{"id":213577,"date":"2017-11-29T08:09:02","date_gmt":"2017-11-29T06:09:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=213577"},"modified":"2017-11-29T08:09:02","modified_gmt":"2017-11-29T06:09:02","slug":"5-important-things-happening-in-south-africa-today-196","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/government\/213577\/5-important-things-happening-in-south-africa-today-196\/","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.businesslive.co.za\/bd\/politics\/2017-11-29-zuma-repositions-himself-to-avert-collapse-of-anc-conference\/\">President Jacob Zuma is worried about the ANC&#8217;s elective conference collapsing, and has appealed to leaders in the party&#8217;s branches to reign in their delegates.<\/a><\/strong> Zuma had previously explicitly backed Nkosazana Dlamini- Zuma to replace him, but is now attempting to be more of a unifying figure in the lead up to the December conference.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailymaverick.co.za\/article\/2017-11-28-parliament-obfuscation-fuzzy-talk-sars-moyane-defends-makwakwas-return-to-work-and-bonus\/#.Wh5LTXcjFTY\">SARS commissioner Tom Moyane has shrugged off any responsibility for possible criminal conduct by his second in command, Jonas Makwakwa, saying it&#8217;s not his problem<\/a><\/strong>. Makwakwa returned to work after being suspended over R1.7 million worth of dodgy deposits being flagged by the FIC. Moyane said it was up to the Hawks to investigate criminality &#8211; internal SARS processes cleared him.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.iol.co.za\/news\/politics\/yes-jacob-zuma-influenced-me-says-busimkhwebane-12189163\">Public protector Busisiwe Mkhwebane has admitted that president Jacob Zuma convinced her to drop an instruction for him to establish a judicial commission of inquiry<\/a><\/strong> in the Absa\/Bankorp matter, after he said it would face the same challenges as her predecessor&#8217;s instruction on the state capture matter. Absa and SARB want the PP&#8217;s report set aside.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.timeslive.co.za\/news\/south-africa\/2017-11-29-parliamentary-committee-proposes-changes-to-law-to-ease-debt-burdens\/\">Parliament is seeking to introduce new regulations that will fine lenders R1 million or 10% of their annual turnover if they are found to be lending money recklessly<\/a><\/strong>. The committee said that penalties are needed to curb the rising level of debt in the country, which has hit R1.72 trillion.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>South Africa\u2019s rand steadied against the dollar on Tuesday, holding near a five-week high touched in the previous session after the country avoided a double downgrade of its local currency debt. <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.xe.com\/currencyconverter\/convert\/?Amount=1&amp;From=USD&amp;To=ZAR\">On Wednesday the rand was trading at R13.69 to the dollar, R18.30 to the pound and R16.22 to the euro<\/a><\/strong>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Tensions are high within the ANC, and Zuma is worried about the elective conference collapsing; SARS commissioner Tom Moyane says it&#8217;s up to the Hawks, not him, to determine if his number two did anything criminal; the Public Protector admits Zuma had influence on her Absa report; and parliament wants heavy penalties for reckless lenders.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":145531,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11121,23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-213577","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-finance","category-government"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/213577","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=213577"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/213577\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":213603,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/213577\/revisions\/213603"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/145531"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=213577"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=213577"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=213577"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}