{"id":656353,"date":"2023-01-16T08:27:31","date_gmt":"2023-01-16T06:27:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=656353"},"modified":"2023-01-16T08:27:31","modified_gmt":"2023-01-16T06:27:31","slug":"5-important-things-happening-in-south-africa-today-1445","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/government\/656353\/5-important-things-happening-in-south-africa-today-1445\/","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>Ramaphosa to stay home<\/strong>: President Cyril Ramaphosa is no longer attending the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos, Switzerland, as he must be in South Africa to deal with the electricity crisis. Ramaphosa was supposed to attend the WEF to show world leaders that South Africa is a desirable investment destination. He is instead convening a meeting with political leaders, the national energy crisis committee and the Eskom board to deal with the nation&#8217;s power cuts. [<a href=\"https:\/\/ewn.co.za\/2023\/01\/16\/ramaphosa-cancels-wef-trip-to-davos-to-deal-with-sa-power-crisis\">EWN<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/energy\/656347\/ramaphosa-skips-davos-to-sit-in-the-dark-with-the-rest-of-south-africa\/\">BusinessTech<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Court proceedings go online<\/strong>: Deputy Judge President of the Gauteng High Court Roland Sutherland directs most court hearings online. He blames the Office of the Chief Justice (OCJ) and the department of public works as they have been unable to procure a reliable generator for the courts. Criminal cases, however, have been paused, as in-person hearings are the only option. [<a href=\"https:\/\/www.timeslive.co.za\/sunday-times\/news\/2023-01-15-load-shedding-crisis-forces-joburg-high-court-to-go-virtual\/\">TimesLive<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>No power means no water<\/strong>: The City of Cape Town has asked residents to use water sparingly during higher stages of load shedding. High-lying areas across Cape Town are the worst affected by the higher stages of load shedding, as water needs to be pumped to get to properties. Siseko Mbandezi, the Acting mayoral committee member for Water and Sanitation, says that higher stages of load shedding also mean that reservoirs can not fill up quickly.\u00a0 [<a href=\"https:\/\/www.news24.com\/news24\/southafrica\/news\/city-of-cape-town-warns-of-water-supply-limitations-caused-by-load-shedding-20230115\">News24<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>No schools for students:\u00a0<\/strong>Over 600 grade one and eight students in the Western Cape are yet to be placed in a school, as the academic year starts this week in coastal areas. &#8211; late applications are still expected. 99% of grade 1 and 8 learners have been placed in schools across the province as the province added over 800 classrooms to accommodate an additional 26,000 learners. KwaZulu Natal will clarify its situation regarding learner placement later today. [<a href=\"https:\/\/www.timeslive.co.za\/sunday-times-daily\/news\/2023-01-15-its-not-back-to-school-for-680-unplaced-western-cape-pupils\/\">TimesLive<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Markets<\/strong>: The rand saw minimal movement against the dollar, remaining below R17.00\/$. The first few weeks of 2023 have been upbeat for the markets compared to a challenging 2022. China&#8217;s reopening and the expectations of a slowdown in inflation and interest rate hikes have led to a positive feeling in many markets &#8211; especially developing markets that are outperforming their developed counterparts. On Monday (13 January), the rand was trading at R16.77\/$, R18.20\/\u20ac, and R20.56\/\u00a3. Brent crude is trading at $84.65 a barrel. [<a href=\"https:\/\/www.moneyweb.co.za\/financial-advisor-views\/mid-january-market-report-2\/\">Moneyweb<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Ramaphosa will not be at the WEF in Davos this week; Gauteng High Court to go online due to blackouts; Cape Town residents urged to use water sparingly; hundreds of Western Cape learners have not yet been placed in schools. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":653859,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9872,23],"tags":[26],"class_list":["post-656353","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\/656353","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=656353"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/656353\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":656377,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/656353\/revisions\/656377"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/653859"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=656353"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=656353"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=656353"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}