BusinessLIVE - For Your Ear

EU trade commissioner Hogan resigns over Covid-19 rules breach

Brussels — EU trade commissioner Phil Hogan stepped down on Wednesday after growing criticism that he broke virus regulations in his Ireland. “This evening I have tendered my resignation,” he said in a statement on Wednesday. “It was becoming increasingly clear that the controversy concerning my recent visit to Ireland…

26 Aug 2020 4PM 4 min

Lockdown day 153: Pictures of the day

A round-up of the best pictures from day 153 of the national lockdown

26 Aug 2020 4PM 1 min

UIF system rejects double claims by retrenched workers

Workers who received payments under the temporary employer/employee (Ters) benefit have not been able to get unemployment insurance fund benefits when they were subsequently retrenched. And the problem is likely to become more acute as the department of employment & labour expects that there will be mass retrenchments in future…

26 Aug 2020 3PM 1 min

EDITORIAL: Telkom option has own pitfalls

It looks like there’s no stopping public enterprises minister Pravin Gordhan’s determination to restart SAA. We have written before criticising a plan that would suck up money from a Treasury that has put fiscal consolidation at the heart of its budgeting as SA grapples with a ballooning budget shortfall and…

26 Aug 2020 3PM 4 min

Ndabeni-Abrahams halts SABC job cuts over lack of staff consultation

Communications minister Stella Ndabeni-Abrahams says she has told the SABC to stop its planned retrenchments, arguing that the ailing public broadcaster had not followed due process. Echoing the concerns raised by trade unions, Ndabeni-Abrahams said in responses to questions in parliament that after meeting all stakeholders, including the leadership of…

26 Aug 2020 2PM 2 min

Government releases names of companies that won Covid-19 tenders

Under pressure from opposition parties and the public, the government on Wednesday released the names of all the companies that won Covid-19 tenders. The ANC-led government has come under heavy criticism in recent weeks after allegations of corruption in the awarding of Covid-19 tenders surfaced countrywide, with provincial governments giving…

26 Aug 2020 2PM 2 min

UN-backed climate fund faces allegations of ‘systemic’ abuse

London — Seventeen employees of the world's largest global climate fund, based in South Korea, have complained of sexism, racism and harassment within the troubled UN-led project. The current and former Green Climate Fund (GCF) workers said they also suffered or witnessed instances of inappropriate relationships and abuse of power…

26 Aug 2020 1PM 2 min

Masondo warns of crisis over slow pace of economic reforms

Deputy finance minister David Masondo says the slow pace of implementing structural economic reforms is worrying and warned that SA faces a “credibility crisis” if it does not accelerate. Critics have highlighted the long time it is taking government to implement the much talked about economic reforms, which are also…

26 Aug 2020 1PM 2 min

World Economic Forum delayed in 2021 due to the pandemic

Zurich — The World Economic Forum (WEF) has said that the coronavirus has forced it to delay its high-profile gathering of global business and financial leaders in the Swiss resort of Davos until early in the 2021 northern hemisphere summer. Normally held each January in the ski town, the gathering…

26 Aug 2020 12PM 2 min

MICHAEL MARCHANT: Steinhoff: in the dark, still

Nearly three years after Steinhoff’s finances were exposed as a sham and the company lost nearly all its value overnight, it is offering shareholders and former partners a settlement agreement. Facing legal claims for over R130bn, Steinhoff’s management is proposing a R16bn settlement, payable in a mixture of cash and…

26 Aug 2020 12PM 4 min

US-China tensions rise as missiles fired and US trade restrictions announced

New York — US-China tensions over the South China Sea escalated on Wednesday as Beijing fired two missiles into the disputed waterway and the Trump administration added 24 Chinese companies to a list of entities facing trade restrictions for helping build outposts in the region. Amid ongoing military drills, China…

26 Aug 2020 12PM 2 min

TRACEY DAVIES: PwC waves magic wage gap wand

In one fell swoop, PwC appears to have eliminated SA’s socially destabilising wage gap. The auditing firm’s recently released "Practices and Remuneration Trends Report — Executive Directors" analyses publicly available information on executive remuneration at JSE-listed companies for the period May 1 2019 to February 29 2020. PwC concludes that…

26 Aug 2020 12PM 5 min

Dead dolphins wash up on Mauritius beach near site of July oil spill

Addis Ababa — Seventeen dead dolphins washed up on Mauritius’s shore on Wednesday, a government official told Reuters, a month after an oil spill from a Japanese ship that ran aground caused a major ecological disaster in the area. “The dead dolphins had several wounds and blood around their jaws;…

26 Aug 2020 12PM 1 min

EDITORAL: Is Ace trembling over Cyril’s letter?

Nelson Mandela had the "Madiba shuffle". Thabo Mbeki preferred more aloof, urbane pursuits — cigars and cognac and pontificating about such high-minded matters as the link between HIV and Aids, and how to appease Robert Mugabe. Jacob Zuma affably giggled his way through parliamentary question sessions and was wont to…

26 Aug 2020 11AM 3 min

Heroic march to a land marred by hatred

In 1996, a Rwandan former child soldier named Kennedy Gihana wrapped his matric certificate in plastic, taped it to his chest and started walking to SA.Many months and 5,000km later he trudged into Joburg. He had nowhere to live, no job, no food. No prospects.He lived on the streets and…

26 Aug 2020 11AM 1 min

A bad week for Stella Ndabeni-Abrahams

A good week Imagine: an ANC cabinet minister on the right side of an argument, for once. Finance minister Tito Mboweni is one of those rare individuals in the cabinet who knows his field, and the value of a country’s financial institutions — like an independent central bank. A pity,…

26 Aug 2020 10AM 1 min

Sweden deploys more forces in Baltic Sea due to higher Russian activity

Stockholm — Sweden is beefing up its military presence in the Baltic Sea amid concerns over increased Russian activity in the region and heightened tensions in Belarus following a disputed election. Sweden has been rearming in recent years after running down its military following the end of the Cold War,…

26 Aug 2020 10AM 1 min

Moderna to present Covid-19 vaccine data in older people at industry meeting

Moderna will present safety data on Wednesday from an early trial that provides the first glimpse of how its Covid-19 vaccine stimulates the immune system in older people. The company will present “new interim safety and immunogenicity data from the cohorts of older adults” from its phase 1 trial, according…

26 Aug 2020 10AM 1 min

Buoyant markets face critical period as hopes pinned on normalisation of earnings

Covid-19 continues to wreak havoc worldwide, with virtually no area of economic and social activity left unscathed. However, the likelihood of a worst-case cataclysmic scenario is rapidly diminishing, and if there is a “second wave”, governments are unlikely to reimpose harsh lockdowns given the challenges of severe financial cost, public…

26 Aug 2020 10AM 5 min

Vitriol against DA is driving attack on Cheaper Electricity Bill

When any bill is introduced in parliament it follows a defined process. The draft legislation is placed before the relevant portfolio committee, which will be briefed on all aspects of the legislation, including the constitutionality of the proposals and the legality of the various clauses. It may be opened up…

26 Aug 2020 9AM 6 min