{"id":211317,"date":"2017-11-17T08:09:41","date_gmt":"2017-11-17T06:09:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=211317"},"modified":"2017-11-17T08:09:41","modified_gmt":"2017-11-17T06:09:41","slug":"5-important-things-happening-in-south-africa-today-188","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/government\/211317\/5-important-things-happening-in-south-africa-today-188\/","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.timeslive.co.za\/politics\/2017-11-17-over-20-banks-linked-to-gupta-companies\/\">Over 20 banks across the world have sent or received money from Gupta-linked companies, a new investigation has revealed.<\/a><\/strong>\u00a0The Organised Crime and Corruption Reporting Project found that billions of rands passed through the likes of\u00a0HSBC, Wells Fargo in the US, India&#8217;s Bank of Baroda, Habib Bank, Standard Chartered Bank, and a dozen Chinese banks.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.enca.com\/south-africa\/eskom-tariff-hike-bad-for-economy-salga\">Eskom wants South Africans to pay 20% more for electricity, but the South African Local Government Agency says this will be disastrous for the country&#8217;s municipalities and consumers<\/a><\/strong>. The group said that it has identified many places in Eskom&#8217;s business it could cut spending, instead. Nersa will make its decision on Eskom tariff hikes on 7 December.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>President Jacob Zuma has shrugged off questions around his decisions to shuffle his cabinet so often, saying that <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/city-press.news24.com\/News\/win-elections-if-you-want-answers-zuma-tells-opposition-20171116\">if opposition parties want to know the reasons why, they should win elections and find out for themselves<\/a><\/strong>. Zuma said it is his prerogative to shuffle as he pleases, and his decisions are not in any way irrational, and the declaration is reason enough.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>The crisis in Zimbabwe has hit a stalemate as president Robert Mugabe refuses to step down, as talks with the military continue. Meanwhile, questions around how much South Africa knew about the planned coup,<strong><a href=\"https:\/\/mg.co.za\/article\/2017-11-17-00-just-what-did-sa-know-about-zimbabwes-coup\"> as it allowed axed Zim deputy (and preferred new leader) Emmerson Mnangagwa to enter and leave the country<\/a><\/strong>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>South Africa\u2019s rand firmed on Thursday, helped by favourable sentiment for emerging market currencies and upbeat retail sales data a day earlier, while stocks ended higher lead by pulp and paper producer Sappi. <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.xe.com\/currencyconverter\/convert\/?Amount=1&amp;From=USD&amp;To=ZAR\">On Friday the rand was at R14.15 to the dollar, R18.72 to the pound and R16.71 to the euro<\/a><\/strong>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Over 20 banks handled Gupta money, a new anti-corruption investigation has found; Eskom&#8217;s plan to hike prices by 20% is being met with a lot of resistance; Zuma shrugs off questions about his cabinet reshuffles; and questions are being raised about how much SA knew about the Zim coup.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":211319,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9872,23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-211317","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\/211317","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=211317"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/211317\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":211321,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/211317\/revisions\/211321"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/211319"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=211317"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=211317"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=211317"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}