{"id":303926,"date":"2019-03-07T06:59:53","date_gmt":"2019-03-07T04:59:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=303926"},"modified":"2019-03-07T06:59:53","modified_gmt":"2019-03-07T04:59:53","slug":"5-important-things-happening-in-south-africa-today-508","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/government\/303926\/5-important-things-happening-in-south-africa-today-508\/","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\/2019-03-06\/hundreds-of-jobs-at-risk-as-absa-revamps-s-african-retail-bank\">Absa is restructuring its South African business, which may lead to job losses.<\/a><\/strong> According to reports, around 830 jobs are at risk. The restructuring is part of a strategy shift at the bank &#8211; however, the new direction may also see the bank hire 340 new positions filled. [Bloomberg]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>The costs of the state capture commission are racking up, with taxpayers footing the R500 million bill for its operations, <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.businesslive.co.za\/bd\/national\/2019-03-07-taxpayers-foot-bill-for-zondo-witnesses-including-jacob-zuma\/\">but also for some of the legal costs of the witnesses and implicated officials being called<\/a> <\/strong>&#8211; including former president Jacob Zuma. [Business Day]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>While South Africans are feeling petrol price pain this month, and likely next month due to tax hikes, <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.moneyweb.co.za\/news\/south-africa\/petrol-price-2019-not-as-bad-as-we-might-think\/\">the forecast for the rest of the year looks subdued<\/a><\/strong>. Only two events could lead to a dramatic rise in the price, being the rand weakening significantly, or the oil price shooting up to $100 a barrel. [Moneyweb]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/city-press.news24.com\/News\/nationwide-shortage-of-vital-vaccines-causes-concern-20190307\">South Africa is currently experiencing a nationwide shortage of vaccines for diphtheria and tetanus,<\/a><\/strong> leaving many parents anxious. The shortages are a global issue, with the DT vaccine in particular no longer produced. A replacement vaccine is currently available, but only in private healthcare, not yet public. [City Press]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>South Africa\u2019s rand weakened against the dollar on Wednesday, weighed down by a souring growth outlook as the continent\u2019s most advanced economy continued to show signs of slowing down. <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.xe.com\/currencyconverter\/convert\/?Amount=1&amp;From=USD&amp;To=ZAR\">On Thursday the rand was at R14.26 to the dollar, R18.79 to the pound and R16.12 to the euro.<\/a><\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Absa is restructuring its business &#8211; and hundreds of jobs are at risk; taxpayers are paying for Zuma&#8217;s legal fees again &#8211; this time at the state capture commission; SA&#8217;s petrol price forecast looks subdued for the rest of the year; and SA is experiencing a DT and tetanus vaccine shortage.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":257761,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9872,23],"tags":[26],"class_list":["post-303926","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\/303926","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=303926"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/303926\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":303938,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/303926\/revisions\/303938"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/257761"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=303926"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=303926"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=303926"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}