Category: Southern Africa

Despite the current tough economic climate in South Africa, exports have grown by 3 per cent in the second quarter of 2016 compared with the same period in 2015. This was revealed in the mid-term budget policy statement, tabled by Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan in parliament on Wednesday. The growth is supported by manufacturing and…

South Africa’s Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan faces a tough balancing act on Wednesday when he unveils a midterm budget meant to boost the sickly economy and show his looming fraud case is not distracting him. Gordhan has said he plans to reduce government spending, raise taxes and cut the budget deficit to 3.2 percent of…

Total, Glencore and Gunvor are bidding for a 75 percent stake in Chevron’s South African downstream assets, which include a refinery, three industry sources told Reuters on Tuesday. U.S. oil major Chevron said in January it planned to sell 75 percent of its South African business unit, which includes a 110,000-barrels-a-day refinery in Cape Town.…

Zimbabwe expects economic growth to quicken to 4.8 percent in 2017 from 1.2 percent this year on improved agriculture production and higher global commodity prices, the Treasury said in a budget strategy document. The southern African nation is in the throes of its worst financial crisis since it switched its currency for the U.S. dollar,…

The Black Business Council (BBC) has announced the departure of its CEO Mohale Ralebitso who has tendered his resignation from its employ and remains available until end of November 2016. Being the aspiring industrialist that he is, he will not be lost to the sector and the general transformation agenda to which BBC is an…

BCL Liquidator Nigel Dixon-Warren will be confronted with shocking findings when he finally conducts health inspections on the 5000 dismissed workers, after Government and other shareholders disregarded warning of disastrous pollution from public health experts, caused by the sulphur dioxide and effluent pumped into the open environment. The closure of BCL mine – estimated to…

A Chinese businessman was yesterday fined $20 for selling Zimbabwe national flags without authority. Weidong Li (28), who operates a retail shop at the Gulf Complex in Harare’s Kopje area, pleaded guilty to contravening the Flag of Zimbabwe Act when he appeared before Harare magistrate Mr Tendai Mahwe. Mr Mahwe fined Weidong or five days…

On Sunday close to 100 CEOs from both listed and unlisted South African companies issued the following pledge in the wake of fraud charges against the country’s finance minister. CEO Initiative Pledge We, the CEOs and business leaders named below, join the Government/Business/Labour initiative, and commit to: Do the right thing; stand by what is…

MTN Group’s next chief executive will take over three months ahead of plan, the South African telecoms company announced on Monday, as the firm faces allegations it illegally moved $14 billion out of Nigeria. Rob Shuter, Vodafone European boss, was due to start in July next year but MTN said in a statement accompanying its…