Deputy President Paul Mashatile on Tuesday condemned acts of violence by his security detail and appealed to South Africans to allow law enforcement to complete its investigation.

This follows a viral video that showed unarmed civilians being assaulted by what looks like members of the South African Police Service (Saps) VIP Protection Unit, on a Johannesburg highway.

The video has angered many South Africans who are calling for the security detail involved to be brought to book.

In a statement, Mashatile said he has full confidence in the Saps under the leadership of Police Minister Bheki Cele and the command of National Police Commissioner General Fanie Masemola.

“Members of the Saps are meant to uphold and protect the fundamental rights of every person and exercise the powers conferred upon them in a responsible and controlled manner,” he said.

He added that he abhors unnecessary force, particularly against unarmed civilians and revealed that Masemola had promised there would be an investigation into the matter.

Meanwhile, the Independent Investigative Directorate (Ipid) national spokesperson Robbie Raburabu has said that it is investigating the allegations of assault against members of Protection Security Services in the Saps.

Ipid has also contacted family members of the victims to lay a charge.

Raburabu says they have also contacted management of the Saps who are cooperating with the IPID investigation.

With the 2024 general elections approaching, seven opposition party leaders will, in August, hold a National Convention to negotiate a pre-election pact.

The National Convention will be held on August 16 and 17 and will see the Democratic Alliance, Inkatha Freedom Party, Freedom Front Plus, ActionSA, National Freedom Party, United Independent Movement and the Spectrum National Party come together, following a series of exploratory meetings over the past two months.

The party leaders said in a joint statement that while there was still much work to be done, parties were working in unison to provide hope and a new way forward for South Africa.

“As the leaders of seven different political organisations, this is a responsibility we take seriously. We know that many citizens are anxious about the future. We know that they want certainty that the new national government that replaces African National Congress (ANC) domination next year will be stable, viable and effective. Above all, they want opposition parties to provide a viable path to achieving the 50%+1 majority we need to form a government without the ANC, the Economic Freedom Fighters and their proxies that can deliver a prosperous future for all South Africans,” said the leaders.

Party leaders have agreed on an agenda that will guide negotiations at the Convention to ensure that they emerge with the strongest possible agreement.

Important items on the agenda include the values and principles that will guide a pact government and the formulation of a joint minimum programme of action.

The agenda also includes rules of engagement during the upcoming election campaign, and a formula to form a Cabinet after the 2024 election.

The leaders explained that these items were critical to forming a stable pact government that could deliver.

“We wish to emphasise that every party leader that has engaged in this process so far has done so voluntarily, and it is for each party to ultimately decide whether it wants to formally join the Pact once negotiations have been concluded at the upcoming National Convention,” leaders added.

The leaders assured that there were no predetermined outcomes, and negotiations at the Convention would be robust, honest and constructive.

The African Christian Democratic Party and Build One South Africa have attended various meetings as observers and are yet to decide if they will attend the National Convention.

President Cyril Ramaphosa noted on Monday that government will soon be finalising a strategy to support the transition to electric vehicle (EV) manufacturing to keep up with global developments.

Worldwide, countries are incentivising the manufacture and uptake of EVs as the world moves towards decarbonisation.

Ramaphosa explained that the decarbonisation of the country’s society could drive growth, improve industrial competitiveness, create jobs and harness the potential of innovation.

“South Africa has some important advantages. We have the world’s largest reserves of platinum and are an attractive location for renewable energy, both of which are important elements in the production of green hydrogen. Such hydrogen can be used as an e-fuel in some models of vehicles, which are exempted from the European Union ban,” he stated.

He argued that while there were fears that the move towards decarbonisation would result in job losses, BMW’s plans for job retention, reskilling and training on electro-mobility would provide certainty to more than 20 000 employees at the company’s facilities across the country.

Last week, the BMW Group announced that it would be spending R4.2-billion over five years to prepare its local manufacturing plant for the production of the next-generation BMW X3.

The plug-in hybrid X3 will be exclusively manufactured in South Africa at BMW’s Rosslyn plant in Pretoria from the second half of 2024.

Ramaphosa said while other vehicle manufacturers were producing hybrid vehicles, the X3 will be BMW’s first locally-produced electric vehicle.

Ramaphosa noted that the investment announcement affirmed the confidence investors continued to have in the country’s economy and said it also gave effect to the principle of the country’s transition to low carbon energy.

“Working in partnership as government, business, labour and civil society, we have to ensure that the transition to new forms of production is managed in a just, equitable manner. Among other things, this means that auto manufacturers need to be supported to expand their investment in the production of new energy vehicles in South Africa,” he said.

Ramaphosa highlighted that the country currently had a range of measures to support automotive manufacturers, such as the special economic zone incentives, the Automotive Investment Scheme and others.

