School of Advanced Learning

Alcohol ban reinstated as SA moves to level 3 lockdown

The ban on the sale, distribution and transportation of alcohol has been reinstated, President Cyril Ramaphosa announced on Monday night, as SA moves to level 3 of the Covid-19 lockdown. "One of the more difficult areas of regulation relates to the sale of alcohol. The liquor industry is a major employer and an important contributor to our economy," Ramaphosa said in his address to the nation.

Posted on 28 December 2020 | 6:49 pm

Sanlam to take stake in new unit of billionaire Motsepe's firm

South Africa's biggest insurer Sanlam said on Friday it would take a minority stake, worth $51-million, in a new subsidiary being set up by billionaire Patrice Motsepe's African Rainbow Capital Financial Services (ARC FS). Sanlam will take a 25% stake in the subsidiary which will hold ARC FS's financial assets including financial services group Alexander Forbes, but excluding its banking related investments, namely start-up, digital-only lender TymeBank.

Posted on 18 December 2020 | 2:45 pm

Coca-Cola Foundation’s RAIN to replenish 15bn litres of water in South Africa

The Coca-Cola Foundation's Replenish Africa Initiative (RAIN) is funding five projects in South Africa to help restore priority water catchment areas by removing invasive alien plants, while creating valuable employment opportunities for women, youth and families. “These important water catchment areas feed our communities, towns and cities, yet thirsty alien invasive plants are consuming millions of litres of this precious resource unnecessarily from these areas each year.

Posted on 18 December 2020 | 2:11 pm

Caxton raises stake in Mpact to 26.2%

Media company Caxton and CTP Publishers and Printers has bought a further 30.49-million shares in paper and plastic packaging products manufacturer Mpact. Caxton acquired the shares from clients of Allan Gray, Old Mutual Investment Group, Old Mutual Customised Solutions, Visio Capital Management and Ninety One for R469.87-million.

Posted on 18 December 2020 | 2:03 pm

Commission recommends approval of Stanlib Fund II's buyout of SCDA 3

The Competition Commission has recommended that the Competition Tribunal approve the proposed transaction whereby Stanlib Fund II intends to acquire Solar Capital De Aar 3 (SCDA 3), without conditions. Stanlib Fund II is involved in the provision of financial services and SCDA 3 is a solar photovoltaic (PV) independent power producer (IPP) in the Northern Cape.

Posted on 18 December 2020 | 1:51 pm

Commission recommends approval of Engie's buyout of Xina CSP

The Competition Commission has recommended that the Competition Tribunal approve the proposed transaction whereby Engie intends to acquire Xina Concentrated Solar Power (CSP) and Xina CSP Operations & Maintenance (O&M), without conditions. In South Africa, the Engie Group supplies a mix of renewable energies. Its energy projects in South Africa include the Aurora Wind Power Project.

Posted on 18 December 2020 | 1:47 pm

Opposition DA files complaint over missed Covax payment

South Africa’s main opposition party will file a complaint against Finance Minister Tito Mboweni for allegedly misleading the legislature about the country’s payment to sign up to the global Covax program, which is to procure and distribute Covid-19 vaccines. The Democratic Alliance will submit the complaint to parliament’s ethics committee after Mboweni told lawmakers that the government would make a down payment to Covax by Dec. 15, party leader John Steenhuisen told reporters in Cape Town on Friday.

Posted on 18 December 2020 | 12:25 pm

Ramaphosa appoints Climate Change Commission members

South African President Cyril Ramaphosa has appointed members of the Climate Change Coordinating Commission established to coordinate and oversee the transition towards a low-carbon and climate change resilient economy. A statement from the Presidency late on Thursday said the commission, an initiative resulting from a jobs summit held in October 2018, would provide independent monitoring and review of South Africa’s progress in meeting its emissions reduction and adaptation goals.

Posted on 18 December 2020 | 10:00 am

Siemens sees train boom from climate-conscious spending on rail

Siemens sees the rail market bouncing back from a coronavirus slump, aided by an international push to slash carbon-dioxide emissions from transport. The global market for trains and related infrastructure will expand by a quarter over the next three years to exceed pre-coronavirus levels, Michael Peter, who heads the German engineering giant’s mobility unit, said in a phone interview. Rising government spending to cut transport emissions is expected to drive the gains after a difficult year for the sector, Peter said. The European Union, one of the world’s biggest train markets, on Thursday announced it will intensify efforts to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 2030, a move that’s expected to favor rail-equipment manufacturers.

