{"id":652453,"date":"2022-12-19T07:46:48","date_gmt":"2022-12-19T05:46:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=652453"},"modified":"2022-12-19T07:46:48","modified_gmt":"2022-12-19T05:46:48","slug":"5-important-things-happening-in-south-africa-today-1431","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/government\/652453\/5-important-things-happening-in-south-africa-today-1431\/","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<hr \/>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>ANC battle:<\/strong> The outcome of the ANC leadership battle is expected to be announced on Monday, following a weekend of politicking and horsetrading between two opposing slates within the party. Following the farmgate scandal, president Cyril Ramaphosa faced a tougher time on his path to the top seat, with team Zweli Mkhize putting up a fight. The conference faced disruptions, and tensions ran high as the party battled to cement its identity. [<a href=\"https:\/\/www.enca.com\/news\/anc-top-7-announcement-expected\">ENCA<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Army at Eskom:<\/strong> The presidency has confirmed that the reason the SANDF has been deployed to four Eskom power stations is to assist with ongoing security threats and continuous acts of criminality and vandalism. A minimum of 10 soldiers of the SANDF will be deployed at power generation stations, with the initial deployment to Tutuka, Camden, Majuba and Grootvlei. Further deployments will be announced in due course. [<a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailymaverick.co.za\/article\/2022-12-18-sandf-to-guard-four-eskom-power-plants-under-threat-of-sabotage-and-vandalism\/\">Daily Maverick<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>School probe:<\/strong> The Department of Basic Education is reportedly set to launch a probe into an alleged matric exam cheating network operating in the country, with several schools &#8211; mainly in Mpumalanga &#8211; under the spotlight. The schools are said to have been identified as being suspected of participating in a &#8216;pay-to-pass&#8217; scheme run through several WhatsApp groups. The group was exposed when a teacher accidentally posted matric exam answers on an unrelated group. [<a href=\"https:\/\/www.timeslive.co.za\/sunday-times\/news\/2022-12-18-probe-into-suspected-matric-cheating-network\/\">TimesLive<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Zuma in play:<\/strong> Jacob Zuma is still very much in play in South Africa&#8217;s political space, with the former president attempting to scupper president Cyril Ramaphosa&#8217;s bid for the ANC&#8217;s top spot this weekend by launching a private prosecution case against the incumbent. Leaders within the ANC have described Zuma and his disruptive supporters as a &#8216;wrecking ball&#8217; inside the party. Ramaphosa&#8217;s legal team have dismissed Zuma&#8217;s legal challenge. [<a href=\"https:\/\/ewn.co.za\/2022\/12\/18\/nzimande-zuma-has-become-a-wrecking-ball\">EWN<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Markets<\/strong>: The South African rand weakened against a stronger dollar last week after the US\u00a0 Federal Reserve and the European Central Bank signalled more interest rate hikes. On Monday, the rand was trading at R17.60\/$, R18.67\/\u20ac and R21.43\/\u00a3. Brent crude is trading at $80 a barrel. [<a href=\"https:\/\/www.nasdaq.com\/articles\/south-african-rand-stocks-on-back-foot-after-fed-rate-signals\">Reuters<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The ANC is expected to announce its top 7 today; presidency explains why the army is at Eskom; Education department getting ready to launch a probe into matric cheating; and Zuma came in a like a wrecking ball at the ANC conference.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":641351,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9874,23],"tags":[26],"class_list":["post-652453","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-energy","category-government","tag-headline"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/652453","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=652453"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/652453\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":652467,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/652453\/revisions\/652467"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/641351"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=652453"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=652453"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=652453"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}