{"id":600298,"date":"2022-06-27T07:23:39","date_gmt":"2022-06-27T05:23:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=600298"},"modified":"2022-06-27T07:23:39","modified_gmt":"2022-06-27T05:23:39","slug":"5-important-things-happening-in-south-africa-today-1308","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/business\/600298\/5-important-things-happening-in-south-africa-today-1308\/","title":{"rendered":"5 important things happening in South Africa today"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Here\u2019s what is happening in and affecting South Africa today:<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Strikes and load shedding: <\/strong>The ongoing wildcat strike at Eskom has wiped out any prospects South Africa&#8217;s economy had for growth in Q2 2022, with Eskom forced to ramp up load shedding due to the labour disputes.\u00a0 Eskom workers are demanding 15% wage increases across the board on a one-year agreement, a R1,600 increase in the housing allowance, and closing of the apartheid wage gap. Stage 4 load shedding is set to continue until at least Wednesday. [<strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.enca.com\/business\/eskom-stage-4-blackouts-continue-until-wednesday\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">eNCA<\/a><\/strong>], [<strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.iol.co.za\/business-report\/economy\/wildcat-strike-at-eskom-set-to-hit-economy-hard-968d6dec-877c-4833-8822-5725a1a49fad\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">IOL<\/a><\/strong>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<ul>\n<li class=\"sc-kkGfuU fJvDsk\">\n<div class=\"sc-kkGfuU eyYtsI\"><strong>Tax revolt:<\/strong> A growing number of South Africa&#8217;s municipalities are revolting against paying rates and other municipal taxes in favour of taking the provision of municipal services into their own hands. Civil society group Outa says it has received calls from various communities throughout South Africa calling for a rates boycott. [<strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.news24.com\/fin24\/economy\/rates-revolt-more-communities-are-ditching-municipal-bills-and-doing-things-themselves-20220627\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">News24<\/a><\/strong>]<\/div>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Water problems:<\/strong> Half of all of South Africa&#8217;s sewage treatment works are failing, with more than a third of the country&#8217;s municipalities in a critical state, the latest Green Drop report shows. The data shows that it is not just that wastewater treatment works are failing to properly treat sewage before releasing it back into the environment, much of it is spilling into the environment before even getting to the treatment works. [<strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.moneyweb.co.za\/news\/south-africa\/half-of-south-africas-sewage-treatment-works-are-failing\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Moneyweb<\/a><\/strong>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Hydrogen play:<\/strong> Japan is looking for private investment opportunities in SA, primarily focusing on investing in hydrogen. \u00a0Japan\u2019s ambassador to South Africa, Norio Maruyama, said the future of both countries depend on hydrogen, with South Korea and the EU also expected to rely more on South Africa in the coming years. [<strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.businesslive.co.za\/bd\/economy\/2022-06-26-ambassador-says-japan-looking-to-tap-into-sas-hydrogen-resources\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">BusinessDay<\/a><\/strong>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Markets:<\/strong> The rand strengthened against a sliding dollar on Friday, as investors started to scale back bets on how far central banks will be able to lift interest rates this cycle to rein in inflation. Global financial markets have been roiled this month on worries that rapid rate hikes by major central banks could cause a recession. However, sliding commodity prices eased some worries about inflation on Friday, sending world stocks higher.The rand is currently trading at R15.80\/$, R16.69\/\u20ac and R19.41\/\u00a3. [<strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.reuters.com\/world\/africa\/south-african-rand-strengthens-eyes-still-fed-2022-06-24\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Reuters<\/a><\/strong>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The ongoing wildcat strike at Eskom is hammering the economy; South Africa faces a tax revolt as more people refuse to pay; Half of South Africa&#8217;s sewage works are failing; and Japan sees South Africa as a big Hydrogen player in the next 10 years. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":436627,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9872],"tags":[26],"class_list":["post-600298","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business","tag-headline"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/600298","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=600298"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/600298\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":600342,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/600298\/revisions\/600342"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/436627"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=600298"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=600298"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=600298"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}