Posted on 18 December 2020 | 9:46 am

Volkswagen plans to link top executives’ bonuses to ESG targets

Volkswagen plans to link top executives’ bonuses to environmental, social and governance targets as the German industrial giant seeks to bolster sustainability credentials that are increasingly relevant to investors. VW will seek shareholder approval for the updated remuneration system at its annual general meeting next year, chairperson Hans Dieter Poetsch told Bloomberg News in an interview. Executives’ compensation includes the bonus, a fixed salary and a long-term incentive plan linked to share-price performance.

Posted on 18 December 2020 | 9:44 am

Rand at its strongest in months, but 2021 could be another rollercoaster

The rand on Thursday broke below the R14.70/$ mark, and an analyst thinks there is scope for it to strengthen even further to R14.50/$. Along with other emerging market currencies, the rand this week rallied on a surge in risk appetite and a weakening dollar. Reports that a Brexit deal may be struck as well as news that a US stimulus deal may be settled before Christmas, in conjunction with the US Federal Reserve Bank's announcement that interest rates will remain zero and it would continue its bond buying programme, were among the factors that helped to swing market sentiment toward emerging market currencies.

Posted on 18 December 2020 | 8:54 am

Africa to benefit as AST, Vodafone launch plans for space-based metwork

Telecommunications firm AST & Science, in partnership with Vodafone, plans to launch the first phase of a space-based commercial mobile communications service in 2023, a move which will boost phone coverage in Africa. SpaceMobile will be the first space-based mobile network to connect directly to 4G and 5G smartphones without any need for specialised hardware. Traditional satellite systems require expensive specialized satellite phones or ground antenna systems.

Posted on 18 December 2020 | 8:31 am

Golden Arrow announces a fare increase

The Golden Arrow Bus Service said on Friday it would increase passenger fares from December 28 to try and mitigate the effects of significantly higher operational cost throughout the year. In a statement Golden Arrow general manager Derrick Meyer said as per the company’s interim operating contract with the provincial government, this year’s calculated permissible increase amounted to 16.5 percent.

Posted on 18 December 2020 | 8:29 am

Airlink to launch non-stop flights between Cape Town and Harare

Independent regional airline Airlink will launch a new non-stop service between Cape Town and Harare from January 18. This is the latest in a series of new and resumed routes across the airline's Southern African network.

Posted on 18 December 2020 | 8:14 am

Covid-19 second wave hits South Africa’s private hospitals

South Africa's biggest private hospital groups are in for a busy festive season as Covid-19 cases rise, putting their facilities under pressure and putting elective surgeries on the backburner. This week, the country passed the 10 000 mark for new cases, which continue to climb, with more than 883 687 South Africans testing positive for the virus this year.

Posted on 18 December 2020 | 8:07 am

SAA pilots union: Key issue is not cuts to salaries, perks - it's who will be rehired and why

The South African Airways Pilots Association (SAAPA) has hit back at claims by the Department of Public Enterprises (DPE) that a regulating agreement dating back to 1988 - which covers the cost structure for the airline's pilots - is too expensive to allow the restructured flag carrier to get off the ground. SAAPA says hanging onto its favourable regulating agreement is not the key issue, but rather the selection criteria proposed for retrenching and then rehiring pilots. It says it is willing to engage with SAA's business rescue practitioners and shareholder, the DPE, on establishing lawful selection criteria.

Posted on 18 December 2020 | 8:00 am

MTN must verify users in Nigeria by year end or face blocked SIM cards

MTN said on Thursday it has embarked on the laborious task of registering customers from its largest market, Nigeria, within two weeks, following a directive from the country's communications commission to suspend new SIM registrations by all network operators. The company, which is Africa's largest mobile phone operator, has already faced a hefty fine in Nigeria over the registration of SIM cards.

Posted on 17 December 2020 | 2:26 pm

Drugmakers should cut Covid-19 vaccine prices for Africa - Africa CDC

Pharmaceutical companies should sell Covid-19 vaccines to African countries at discounted rates and allow them to be produced locally to potentially cut costs, the head of the continent's disease control body said on Thursday. Africa is aiming to vaccinate up to 60% of its 1.3 billion people in the next two years, but may need several years of inoculations, John Nkengasong, director of the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) told reporters.

Posted on 17 December 2020 | 2:02 pm

120 MW Golden Valley Wind Energy Facility connected to the grid

The 120 MW Golden Valley Wind Energy Facility, in the Eastern Cape, is the latest wind farm to be connected to South Africa's national grid. “We are pleased to announce the successful commissioning of all 48 wind turbine generators as the year draws to an end and we prepare to have our portfolio in operations in the next quarter,” says BioTherm Energy CEO Robert Skjodt.

