{"id":736871,"date":"2023-12-08T07:58:10","date_gmt":"2023-12-08T05:58:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=736871"},"modified":"2023-12-08T07:58:10","modified_gmt":"2023-12-08T05:58:10","slug":"5-important-things-happening-in-south-africa-today-1669","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/government\/736871\/5-important-things-happening-in-south-africa-today-1669\/","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>Another bailout incoming:<\/strong>&nbsp;The Post Office&#8217;s creditors have voted to approve its business rescue plan. However, the plan requires a government bailout of almost R4 billion, and one of the entity&#8217;s business rescue practitioners says there are &#8220;positive indications&#8221; the funds will be released. [<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.dailymaverick.co.za\/article\/2023-12-07-its-now-up-to-government-to-decide-on-r3-8bn-bailout-for-sa-post-office\/\" target=\"_blank\">Daily Maverick<\/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>Medical exodus warning:<\/strong>&nbsp;SA doctors, medical schemes and hospital groups have lashed out at the current version of the National Health Insurance Bill that the National Council of Provinces passed on Wednesday. &#8220;SA will see an exodus of doctors, while the country\u2019s struggling poor and middle-class will suffer through higher taxes if President Cyril Ramaphosa signs the &#8216;unconstitutional&#8217; National Health Insurance (NHI) Bill into law in its current form,&#8221; said the South African Medical Association (SAMA). [<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.news24.com\/fin24\/economy\/nhi-exodus-of-doctors-if-bill-is-signed-into-law-healthcare-bodies-warn-20231207\" 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>Interest rates higher for longer:<\/strong> There is a good case for South Africa\u2019s interest rates to stay higher for longer due to persistent inflation and the rise in government borrowing.&nbsp;This is because the government needs to raise borrowing while interest rates are higher and South Africa\u2019s risk premium has risen, said Reserve Bank Deputy Governor Fundi Tshazibana. [<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/dailyinvestor.com\/finance\/39576\/good-case-for-interest-rates-being-higher-for-longer\/\" 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>Load shedding update:&nbsp;<\/strong>Eskom increased load shedding to stage 4 at 16:00 on Thursday (7 December 2023) without notifying the public before reverting back to stage 3 on Friday. Eskom is expected to outline the weekend load shedding schedule later in the day. [<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/energy\/736859\/eskom-ramps-up-load-shedding-heres-the-schedule\/\" target=\"_blank\">BusinessTech<\/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>&nbsp;&nbsp;The South African rand gained on Thursday on increasing bets that the U.S. Federal Reserve might implement interest rate cuts early next year. On Friday (8 December), the rand was trading at R18.99 to the dollar, R23.83 to the pound and R20.44 to the euro. Oil is trading at $74.66 a barrel. [<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.reuters.com\/markets\/currencies\/south-african-rand-unchanged-ahead-q3-current-account-data-2023-12-07\/\" target=\"_blank\">Reuters<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Another bailout a possibility for the Post Office; Doctor exodus warning; Interest rate concerns for South Africa; and load shedding escalated.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":658447,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[853],"class_list":["post-736871","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\/736871","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=736871"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/736871\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":736889,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/736871\/revisions\/736889"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/658447"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=736871"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=736871"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=736871"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}