Trade union federation Cosatu and its affiliates will strike on Thursday in protest against the state of the economy, poor governance, and the falling living standards of workers, it said in a statement on Monday.

The strike will occur under section 77 of the Labour Relations Act (LRA), for which the federation has received a strike certificate from Nedlac. The strike is therefore protected under the LRA, and no one can be dismissed for participating. However, the no work, no pay rule will apply.

"It is a demonstration by workers that government needs to do more to end the levels of load shedding, cable theft, crime and corruption, wasteful expenditure, and austerity crippling the state, suffocating the economy, and further plunging workers into high levels of indebtedness and misery. This is also a signal to the government, the Reserve Bank, and the commercial banks that the working class can no longer afford to bear the burden of rising levels of inflation, electricity tariff hikes, and relentless and reckless increases in the repo rate," Cosatu said.

Cosatu claims its affiliates have a membership of 1.8 million, but a substantial section of these is in the public service, which includes essential services workers which may not strike.

Cosatu's last day of action just under a year ago did not cause significant disruption to the economy as it was poorly attended by workers. Last year's protest was also backed by rival federation SA Federation of Trade Unions (Saftu).

Cosatu says, among other things, it wants the government to:

Raise the R350 social relief of distress grant to the food poverty line (which is R624);

Increase the number of participants in the presidential employment stimulus programme, which employs mainly unemployed youth, to 2-million participants by February;

To intervene and rebuild Transnet and Metro Rail; and

To provide more resources to the SA Post Office to prevent its liquidation.

The provisional liquidators overseeing the SA Post Office (Sapo) have come out against a plan put forward by the Department of Communications and Digital Technologies (DCDT) to place the struggling entity in business rescue.

Just days before a court is set to hear the department's application, provisional liquidators Anton Shaban and Gerry Musi have said they fear business rescue is "not an option" and will not work.

The post office was placed into provisional liquidation in March as it could not pay its debts.

In a statement on Friday, Shaban and Musi said that for business rescue to work, Sapo would need billions of rands in extra funding and a complete overhaul of its business operations. Parliament still needs to pass the Post Office Amendment Bill, they stated.

Instead of business rescue, the Shaban and Musi have put forward a compromise agreement under section 155 of the Companies Act.

This is the same section of the act used by retailer Steinhoff in its R25-billion settlement agreement with creditors and shareholders.

This section of the act allows a company to put forward a compromise agreement to creditors to bypass being liquidated or placed into business rescue.

Let's compromise

Shaban said a compromise agreement was the best route to restore the Post Office to solvency. He said it could be done more quickly and at a lower cost than business rescue, without revealing any figures.

The DCDT, meanwhile, is hoping to convince the North Gauteng High Court in Pretoria that the Sapo is a candidate for business rescue when the matter is heard on Tuesday.

The department has nominated Anoosh Rooplal, the chartered accountant who has overseen the liquidation of VBS Bank for the past four-and-a-half years, as the Post Office's business rescue practitioner.

"We are crossing our fingers that the court responds to our prayer favourably," DCDT Minister Mondli Gungubele told a Parliamentary briefing earlier this month.

If the court declines to place the debt-laden State-owned entity into business rescue and the section 155 settlement proposal does not pan out, the Sapo will face a final liquidation hearing later this year.

South Africa must balance the need to cut emissions with increasing electricity access and developing its natural resources, according to the nation’s energy minister.

“We can’t be only about decarbonisation,” Minister of Mineral Resources and Energy Gwede Mantashe said in a televised speech in Johannesburg on Friday. “We must deal with energy poverty.”

South Africa’s transition from a reliance on coal to cleaner sources of power is a massive undertaking that includes changing a significant social aspect centered on mining of the dirtiest fossil fuel. Mantashe’s position has complicated the implementation of a $8.5-billion pledge by rich nations to help South Africa move to green energy.

Mantashe, a former mine worker and labor-union leader who has previously said he doesn’t have a problem with being identified as a “coal fundamentalist,” has overseen a stop-start programme to boost renewable power generation.

South Africans must “never allow ourselves to be encircled by the developed nations who fund lobbyists to pit our country’s developmental needs against their own self-serving protection of the environment,” he said. “Our country deserves an opportunity to transition at pace and scale determined by its citizens.”

The country has a number of offshore oil and gas prospects, proven by recent discoveries in neighbouring Namibia, but searches for the resources have been blocked by environmental groups, according to Mantashe. “Every time we touch that, we go to court. Touch it, go to court.”

The environmental concerns should be balanced with development, he said.