Posted on 17 December 2020 | 1:08 pm

Polluters make some net-zero progress, climate action 100+ says

Three years after some of the world’s biggest investors joined forces to pressure the largest producers of greenhouse gases to cut emissions, about half of them have made net-zero commitments. Climate Action 100+, an investor group with 545 members managing a combined $52 trillion of assets, said in a report Thursday that 43% of the initiative’s 160 focus companies, which include the likes of BP Plc and Exxon Mobil Corp., have set targets for net-zero emissions by 2050. Still, the group said there’s plenty of work to do since more than half of the companies have made no plans and only 10% have targets for customer emissions known as Scope 3.

Posted on 17 December 2020 | 12:40 pm

AfDB secures nearly $90m in new funding towards sustainable energy in Africa

The African Development Bank says it has secured $90-million in new donor commitments towards the Sustainable Energy Fund for Africa (Sefa). In a statement dated Wednesday, the AfDB said the Sefa had also been transformed on Monday into an expanded and more flexible fund that is more responsive to Africa’s fast changing energy market, with a sharper focus on green mini-grids and green baseload and offering a wider array of catalytic finance instruments.

Posted on 17 December 2020 | 12:13 pm

Altron successfully completes demerger, separate listing of Bytes

JSE-listed Allied Electronics Corporation (Altron) has completed the demerger of its Bytes Technology Group subsidiary, following the listing of Bytes on the LSE and the JSE. As a result of the demerger of Bytes, Altron shareholders will receive, after tax and transaction costs, about £542-million or about R10.9-billion in the form of Bytes ordinary shares and cash.

Posted on 17 December 2020 | 10:25 am

DPE says pilot deal is too expensive and makes new SAA unattractive for investors

In order for a restructured South African Airways (SAA) to get off the ground, it is critical to reduce what it regards as the too high current cost structure relating to pilots in terms of a regulating agreement dating from 1988, the Department of Public Enterprises (DPE) said in a statement on Thursday. The DPE, led by Minister Pravin Gordhan, is the shareholder of SAA, which has been in business rescue for more than a year now. Employees have not received salaries since May this year and since the lockdown started at the end of March only some repatriation and cargo flights have been undertaken.

Posted on 17 December 2020 | 10:20 am

Summer rains improve levels in 7 provinces

Dams in the Eastern Cape have reached 51% capacity after months of dry conditions in the province, the Department of Water and Sanitation says. The department's weekly report showed that dam levels have been on the rise in the past two weeks due to torrential summer rains. Gauteng dam levels increased from 91.7% to 96.1% since the beginning of December.

Posted on 17 December 2020 | 9:52 am

South Africa misses Covax deadline to secure vaccines

South Africa, the country hardest hit in Africa by the coronavirus, missed a December 15 deadline to make a deposit to secure vaccines to fight the pathogen, and hasn’t arranged a guarantee to make the full payment. The payment to the Covax program will be made in coming days, according to Tandi Nzimande, the chief executive officer of the Solidarity Fund, a philanthropic organization backed by some of South Africa’s richest people and biggest companies. The fund undertook to make the R327-million ($22-million) deposit, which represents 15% of the R2.2-billion rand that will ultimately have to be paid, after the government failed to do so.

Posted on 17 December 2020 | 9:50 am

Brexit talks head for their climax with a fight over fishing

The UK and European Union (EU) are heading for a final battle over fishing rights as trade talks reach a climax, with officials cautiously predicting a deal within days. The pound climbed against the dollar on Wednesday amid optimism that the focus on fish is a sign the two sides have largely settled their differences over the other major obstacle to an accord: the level competitive playing field for business.

Posted on 17 December 2020 | 8:37 am

Rand hits ten-month high as risk appetite nudges up

South Africa's rand hit a fresh 10-month high on Thursday as progress on a US fiscal stimulus deal and a pledge by the Federal Reserve to keep rates low until an economic recovery is secure boosted risk appetite. At 0600 GMT, the rand traded at 14.7950 against the U.S. dollar, 0.15% firmer than its previous close. It was trading at its strongest since February 12.

Posted on 17 December 2020 | 8:19 am

South Africa's economy will expand 3.9% next year - poll

The South African economy will expand 3.9% next year after contracting nearly twice that rate in 2020, a Reuters poll found on Thursday, after a strong third quarter performance likely ease this year's estimates. The country's performance rebounded strongly last quarter as coronavirus restrictions were relaxed, with mining and manufacturing leading an expansion across all sectors.

Posted on 17 December 2020 | 8:14 am

Mozambique weighs help to fight insurgents in gas-rich north

Mozambique is considering offers from around the world to help fight an Islamist insurgency in the natural gas-rich north of the country, President Filipe Nyusi said, while striking a cautious tone in accepting outside assistance. The government has been working with some countries, but won’t publicize its tactics and strategies, Nyusi told lawmakers Wednesday in his state-of-the-nation speech in Maputo, the capital.

