{"id":207559,"date":"2017-10-26T07:52:54","date_gmt":"2017-10-26T05:52:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=207559"},"modified":"2017-10-26T07:52:54","modified_gmt":"2017-10-26T05:52:54","slug":"5-important-things-happening-in-south-africa-today-172","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/business\/207559\/5-important-things-happening-in-south-africa-today-172\/","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>Finance minister Malusi <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.businesslive.co.za\/bd\/economy\/2017-10-26-malusi-gigabas-maiden-budget-fails-to-win-over-market\/\">Gigaba&#8217;s maiden budget speecch has been poorly received<\/a><\/strong>, with analysts calling it a showreel of stagnation &#8211; and <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/ewn.co.za\/2017\/10\/26\/economists-warn-of-further-credit-downgrades-after-mtbps\">warning that ratings downgrades for South Africa are on the horizon<\/a><\/strong>. Gigaba outlined a country that is swiftly running out of money, with <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.businesslive.co.za\/bd\/economy\/2017-10-26-banks-ultimatum-to-gigaba-fix-soes-or-forget-loans\/\">SOEs that are poorly governed<\/a><\/strong>, and no real plan to get things back on track.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.timeslive.co.za\/politics\/2017-10-26-zuma-u-turn-on-state-capture-shocks-litigants\/\">President Jacob Zuma&#8217;s bid to have the public protector&#8217;s report into state capture sent back to the PP&#8217;s office took a strange turn after his legal team did a U-turn on its desire to do so<\/a><\/strong>, leaving opposing legal teams stunned. Zuma wanted the new PP to investigate state capture further, but his legal team on Wednesday withdrew that order, leaving the case in limbo.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong><a href=\"http:\/\/ewn.co.za\/2017\/10\/25\/office-of-anc-chief-whip-welcomes-mkhwebane-inquiry-decision\">The ANC has used its majority on Parliament&#8217;s Portfolio Committee on Justice to shoot down a probe into Public Protector Busisiwe Mkhwebane, following her blunder in trying to force a change in South Africa&#8217;s constitution through one of her reports.<\/a><\/strong> The committee voted 6-4 to dismiss the probe, with the ANC saying it was a witch hunt.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailymaverick.co.za\/article\/2017-10-25-feesmustfall-protests-disrupt-exam-at-uct-but-varsity-stays-open\/#.WfF1iXcjFTY\">With less than a week to go before exams kick off at South African universities, fresh #FeesMustFall protests among students are starting up and disrupting campus activities <\/a><\/strong>&#8211; however they have remained open and continued, business as usual. Students have vowed to keep the pressure up, demanding a fees report that is currently sitting with president Zuma be released.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>South Africa&#8217;s rand dropped to a 10-month low on Wednesday after Finance Minister Malusi Gigaba flagged weaker growth expectations and rising government debt in his budget speech. Stocks were firmer. <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.xe.com\/currencyconverter\/convert\/?Amount=1&amp;From=USD&amp;To=ZAR\">On Thursday, the rand was trading at R14.07 to the dollar, R18.67 to the pound and R16.65 to the euro.<\/a><\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Reaction to Gigaba&#8217;s first budget speech has not been great; Zuma&#8217;s legal team frustrates the court battle around the state capture report; the ANC has used its majority to get the probe into public protector Busisiwe Mkhwebane dropped; and #FeesMustFall protests are cropping up once again, with less than a week to go before exams.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":207569,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9872,11121],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-207559","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business","category-finance"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/207559","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=207559"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/207559\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":207571,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/207559\/revisions\/207571"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/207569"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=207559"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=207559"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=207559"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}