Tag: State Owned Enterprise (SOE)

The ANC’s 2019 manifesto refers to investigating prescribed assets, which are defined as the proportion of financial institutions’ resources that would be assigned to socially productive assets as a key priority. Prescribed assets are mentioned under the two sections in the 2019 manifesto. Both mentions refer to investigation and that no detail has been provided about the form that the prescription could take.

The latest GDP numbers show that the South African economy declined by 3.2% for the first quarter of 2019. This comes after President Ramaphosa announced a R50 billion stimulus package in September 2018. Since that stimulus followed on a decade of stimulus spending instituted since the 2008 global economic crisis, we must now ask whether Minister Pravin Gordhan’s decision to choose stimulus over austerity was the right one.

South African Airways’ sometimes-controversial CEO, Vuyani Jarana, has resigned. When the news broke on Sunday, many were caught by surprise, perhaps because it follows only a week after the resignation of another state-owned enterprise (SOE) CEO, Eskom’s Phakamani Hadebe.

If you counted every hair on your head, that amount probably will not add up to the amount of times you have read and heard about the causes of the Eskom crisis. Corruption and state capture have been identified as the bedrock reasons why South Africans have been thrown into darkness over the past two weeks. A few people have pinpointed the unions as the cause of the problem because they are enraged about President Ramaphosa’s announcement that Eskom will be unbundled. Yet others have laid the blame on transformation policies, specifically BEE.

Finance Minister Tito Mboweni’s maiden Budget speech is a structural reform budget, which aims to reduce the immediate fiscal and economic risks posed by Eskom’s and other State Owned Enterprises’ (SOEs) unsustainable balance sheets and operational models.

As an election year, a second State of the Nation Address (SONA) will probably be held during June 2019 wherein the newly elected government will present their programme of action for the 2020 financial year. The SONA address that was delivered by President Cyril Ramaphosa on Thursday 7 February 2019, accordingly reflected on the Medium Term Strategic Frameworks designed and implemented in the past five years.

Ramaphosa delivers positive 25th State of the Nation address - full text.

“Black man, you are on your own.” – S Biko. What did Biko mean when he said this? Did he mean that putting people with a black skin colour in power would automatically solve all our problems?

Few currencies matched the rand’s turbulence in 2017, with factors such as Trumpenomics, the firing of finance minister Pravin Gordhan and the appointment of Cyril Ramaphosa as ANC president, contributing to the R2.04 price swing during the year.

Industry grinds to a halt. Traffic stands gridlocked. Lights in dangerous areas go out. People sit in the dark. Whereas Christmas should usher in a time of jovial spirit, this December once again brings in load-shedding for South Africans.