Posted on 17 December 2020 | 7:30 am

Vaccinating billions means finding ways around a patent impasse

Covid-19 vaccines look set to protect millions of citizens of the world’s richest countries in the coming months. But inoculating the rest of the planet’s population may mean finding a way around an impasse over intellectual property. Representatives from all 164 member states of the World Trade Organization (WTO) met last week in Geneva to discuss a proposal from India and South Africa to waive broad sections of the WTO’s intellectual property rules and to try to forge an agreement on how patents developed in the race against Covid-19 should be recognized.

Posted on 17 December 2020 | 7:25 am

Eskom’s bailout emerging as equity swap by biggest bondholder

South Africa’s biggest pot of available cash – R1.91-trillion of civil-servant pensions and unemployment funds managed by the Public Investment Corporation (PIC) – is emerging as the key to rescuing the debt-stricken national power monopoly. The money manager has approached its parent agency, the National Treasury, with a proposal to ease the R464-billion load of obligations crushing Eskom, signaling officials are gearing up for the complex financial and political operation to convert about R95-billion of Eskom debt held by the PIC into equity.

Posted on 17 December 2020 | 7:17 am

Electric cars closing in on gas guzzlers as battery costs plunge

Electric vehicles may cost about the same as their gas-guzzling brethren in just three or four years -- and only get cheaper from there, according to a new report from BloombergNEF. Electric cars and buses have long been saddled with bigger up-front costs than those burning gasoline or diesel, due to the cost of batteries. But researchers say that price premium will disappear once battery packs reach $100/kWh -- a tipping point BNEF expects to occur in 2023, according to its 2020 Battery Price Survey.

Posted on 17 December 2020 | 7:15 am

Planet-warming emissions from buildings put climate goals at risk

Planet-warming carbon dioxide emissions from buildings and construction are jeopardising global goals to keep devastating climate change at bay, a UN-backed coalition warned on Wednesday, after data showed they hit an all-time high in 2019. The use of coal, oil and natural gas for heating, lighting and cooking fuelled a rise in emissions from the operation of buildings to about 10 gigatons last year, including direct emissions and indirect emissions from power generation, the Global Alliance for Buildings and Construction (GlobalABC) said.

Posted on 17 December 2020 | 6:44 am

Zuma files challenge against Zondo

Former President Jacob Zuma on Tuesday filed a legal challenge against the judge who refused to recuse himself from an inquiry into State corruption, his lawyer confirmed. "The review challenge was filed today," Eric Mabuza, Zuma's attorney, said in an emailed reply to Reuters. The country's Deputy Chief Justice Raymond Zondo in November rejected an application by Zuma's lawyers seeking his recusal from the corruption case on allegations of bias. He rejected the application on grounds Zuma had failed to establish that he was biased.

Posted on 16 December 2020 | 8:58 am

Public sector unions lose court bid to force government to implement wage deal

The Labour Appeal Court has dismissed an application from public sector unions challenging government's decision to renege on paying salary increases for the final year of a three-year wage deal. The hearing was held earlier this month and Judges Dennis Davis, Violet Phatshoane and Philip Coppin delivered the judgment on Tuesday.

Posted on 15 December 2020 | 3:04 pm

South Africa gains 75 000 non-farm jobs in the third quarter

Non-agriculture related jobs increased by 75 000 during the third quarter, data from Stats SA shows. Stats SA on Tuesday released the quarterly employment survey (QES) for the quarter ending in September – surveying private, non-agricultural businesses such as factories, firms, offices and stores as well as national, provincial and local government entities. It is different to the quarterly labour force survey which is household based and covers agricultural workers.

Posted on 15 December 2020 | 3:02 pm

Rand Water, Emfuleni mayor meet to discuss debt agreement

Water utility Rand Water on December 15 met with Emfuleni executive mayor Gift Moerane about a debt settlement agreement. The municipality owes Rand Water about R1.1-billion in outstanding debt, with Rand Water having reduced the water pressure to the municipality by 20% as a credit control action to compel the municipality to meet its obligations to settle amounts due to Rand Water for water services rendered.

Posted on 15 December 2020 | 2:22 pm

Consortium launches dashboard to give public insight into Covid-19 spread

The South African Covid-19 Modelling Consortium (SACMC) has unveiled its new SACMC Epidemic Explorer dashboard to enable the public to explore the Covid-19 epidemic data in South Africa. The open-source platform, which will be updated regularly, analyses the resurgence risk, presents metrics to prepare for future outbreaks and monitors Covid-19 hospital admissions.

Posted on 15 December 2020 | 12:44 pm