Business

5 important things happening in South Africa today

Staff Writer

 ·11 Nov 2021

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

Coronavirus: In South Africa, there have been 305 new cases of Covid-19, taking the total reported to 2,924,622. Deaths have reached 89,435 (+48), while recoveries have climbed to 2,818,761, leaving the country with a balance of 16,426 active cases. The total number of vaccines administered is 23,540,547 (+138,263).

• Taxman: SARS says its concerted effort to clamp down on tax non-compliance has resulted in R172 billion for the fiscus, drawn across all tax types. However, the revenue service warned that tax compliance was under strain, dropping from 65% to 62%. Tax morality is heavily tied to a well-run and efficient government. Over the last decade, widespread corruption and wasteful spending have not instilled this morality in taxpayers. SARS’ compliance drive yielded R12 billion in debt collections from large businesses, R42 billion from high wealth individuals, and R6.8 billion from corporates. The balance was collected from the voluntary disclosure programme, outstanding returns and targeted criminal investigations. [Monewyweb]

• Negotiations: Rookie political parties who emerged as kingmakers in several hung councils are demanding administrative roles in local government as part of coalition negotiations – but these roles are not allowed to be doled out and follow a regulated process of appointment. The only roles that can be part of negotiations are political roles, such as mayor, deputy mayor or mayoral committee placements. There is a separation between politics and the administration in local government. While parties like Action SA have made it their mandate to put the poor and service delivery top of the agenda in negotiations, the Patriotic Alliance made it clear his party is vying for mayoral positions. [News24]

• Power: Eskom is running out of options to stabilise its grid, and experts say the power utility should consider permanent stage 1 load shedding to do the necessary maintenance to its plants. Load shedding should not be a crisis during the summer months, as this is the period where electricity demand is quite low. In exceptional circumstances, such as a heatwave, demand could spike, but that is not the case right now. There are no short-term solutions to the problem, so Eskom needs to do as much maintenance as possible. At the same time, the government needs to look at long-term solutions and allow businesses to generate their own electricity. [TimesLive]

• Cooked: A new Financial Sector Conduct Authority irregularities report lays out the allegations of misconduct against management at financial intermediary Insure Group Managers Limited, who allegedly cooked the company’s books, rewarded themselves, and created a R1.7 billion financial hole for clients. The report, which contained affidavits and was submitted to the Hawks, alleges that the directors collected insurance premiums on behalf of clients but did not give the money over to the insurers as they were supposed to. They instead allegedly bought illiquid, speculative and ultimately loss-making assets using the funds and tried to plug the holes with a credit line from VBS, which later disappeared as the bank imploded. [Daily Maverick]

• Markets: The South African rand was weaker on Wednesday, a day after state utility Eskom painted a bleak picture about the country’s power outlook. Eskom, which is currently implementing scheduled electricity cuts because of multiple faults in its coal fleet, said the risk of outages would remain until another 4,000 to 6,000 megawatts of capacity is added to the grid. That could take years if the current sluggish pace of power procurement continues. South Africa has experienced recurring power cuts for more than a decade that have constrained economic growth. On Thursday, the rand was at R15.45/$, R17.74/€ and R20.69/£. [Reuters]