15% and 250% more for vaccines than its European counterparts, amounting to R14.1 billion, of which R1.79 billion is non-refundable. The HJI said this shows SA’s sovereignty was bartered for scarce supplies. [Daily Maverick]
Joburg risks power collapse: Johannesburg’s electricity network is facing the possibility of total collapse due to the effects of prolonged outages and load-shedding on its operations. City Power CEO Tshifularo Mashava said Joburg residents logged around 4,000 electrical faults with City Power per day, but it only had enough resources to attend to 800. These frequent repairs are depleting the city’s supply of spare parts. City Power used up the stock that was supposed to last a year within three months. [Daily Investor]
Former Eskom COO’s new job: Former Eskom chief operating officer Jan Oberholzer has been appointed non-executive chairperson of Mulilo Energy Holdings, a renewable energy firm with significant investments in SA. Mulilo has 420MW of solar PV projects in SA and 240MW of wind and aims to develop and own 5GW in solar and battery storage projects in the next five years. “This is where I would like to play a part and make a contribution outside Eskom,” said Oberholzer. [BusinessTech]
Markets: The South African rand weakened by 0.5% on Tuesday against a stronger dollar as the country suffered the worst power cuts on record. “With the U.S. closed … most markets were stable, except the rand that fell sharply,” said Rand Merchant Bank analysts in a research note. On Wednesday (6 September), the rand was trading at R19.16/USD, R20.56/EUR and R24.09/GBP. Oil is trading at $90 a barrel. (Reuters)
Loading ...