{"id":664599,"date":"2023-02-14T08:28:38","date_gmt":"2023-02-14T06:28:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=664599"},"modified":"2023-02-14T14:49:14","modified_gmt":"2023-02-14T12:49:14","slug":"5-important-things-happening-in-south-africa-today-1466","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/trending\/664599\/5-important-things-happening-in-south-africa-today-1466\/","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>Gun violence: <\/strong>The South African Gun Owners Association says the high level of gun violence in the country is due to there not being an intelligence-driven operation to fight it. The association said that a complete overhaul of the police on the national and provincial levels is needed to fight the problem, with stronger policing resulting in a decrease in gun crime. Currently, only 5% of murderers in South Africa are successfully prosecuted. [<a href=\"https:\/\/www.timeslive.co.za\/sunday-times-daily\/news\/2023-02-13-criminal-justice-system-no-longer-seen-as-deterrent-as-gun-violence-rises-say-experts\/\">TimesLive<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>University shutdown<\/strong>: The University of Cape Town is moving all of its academic programs online until further notice. Faculties and departments that cannot move online will communicate specific arrangements with the relevant staff and students. This comes after the EFF-led SRC shut down the campus yesterday due to the financial exclusion of students with fee blocks and a housing crisis for students. [<a href=\"https:\/\/www.news.uct.ac.za\/article\/-2023-02-13-measures-in-place-following-campus-disruptions\">UCT<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailymaverick.co.za\/article\/2023-02-13-uct-rocked-by-shutdown-as-students-fume-over-fees-housing\/\">Daily Maverick<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Vodacom not a crime fighter: <\/strong>The South Africa Police Service (SAPS) can no longer access Vodacom&#8217;s services after the network provider issued a letter demanding that the police&#8217;s crime intelligence unit pay it the R3 million it is owed. Crime intelligence requires a cellphone network to spy on criminal suspects and collect evidence via location services, intercepting calls and eavesdropping on messages from the network&#8217;s subscribers. [<a href=\"https:\/\/www.news24.com\/citypress\/news\/police-cant-pay-network-provider-vodacom-for-spying-services-20230212\">City Press<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>New acting Tshwane Mayor<\/strong>: Peter Sutton is the acting executive mayor of Tshwane moving from his role as MMC of finance. Sutton takes the role from the DA&#8217;s Randall Williams, who resigned ahead of a motion of no confidence &#8211; which was scheduled for today. SA Municipal Workers&#8217; Union (Samwu) welcomed Williams&#8217;s resignation and said that the metro&#8217;s finances collapsed during his reign. [<a href=\"https:\/\/www.businesslive.co.za\/bd\/national\/2023-02-13-williams-presided-over-collapse-of-tshwanes-finances-says-samwu\/\">BusinessDay<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Markets<\/strong>: The South African rand strengthened on Monday against a weaker US dollar, after hitting a three-month low earlier in the day amid concerns about persistent power cuts. Earlier in the day, it broke above R18 to the dollar for the first time since November 2022. On Tuesday (14 February), the rand was trading at R17.84\/$, R19.16\/\u20ac, and R21.68\/\u00a3. Brent crude is trading at $85.98 a barrel. [<a href=\"https:\/\/www.nasdaq.com\/articles\/south-african-rand-strengthens-against-weaker-dollar\">Nasdaq<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Complete overhaul needed to fight gun crime, UCT moves all academics online, Vodacom stops police spying on customers, a new acting Mayor in Tshwane. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":656865,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[26],"class_list":["post-664599","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-trending","tag-headline"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/664599","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=664599"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/664599\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":664647,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/664599\/revisions\/664647"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/656865"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=664599"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=664599"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=664599"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}