News in South Africa 25th February: 1. Budget speech – response largely positive: he response to National Treasury’s 2021 budget has been broadly positive, with analysts praising the finance minister for sticking to his guns on cutting spending, while dropping plans to raise more taxes. However, it has not been without controversy, particularly from the […]
News in South Africa 22nd February: 1. Tito’s Budget Speech this week: The week will be dominated by finance minister Tito Mboweni’s Budget 2021 on Wednesday. While government’s tax income was hit by the pandemic, including bans on cigarette and alcohol sales, there has been a surge in tax from mining companies – which is helping […]
News in South Africa 17th February: 1. Johnson & Johnson vaccines arrive: South Africa has received the first delivery of the Johnson & Johnson vaccines at OR Tambo International Airport last night. The consignment will be moved to a secure facility in Gauteng before being distributed overnight to the various vaccine centres in all provinces […]
News in South Africa 15th February: 1. Johnson & Johnson vaccine approved: SA’s regulators have given Johnson and Johnson’s (J&J) Covid-19 vaccine the green light for a phase 3b trial in health-care workers, paving the way for the government to begin dispensing shots on Wednesday. This marks the start of South Africa’s vaccine rollout, with […]
News in South Africa 10th February: 1. Ratepayers have had enough: Rates and tax revolts are either underway or being contemplated by ratepayer associations fed up at being forced to pay rates and taxes to dysfunctional municipalities. They are called ‘tax diversions’ rather than revolts, and they’re of questionable legality, but several ratepayer associations are […]
News in South Africa 9th February: 1. Updated academic calendar released for schools: The Department of Basic Education has published the updated academic calendar for schools in South Africa for 2021. The amended calendar comes after the return of public schools was delayed by several weeks until 15 February, due to the impact of a […]
News in South Africa 8th February: 1. AstraZeneca ineffective against local Covid variant: The roll-out of the AstraZeneca vaccine to South Africa’s health workers has been temporarily halted following results showing low efficacy against the South African variant of the coronavirus. South African health workers will now receive the Johnson & Johnson single dose vaccine […]
News in South Africa 5th February: 1. Future alcohol bans still a possibility: The blanket ban on alcohol sales might be over, but the legal battle between South African Breweries (SAB) and Minister of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs (Cogta) Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma is not. And, according to an affidavit filed by the minister in the […]
News in South Africa 4th February: 1. 3.1 Million vaccines from Covax: South Africa is expected to get another 3.1 million doses of the Coronavirus vaccine in the first half of this year. COVAX has announced that around 2.8-billion jabs from AstraZeneca and 117,000 from Pfizer should be made available to South Africa. That is if the vaccines are […]
News in South Africa 28th January: 1. Vaccines due to arrive Monday: South Africa’s first batch of COVID-19 vaccines are set to arrive in the country on Monday. Health Minister Zweli Mkhize made the announcement on Wednesday, saying that work would now begin to vaccinate the country’s more than 1,25 million health workers first. The Serum Institute of […]
