{"id":688615,"date":"2023-05-17T08:06:48","date_gmt":"2023-05-17T06:06:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=688615"},"modified":"2023-05-17T08:21:13","modified_gmt":"2023-05-17T06:21:13","slug":"5-important-things-happening-in-south-africa-today-1527","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/energy\/688615\/5-important-things-happening-in-south-africa-today-1527\/","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>Stage 8 concerns:<\/strong> Eskom Acting CEO Calib Cassim says he is not concerned about South Africa suffering a grid collapse, but he is worried that the nation could hit stage 8 load shedding. Despite recent fears of a grid collapse, Cassum said the system operator informed him this will never happen. Eskom&#8217;s transmission manager, Segomoco Scheppers, added that even an escalation to stage 8 does not mean a blackout is coming, as there are protection devices that kick in to stabilise the grid. [<a href=\"https:\/\/www.news24.com\/fin24\/economy\/acting-eskom-ceo-doesnt-lose-sleep-over-a-blackout-but-worries-about-stage-8-20230516\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">News24<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Trade numbers<\/strong>: Genera Capital&#8217;s Adrian Saville says South Africa&#8217;s import bill could rise by R110 billion due to the weakness of the rand. Saville said SA\u2019s imports could rise to R2.34-trillion in 2023 from R2.23-trillion in 2022 if the rand reaches an average of R19.20\/$, up from R18.20\/$. He said that this could add 1.8% to consumer prices. He added that the SARB&#8217;s Monetary Policy Committee may have to raise interest rates by 50 basis points in its next meeting to make the rand more attractive. [<a href=\"https:\/\/www.businesslive.co.za\/bd\/economy\/2023-05-16-import-bill-could-rocket-r110bn-due-to-weaker-rand\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">BusinessDay<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Gym numbers still low<\/strong>: Virgin Active still remains far off its pre-covid membership and revenue numbers, despite a large recovery over the last year.\u00a0 Overall, revenue is 9% lower than pre-covid, while membership is down 11%. In South Africa, the group only has 85% of its base. It added that it is over-reliant on South Africa, where half of its base is &#8211; which is a concern with the operation having more bad debt and a difficult economic environment. [<a href=\"https:\/\/www.moneyweb.co.za\/news\/south-africa\/virgin-active-still-not-near-pre-covid-members-revenue\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Moneyweb<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Political funding issues<\/strong>: The IEC says that the ANC, DA and EFF\u00a0 failed to meet the basic legislative requirements for presenting annual financial statements, as per the Political Party Funding Act.\u00a0 The IEC&#8217;s chief electoral officer, Sy Mamabolo, added that the ANC may not have declared all the donations it received over the last financial year. Moreover, Cope, AI and the NFP failed to submit their financial statements, with the IEC holding the parties&#8217; funding from Parliament and the multiparty democracy fund. [<a href=\"https:\/\/www.news24.com\/news24\/politics\/government\/iec-says-it-is-not-sure-whether-the-anc-declared-all-donations-20230517\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">News24<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Markets<\/strong>: South Africa&#8217;s rand weakened on Tuesday after data released earlier in the day showed a rise in first-quarter unemployment figures, providing a steer on the health of the local economy after a week of market turbulence. Stats SA released the country&#8217;s unemployment figures for Q1 2023, which showed a <span id=\"x1\">rise in unemployment<\/span> to 32.9%, up from 32.7% in the previous quarter. On Wednesday (17 May), the rand was trading at R19.09\/$, R20.74\/\u20ac, and R23.82\/\u00a3. Brent crude is trading at $74.84 a barrel. [<a href=\"https:\/\/www.nasdaq.com\/articles\/south-african-rand-dips-after-unemployment-data-turbulent-market\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Nasdaq<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Eskom Acting CEO more concerned about stage 8 than blackout, South Africa&#8217;s import bill could grow, Virgin Active still far off Covid-19 base, three biggest parties fail to meet basic legislative requirements. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":95,"featured_media":670357,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9874],"tags":[26],"class_list":["post-688615","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-energy","tag-headline"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/688615","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\/95"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=688615"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/688615\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":688653,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/688615\/revisions\/688653"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/670357"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=688615"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=688615"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=688615"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}