{"id":151701,"date":"2017-01-20T08:24:44","date_gmt":"2017-01-20T06:24:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=151701"},"modified":"2017-01-20T08:31:43","modified_gmt":"2017-01-20T06:31:43","slug":"5-things-you-need-to-know-in-south-africa-today-119","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/government\/151701\/5-things-you-need-to-know-in-south-africa-today-119\/","title":{"rendered":"5 things you need to know in South Africa today"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Here&#8217;s what is happening in and affecting South Africa today:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.businesslive.co.za\/bd\/politics\/2017-01-20-anc-youth-call-for-gordhan-to-be-fired\/\">There is growing talk of president Jacob Zuma initiating a cabinet reshuffle soon, and Zuma supporters are getting louder in targeting those seen as being opposed to the president.<\/a><\/strong> The ANC Youth League in particular is calling for finance minister Pravin Gordhan to be removed &#8211; for nebulous reasons involving SAA. However the key priority of any shuffle is seen to be finding a place in government for outgoing AU chair, Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.co.za\/pieter-du-toit\/absa-the-public-protector-may-have-got-it-horribly-wrong-here\/?utm_hp_ref=za-homepage\">Public Protector Busisiwe Mkhwebane appears to have made a blunder in the Absa state looting report, having misunderstood the terms of the deal made between the bank and the SARB<\/a><\/strong>, where the former paid interest on the apartheid loan in question every quarter until it was fully paid up in 1995. Sources involved with the deal confirmed as much to the Huffington Post SA, and this information is expected to be part of the Absa and SARB response to the report.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.enca.com\/south-africa\/public-enterprises-minister-secures-temporary-reprieve-for-defaulting-municipalities\">Municipalities which still collectively owe Eskom billions of rands in debt have been given a brief reprieve by public enterprises minister Lynne Brown, who has ordered the power utility to halt power cuts the areas in question<\/a><\/strong>. Eskom reached an agreement with the department and local government to put off power cuts until the end of January, giving the municipalities extra time to come up with payment plans.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong><a href=\"http:\/\/ewn.co.za\/2017\/01\/20\/guptas-to-file-formal-legal-response-over-claims-of-suspicious-transactions\">Today is the day the controversial Gupta family will head to court to submit their answering affidavit in the case of R7 billion in &#8216;questionable&#8217; payments made by their companies.<\/a><\/strong> The family maintains that they are victims in a political conspiracy. The case was brought by finance minister Pravin Gordhan, seeking a court order that he cannot get involved in the family&#8217;s very public spat with South Africa&#8217;s banks.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>South Africa&#8217;s rand softened on Thursday, succumbing to lower commodity prices and renewed demand for the dollar after the head of the U.S. Federal Reserve suggested interest rates would rise steadily in the years ahead.<strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.xe.com\/currencyconverter\/convert\/?Amount=1&amp;From=USD&amp;To=ZAR\"> On Friday the rand was trading at R13.55 to the dollar, R16.74 to the pound and R14.47 to the euro<\/a><\/strong>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A cabinet reshuffle may be coming soon &#8211; and some want Gordhan to go; a new report indicates that the Public Protector may have misinterpreted information around the Absa apartheid bailout; and the Guptas will file their answer to allegations of R7 billion in questionable payments in court today. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":53100,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9872,23],"tags":[26],"class_list":["post-151701","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business","category-government","tag-headline"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/151701","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=151701"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/151701\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":151713,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/151701\/revisions\/151713"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/53100"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=151701"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=151701"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=151701"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}