{"id":192998,"date":"2017-08-17T08:05:11","date_gmt":"2017-08-17T06:05:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=192998"},"modified":"2017-08-17T08:05:11","modified_gmt":"2017-08-17T06:05:11","slug":"5-important-things-happening-in-south-africa-today-124","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/government\/192998\/5-important-things-happening-in-south-africa-today-124\/","title":{"rendered":"5 important things happening 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=\"https:\/\/www.bloomberg.com\/news\/articles\/2017-08-16\/gupta-firms-suing-bank-of-baroda-to-try-stop-account-closures\">Gupta companies are taking legal action against the Bank of Baroda to try and stop it from shutting down their accounts.<\/a><\/strong> The Bank is the latest in a long line of financial institutions to shut down Gupta accounts, following news of widespread corruption and state capture orchestrated by the family. South Africa&#8217;s banks shut down Gupta accounts in 2016.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.businesslive.co.za\/bd\/companies\/energy\/2017-08-17-eskoms-brics-bank-loan-on-ice-until-2018\/\">A R2.4 billion loan given to Eskom by the New Development Bank has been put on ice, as it is not being used for its intended purpose<\/a><\/strong>. The loan was awarded to Eskom in 2016 so that the power utility could connect 500MW of green energy to the national grid &#8211; Eskom, however, has since refused to move ahead and sign off on any new green energy projects.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.iol.co.za\/motoring\/industry-news\/taxify-driver-beaten-up-in-front-of-passenger-10826655\">Violence between metred taxi drivers and drivers of app-based lift groups continue, with drivers of Uber competitor, Taxify, now also in the firing line.<\/a><\/strong> The attacks against Uber drivers hit a point where the company has hired private security to guard their drivers in problem areas. Taxify drivers have also faced increasing threats, and one has now been beaten up.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.co.za\/2017\/08\/16\/how-a-kzn-court-case-could-determine-sas-next-president_a_23079247\/?utm_hp_ref=za-homepage\">In-fighting has erupted within the ANC in KwaZulu Natal, which could have serious ramifications for the future leadership of the party.<\/a><\/strong> KZN, a Zuma stronghold, is the kingmaker in ANC politics &#8211; but the provincial leadership is divided, which could make or break Zuma&#8217;s support base leading up to the party&#8217;s elective conference.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>South Africa&#8217;s rand raced to a one-week high on Wednesday as traders bet the currency was poised for a sustained uptrend as political fears eased and the economy shows signs of clawing its way to recovery. <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.xe.com\/currencyconverter\/convert\/?Amount=1&amp;From=USD&amp;To=ZAR\">On Thursday, the rand was trading at R13.17 to the dollar, R16.99 to the pound and R15.51 to the euro<\/a><\/strong>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Guptas are taking legal action against the Bank of Baroda to try and stop it from closing its accounts; a R2.4 billion Eskom loan has been iced; Taxify drivers also face the wrath of metred taxi drivers; and in-fighting in the KZN ANC could have major implications on the future leadership of the party.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":143991,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sma_x_autopost_status":"idle","_sma_x_autopost_error":"","_sma_x_post_id":"","_sma_x_attempts":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9872,23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-192998","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business","category-government"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/192998","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=192998"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/192998\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":193010,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/192998\/revisions\/193010"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/143991"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=192998"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=192998"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=192998"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}