For Creamer Media in Johannesburg, I’m Sane Dhlamini.

Making headlines: Gordhan says SOEs in need of expert staff, Mashaba threatens to go to Nersa after Eskom's failure to restore power to parts of Soweto and, economists expect Reserve Bank to cut repo rate by 25 basis points

 

Gordhan says SOEs in need of expert staff

Public Enterprises Minister Pravin Gordhan has revealed that South Africa's State-owned enterprises need technical experts to make up three-quarters of their staff, whereas at the moment up to half were administrative support staff.

The Minister was addressing Parliament's select committee on public enterprises and communication.

He said efforts to address the need were underfoot, but added that the running of the department had, for the past year, been a case of crisis management as the woes of entities like Eskom, South African Airways and Denel worsen.

 

Mashaba threatens to go to Nersa after Eskom's failure to restore power to parts of Soweto

Johannesburg Mayor Herman Mashaba has threatened to go to the National Energy Regulator of South Africa over his plea to power utility Eskom to restore electricity to parts of Soweto.

This comes after Eskom said it would not repair infrastructure in areas where there are high levels of non-payment, especially in Soweto.

Mashaba said it was disappointing that, despite a productive meeting with Eskom officials in the province, the utility failed to honour a request for an urgent meeting to discuss residents' concerns about Eskom's credit control measures.

Soweto owes Eskom more than R17-billion in unpaid electricity bills.

 

Economists expect Reserve Bank to cut repo rate by 25 basis points

Economists on Wednesday said that they expect the South African Reserve Bank to cut the repurchase rate by 25 basis points in a bid to stimulate economic growth.

The central bank had forecast in May that South Africa's growth would reach one percent in 2019. The reduction in repo rate would also trigger banks to decrease their interest rates to 10 percent as well, down from 10.25 percent.

South Africa's central bank last raised the repo rate by 25 basis points in November to stem inflation pressures.

 

That’s a roundup of news making headlines today

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