{"id":333541,"date":"2019-08-07T07:09:10","date_gmt":"2019-08-07T05:09:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=333541"},"modified":"2019-08-07T07:09:10","modified_gmt":"2019-08-07T05:09:10","slug":"5-important-things-happening-in-south-africa-today-610","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/government\/333541\/5-important-things-happening-in-south-africa-today-610\/","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:\/\/af.reuters.com\/article\/southAfricaNews\/idAFL8N2525ZK\">Ratings firm Moody&#8217;s has warned that Eskom&#8217;s capital structure is unsustainable, and the power utility urgently needs a turnaround plan.<\/a><\/strong> Moody&#8217;s is the only ratings agency keeping South Africa above junk status, and has repeatedly warned about Eskom&#8217;s impact on that status. The group has been waiting for the SA government to publish a comprehensive turnaround strategy for Eskom, but it has failed to do so. [Reuters]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>In a twist on her usual modus operandi, <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/mg.co.za\/article\/2019-08-06-public-protector-wont-oppose-ramaphosas-interdict-application-in-bosasa-matter\">Public Protector Busisiwe Mkhwebane will not be opposing President Cyril Ramaphosa&#8217;s bid to interdict her report against him regarding the funding of his CR17 campaign<\/a><\/strong>. However, she said that he cannot interdict her instructions to NPA head Shamila Batohi in the matter, saying that the NPA cannot be instructed to deviate from its duties. Ramaphosa&#8217;s legal team agreed &#8211; except pointed out that Mkhwebane was doing exactly that. [M&amp;G]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.moneyweb.co.za\/news\/south-africa\/we-are-getting-poorer-in-sa\/\">The South African population is growing, but GDP is not, resulting in the country as whole getting poorer year on year<\/a><\/strong>, on a per capita basis. Stats from Stats SA shows that while GDP grows at around 0.6%, the population has grown by 2% &#8211; while unemployment has jumped to 29%. There are more people, with fewer in jobs contributing to GDP. [Moneyweb]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.iol.co.za\/news\/politics\/julius-malemas-lawyer-says-he-is-not-liable-for-actions-by-eff-supporters-30407542\">EFF leader Julius Malema says he is not responsible for the actions of his supporters<\/a><\/strong>. Through his lawyer, Malema said the he and the EFF can&#8217;t be held liable for the actions and statements of supporters, or Twitter trolls who attack journalists. The EFF is also subject to such behaviour, he said. Malema is being accused of targeting journalists online, revealing their personal details, and coaxing his supporters to attack them. [IOL]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>South Africa\u2019s rand weakened to two-month lows in late afternoon trade on Tuesday, giving up gains earlier in the session, after ratings agency Moody\u2019s said power utility Eskom urgently needs a turnaround plan as its capital structure is unsustainable. <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.xe.com\/currencyconverter\/convert\/?Amount=1&amp;From=USD&amp;To=ZAR\">On Wednesday the rand was at R14.97 to the dollar, R18.21 to the pound and R16.79 to the euro.<\/a><\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Moody&#8217;s says Eskom is unsustainable and needs an urgent turnaround plan; Mkhwebane changes tact and doesn&#8217;t oppose Ramaphosa&#8217;s latest bid for an interdict; South Africans are getting poorer; and Malema says he can&#8217;t be held responsible for what his supporters do or say.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":290474,"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":[11121,23],"tags":[26],"class_list":["post-333541","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-finance","category-government","tag-headline"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/333541","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=333541"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/333541\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":333545,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/333541\/revisions\/333545"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/290474"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=333541"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=333541"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=333541"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}