{"id":722450,"date":"2023-10-03T08:03:17","date_gmt":"2023-10-03T06:03:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=722450"},"modified":"2023-10-03T08:03:17","modified_gmt":"2023-10-03T06:03:17","slug":"5-important-things-happening-in-south-africa-today-1621","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/government\/722450\/5-important-things-happening-in-south-africa-today-1621\/","title":{"rendered":"5 important things happening in South Africa today"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Here\u2019s what is happening in and affecting South Africa today:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>End of load shedding: <\/strong>Speaking with JJ Tabane on Power to Truth, Electricity Minister Kgosientsho Ramokgopa said he expects blackouts to be gone by the middle of 2024. He noted\u00a0that more generating units are coming online, which has led to increased generation capacity. At the same time, South Africa will receive the first consignment of power equipment from Chinese companies as early as next week. This follows the agreements signed between the two countries on the sidelines of the BRICS summit. [<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.enca.com\/top-stories-videos\/watch-ramokgopa-aims-mid-2024-see-end-blackouts\" target=\"_blank\">eNCA<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Cele found guilty:&nbsp;<\/strong>Parliament has found Police Minister Bheki Cele MP guilty of breaching the code of ethical conduct for members of Parliament for threatening a member of the public. The breach was in relation to a complaint following a police imbizo in July last year, where crime activist, Ian Cameron, alleged that Cele did not behave in a dignified manner when he told him to &#8220;shut up&#8221;. Parliament&#8217;s Joint Committee on Ethics and Members\u2019 Interests said it would now recommend to the National Assembly that Cele apologises to Cameron in the House for his conduct. [<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/ewn.co.za\/2023\/10\/03\/parliament-finds-cele-guilty-of-breaching-conduct-code-for-threatening-activist\" target=\"_blank\">EWN<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Pick n Pay takes a big hit:<\/strong>\u00a0In morning trade on Monday, Pick n Pay&#8217;s shares crashed almost 11% and have now lost more than 44% on a one-year basis. This follows Pieter Boone stepping down as CEO less than two and half years into the role, while the retailer also flagged a half-year loss to 27 August 2023. Sean Summers, who was Pick n Pay CEO from 1999 to 2007, has returned to the role with immediate effect. [<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.news24.com\/fin24\/companies\/pieter-boone-out-as-ceo-after-pick-n-pays-performance-did-not-meet-expectations-20231002\" target=\"_blank\">News24<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Cash cows lifelines<\/strong>: South African Institute of Taxation CEO Keith Engel says the government faces a significant budget shortfall but is unwilling to do the one thing it can to fill the gap \u2013 cutting off its struggling state-owned enterprises (SOEs). University of the Witwatersrand Professor Alex van den Heever previously said the government keeps many of South Africa\u2019s SOEs alive because the \u201cANC and other political parties want to retain these organisations as cash cows\u201d. He added that vested interests in many SOEs prevent them from being cut off from government support, and this is now a critical problem when faced with the current debt crisis in South Africa. [<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/dailyinvestor.com\/south-africa\/32953\/government-keeps-soes-alive-to-milk-them-as-cash-cows\/\" target=\"_blank\">Daily Investor<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Markets<\/strong>: The South African rand slumped on Monday, dragged down by a stronger dollar and local purchasing managers&#8217; data that showed factory activity shrank for the eighth month in a row in September. On Tuesday (3 September), the rand was trading at R19.29\/$, R20.18\/\u20ac, and R23.27\/\u00a3. Brent crude is trading at $89.75 a barrel. [<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.reuters.com\/markets\/currencies\/south-african-rand-slumps-after-local-pmi-data-2023-10-02\/\" target=\"_blank\">Reuters<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Ramokgopa gives another end date to load shedding; Bheki Cele guilty of breaching the code of ethical conduct; Pick n Pay&#8217;s shares crashed on Monday; and the government&#8217;s unwillingness to cut off its cash cows is a big issue.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":681859,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[853],"class_list":["post-722450","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-government","tag-south-africa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/722450","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=722450"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/722450\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":722500,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/722450\/revisions\/722500"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/681859"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=722450"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=722450"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=722450"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}