{"id":675395,"date":"2023-03-27T07:53:50","date_gmt":"2023-03-27T05:53:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=675395"},"modified":"2023-03-27T07:53:50","modified_gmt":"2023-03-27T05:53:50","slug":"5-important-things-happening-in-south-africa-today-1494","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/business\/675395\/5-important-things-happening-in-south-africa-today-1494\/","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>Emission standards too expensive<\/strong>: Public enterprises minister Pravin Gordhan says it will cost R400 billion to retrofit Eskom&#8217;s coal-fired power stations to improve their emissions standards. He said that life-extension retrofits take a minimum of two years, while flue gas desulphurisation retrofits can take up to seven years to finish. He added that retrofits would reduce supply, which would worsen load shedding. [<a href=\"https:\/\/www.businesslive.co.za\/bd\/national\/2023-03-26-retrofitting-old-coal-power-stations-too-costly-says-gordhan\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">BusinessDay<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Greylisting plans<\/strong>: Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana says boosting South Africa&#8217;s security cluster is central to getting the nation off the FATF&#8217;s grey list. He said that the security cluster is responsible for most of the nation&#8217;s problems regarding the greylisting. He added that South Africa is at risk of being seen as lax on critical issues by the international community. According to National Treasury, South Africa must meet eight &#8216;strategic deficiencies&#8217; by January 2025. [<a href=\"https:\/\/www.moneyweb.co.za\/news\/economy\/godongwanas-plan-to-get-sa-off-the-grey-list\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Moneyweb<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Pit toilets gone by 2025<\/strong>: Minister of Education Angie Motshekga says pit latrine toilets will be eliminated from schools by 2025. In 2013, the department adopted a policy which banned pit toilets and created a legal responsibility for national and provincial departments to eliminate them at schools. However, it has since missed numerous deadlines. Earlier this month, a four-year-old drowned in a pit toilet in the Eastern Cape. [<a href=\"https:\/\/ewn.co.za\/2023\/03\/26\/basic-education-commits-to-eradicating-pit-toilets-in-schools-by-2025-1\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">EWN<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Cabinet on Putin<\/strong>: The Cabinet is set to discuss legal advice regarding Vladimir Putin&#8217;s proposed visit to South Africa in August to attend the BRICS summit. The International Criminal Court (ICC) has issued an arrest warrant for the Russian leader over alleged war crimes in Ukraine. In 2015, South Africa was in a similar situation when then-Sudanese President Omar Al-Bashir visited the country. After Bashir left, the North Gauteng High Court said that government should have cooperated with an ICC arrest warrant. [<a href=\"https:\/\/www.sabcnews.com\/sabcnews\/cabinet-to-discuss-icc-arrest-warrant-for-putin-his-visit-to-sa-in-august\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">SABC News<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Markets<\/strong>: South Africa&#8217;s rand was listless against a steady dollar on Friday, as investors assessed the prospects that the U.S. Federal Reserve might pause its rate-hike trajectory. Local investors will shift their focus towards the central bank&#8217;s rate decision due this week, with markets expecting a 25-basis-point hike. On Monday (27 March), the rand was trading at R18.17\/$, R19.56\/\u20ac, and R22.24\/\u00a3. Brent crude is trading at $74.99 a barrel. [<a href=\"https:\/\/www.nasdaq.com\/articles\/south-african-rand-flat-as-markets-weigh-feds-rate-stance\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Nasdaq<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It&#8217;s too expensive to retrofit coal-fired power stations, Godongwana addresses greylisting, basic dedication plans to eradicate pit toilets, Cabinet to discuss Putin&#8217;s visit. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":644645,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9872],"tags":[26],"class_list":["post-675395","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\/675395","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=675395"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/675395\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":675429,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/675395\/revisions\/675429"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/644645"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=675395"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=675395"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=675395"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}