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Daily English South Africa Business News · News
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LETTER: Government was reckless on pay deal

Thanks to Craig Moffet for an interesting and well argued piece (“Extraordinary times require extraordinary measures on public sector pay”, August 17 ( The real problem is that the SA government entered into the agreement recklessly in the first place. The negotiators, on behalf of our government, knew full well…
20 Aug 2020 9AM 1 min

Canadian prime minister shows true colours

It’s safe to say Justin Trudeau has arrived as a Canadian prime minister. The callow scion deemed “just not ready” by the Conservatives in 2015, and who promised to do politics differently, has officially completed his transformation into a leader who is ruthless, cynical and disdainful of parliament. He coldly…
20 Aug 2020 9AM 2 min

Pandemic will help Africa to leapfrog to clean energy

Concerns that the Covid-19 pandemic could put clean energy on the back burner appear to be unfounded. Experts forecast that clean energy technologies will account for 40% of global energy generation in 2020 and that, far from slowing down the shift, the pandemic is boosting it by further exposing the…
20 Aug 2020 9AM 4 min

LETTER: Land hunger makes people vulnerable

The desperation of people to own a piece of land on which they can build themselves a home has made many South Africans easy prey for criminals. People should be wary of falling into the trap of buying land illegally from strangers who do not produce sufficient tangible proof that…
20 Aug 2020 9AM 1 min

Anti-Putin activist Alexei Navalny in coma likely from poisoning

Moscow — Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny was in a coma in a Siberian hospital on Thursday after drinking a cup of tea his spokesperson said she believes was laced with poison. A fierce critic of President Vladimir Putin, Navalny started feeling ill when returning to Moscow from Tomsk in…
20 Aug 2020 9AM 3 min

LETTER: Mthethwa is out of line

Sports minister Nathi Mthethwa is out of line in asking SA Rugby to make a pronouncement on the actions of eight SA players, who declined to kneel in support of the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement ahead of a match played in Britain at the weekend. The players were well…
20 Aug 2020 8AM 1 min

BHEKI NTSHALINTSHALI: Ramaphosa has reopened a stagnant and bleeding economy

The further reopening of the economy by President Cyril Ramaphosa has created positivity and optimism for many South Africans, who are desperate for good news. The announcement represents an improvement because tax relief and other announced economic measures were proving useless in the face of the lockdown, with companies not…
20 Aug 2020 8AM 6 min

Assimi Goita tells Malians he is head of the junta that ousted the president

Bamako — Army colonel Assimi Goita presented himself as head of the junta that ousted Mali's president, as its spokesperson sought to reassure citizens that daily life could resume as normal from Thursday. Junta members met government ministry officials late on Wednesday to map out a return to stability, a…
20 Aug 2020 7AM 2 min

The 4IR could be a vaccination against the procurement virus

Procurement legislation needs a massive overhaul with regard to new technologies. Legislation being introduced presents an opportunity to revolutionise the current procurement regime while remaining true to the principles of cost-effectiveness, fairness, transparency, equity and competitiveness, which are designed to advance economic development; poverty eradication; job creation; redress of imbalances…
20 Aug 2020 7AM 7 min

Obama’s plea for Joe Biden, and put-down of Donald Trump

Bethesda — Former president Barack Obama gave an impassioned and emotional plea for Americans to vote for Joe Biden this election, evoking the civil rights movement as he argued that democracy itself is at stake. He began by asserting that his successor did not deserve re-election: “Donald Trump hasn’t grown…
20 Aug 2020 6AM 2 min

Acsa signs new R3bn loan with banks

Airports Company SA (Acsa) has signed a new R3bn loan with domestic banks and shelved major projects to shore up its finances during the coronavirus crisis, its CFO said on Thursday. Since March, when a state of disaster was declared to contain the Covid-19 pandemic, major domestic airports, such as…
20 Aug 2020 6AM 2 min

Somalia bill may approve marriage for girls as young as 10

Mogodishu — Hafsa was married off at 13 by her father to a man who paid $100. She and her mother say she was beaten and raped for two years before they convinced him to divorce her. “The man just slept with me, beating me always,” she said, sitting by…
20 Aug 2020 6AM 2 min

Kim Jong-un reveals North Korea is reeling from a poor economy aided by the virus

Seoul — Kim Jong-un has said North Korea’s development goals have been “seriously delayed”, a rare acknowledgment that shows the country’s already anaemic economy is under severe strain from sanctions, flooding and the pandemic. At the first gathering of the ruling Workers’ Party of Korea’s central committee in eight months,…
20 Aug 2020 6AM 3 min

Oil prices fall as fuel demand drops and on oversupply concern

London — Oil prices fell on Thursday on demand concerns driven by cautious views from oil cartel Opec and its allies (Opec+) and the US Federal Reserve regarding economic recovery from the coronavirus pandemic. Brent crude was down 44c, or 1%, at $44.93 a barrel at 8.26am GMT, and West…
20 Aug 2020 5AM 1 min

California battles hundreds of wildfires on top of Covid-19

San Francisco/Los Angeles — Californians are in their sixth month of sheltering in place because of a pandemic that’s killed more than 11,000 residents. Now a new crisis is forcing people to prepare to flee their homes at a moment’s notice — hundreds of wildfires. “This really is unprecedented,” said…
20 Aug 2020 5AM 4 min

Zambia’s lockdown lock-in

Since recording the first Covid-19 case in March 2020, Zambia has been fighting the spread of the pandemic using various preventive measures recommended by the local ministry of health and the World Health Organisation. But with an accumulative total of 8,501 with 241 deaths and 7,004 recoveries, as of August…
20 Aug 2020 5AM 4 min

Europe set to shed more jobs as economic rebound flags

Zurich/Geneva — European workers may be about to get another batch of bad news after a summer of job cuts and with the economic recovery threatened by fresh virus outbreaks and localised lockdowns. Even as some governments consider extensions to job-protecting furlough programmes, the back-to-school period as the continent returns…
20 Aug 2020 5AM 3 min

US Fed minutes push Asian and European markets down

London — Asian and European share markets fell on Thursday, after the US Federal Reserve's latest meeting minutes highlighted doubts about the recovery of the world's largest economy and knocked Wall Street from recent record highs. MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan had its biggest daily decline in…
20 Aug 2020 5AM 3 min
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