{"id":690217,"date":"2023-05-23T08:03:11","date_gmt":"2023-05-23T06:03:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=690217"},"modified":"2023-05-23T08:03:11","modified_gmt":"2023-05-23T06:03:11","slug":"5-important-things-happening-in-south-africa-today-1531","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/business\/690217\/5-important-things-happening-in-south-africa-today-1531\/","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>Kusile wait<\/strong>: Electricity Minister Kgosietsho Ramokgopa says three units at Kusile power station will come back online in December this year and will be able to mitigate three stages of load shedding. However, Ramokgopa said he could not guarantee that South Africa would not hit stage 8 in the coming months. He said that until the three units are fixed at Kusile, he cannot confidently state that South Africa will avoid stage 8. [<a href=\"https:\/\/ewn.co.za\/2023\/05\/22\/ramokgopa-it-will-be-at-least-6-months-before-sa-sees-results-with-power-cuts\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">EWN<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Fast food changes:<\/strong> Famous Brands, the owner of Wimpy, Steers, Debonairs and Fishaways, says it will continue investing in smaller stores and drive-throughs as consumers prefer eating at home. The group added that it will also continue to invest in delivery services. Over the last financial year, the group&#8217;s operating profit increased by more than one-third to R860.9 million, citing the end of the Covid-19 pandemic for the improvement in South African sales. [<a href=\"https:\/\/www.businesslive.co.za\/bd\/companies\/retail-and-consumer\/2023-05-22-famous-brands-looks-to-drive-throughs-as-dividend-jumps\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Business Day<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Cholera deaths<\/strong>: The cholera death toll in Hammanskraal, Gauteng, has risen to 15, with many more admitted to hospital with the disease. The City of Tshwane said that response teams were sent to test the water, and water tankers were dispatched to the area. Although the city released a health warning telling residents not to drink tap water on Sunday, the South African Human Rights Commission said the water was unsafe in 2019. Residents have thus been critical of the government&#8217;s intervention only after people died. [<a href=\"https:\/\/ewn.co.za\/2023\/05\/22\/tshwane-s-brink-fears-cholera-outbreak-won-t-be-contained-if-source-not-found\">EWN<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Mashaba book off the shelves<\/strong>: Jonathan Ball Publishers is taking the &#8216;Unauthorised<i>&#8216; <\/i>biography of Action SA leader Herman Mashaba off the shelves due to a breach of trust. Political analyst Prince Mashele wrote the book. However, it emerged that Mashaba paid him R12.5 million to write the book in a secret arrangement in 2019. Jonathan Ball said that it was unaware of the agreement between Mashale and Mashabe and viewed it as material non-disclosure. [<a href=\"https:\/\/www.timeslive.co.za\/news\/south-africa\/2023-05-22-publisher-pulls-herman-mashabas-book-from-shelves-over-breach-of-trust\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">TimeLive<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Markets<\/strong>: The rand strengthened on Monday amid relief that South Africa&#8217;s credit rating was not downgraded and bets on a large interest rate hike, with a central bank announcement the main focal point of the week. Analysts polled by Reuters <span id=\"x1\">predict<\/span> a 25-basis-point rate hike by the South African Reserve Bank (SARB) on Thursday, in what could be its final hike of 2023. On Tuesday (23 May), the rand was trading at R19.23\/$, R20.78\/\u20ac, and R23.91\/\u00a3. Brent crude is trading at $76.11 a barrel. [<a href=\"https:\/\/www.nasdaq.com\/articles\/south-african-rand-firms-on-bets-of-large-sarb-rate-hike-credit-rating-unchanged\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Nasdaq<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Kusile&#8217;s Demeber deadline, fast-food adapts, Cholera deaths grow, Mashaba&#8217;s book taken off the shelves. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":95,"featured_media":690257,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9872],"tags":[26],"class_list":["post-690217","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\/690217","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=690217"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/690217\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":690265,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/690217\/revisions\/690265"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/690257"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=690217"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=690217"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=690217"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}