While the office of the Public Protector has cleared President Cyril Ramaphosa of wrongdoing in the Phala Phala scandal, it found that Presidential Protection Service head Major General Wally Rhoode was not authorised to conduct an investigation into the burglary on the farm.

Acting Public Protector Kholeka Gcaleka held a media briefing on Friday afternoon where she released the much-anticipated report on allegations of misconduct by Ramaphosa relating to the Limpopo farm, which is owned by a company that the president is the sole director of.

The matter relates to a burglary on the farm on the night of 9 February 2020, where at least two burglars stole an undisclosed amount of dollars stuffed under a sofa cushion.

News24 previously reported that Ramaphosa claimed the $580 000 in cash was paid to his former farm manager, Sylvester Ndlovu, by Sudanese businessman Hazim Mustafa on Christmas Day in 2019.

The president has maintained the cash was in exchange for a group of buffaloes, even though the buffaloes remained on the farm more than three years later.

After the theft, Ramaphosa is said to have reported the matters to Rhoode, who allegedly conducted his own investigation.

In her report, Gcaleka dealt with the following allegations against Ramaphosa:

Whether Ramaphosa acted in a manner that is inconsistent with his office in dealing with the alleged housebreaking and thus abused state resources, exposed himself to any situation involving a risk of a conflict between his constitutional duties and obligations and his private interests arising from or affected by his alleged paid work in violation of the Executive Ethics Code.

Whether the President failed to report the crime and abused his power in utilising state resources by causing the Presidential Protection Services (PPS) to be deployed to Phala Phala farm and to investigate a housebreaking thus the Executive Ethics Code; and whether such conduct constitutes improper conduct as contemplated in the Constitution and abuse of power as contemplated in the Public Protector Act.

Whether members of the South African Police Service attached to the PPS acted improperly by investigating the alleged housebreaking and if so, whether such conduct constitutes improper conduct as contemplated in the Constitution and maladministration as contemplated the Public Protector Act.

Gcaleka said they could not investigate tax matters, or foreign exchange control regulations, as that fell under the mandate of the South African Revenue Service (Sars) and the South African Reserve Bank (SARB).

The Public Protector's office also did not investigate whether Ramaphosa had correctly reported the burglary to law enforcement in terms of Prevention and Combating of Corrupt Activities Act (Precca). Gcaleka said this formed part of the Hawks investigation.

Findings on Ramaphosa

The acting Public Protector found there was no evidence that Ramaphosa was involved in the day-to-day running of the farm, or that he received and remuneration from the farm.

"No evidence could be found indicating that the president either works at Phala Phala farm or receives remuneration from Phala Phala farm," Gcaleka said.

However, she did note that evidence arising from the inspection of the president’s register for financial interests revealed that he retained financial interests in Ntaba Nyoni, the holding company of the Phala Phala farm.

Gcaleka said that, while not conclusive, there were also facts that pointed towards Ramaphosa being more actively involved in the "management of the affairs of the closed corporation than he appears to let on in his general submissions".

"The evidence revealed that the president held discussions with farm managers, notably, regarding the disposal of certain animals due to them being substandard.

"There are, of course, other facts which point away from the president being involved in paid work. For one thing, he neither draws a salary from the Ntaba Nyoni CC nor receives any distributions (o...

South Africa said on Thursday it will host the Brics bloc summit in August as planned, amid speculation that it may move to China so Russia's President Vladimir Putin can attend in a nation not obliged to arrest him on war crimes accusations.

South Africa has a duty as a signatory to the International Criminal Court (ICC) to arrest Putin if he attends the talks between the leaders of Brazil, Russia, India and China, due to an arrest warrant over the deportation of children from Ukraine.

Putin denies the charges.

South African President Cyril Ramaphosa met with him on June 17 in Russia, historically a strong ally of the governing African National Congress (ANC) since it was a liberation movement fighting white minority rule decades ago.

"South Africa will host the 15th Brics Summit at the Sandton Convention Centre in Sandton, Johannesburg, from 22 to 24 August 2023," the Department of International Relations said in a statement.

Presidency spokesperson Vincent Magwenya confirmed to Reuters in a text message that this meant the whole summit, including the main part involving the Brics heads of state, would take place in South Africa.

He and a spokesperson for the international relations department declined to comment on whether or not Putin will attend.

South African officials had at the end of last month said the Brics countries were considering moving the summit to China, which is not a member of the international court. They could still decide to change the venue at the last minute.

On Tuesday, South Africa's Minister of International Relations Naledi Pandor said Putin had not yet replied to an invitation, sent before the ICC charged him on March 18.

Chinese President Xi Jinping, India's Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva are all planning to attend, Pandor said.

South Africa says it is neutral in the Ukraine conflict, but has been criticised by Western powers for being friendly to Russia, including hosting Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and conducting joint naval exercises.

South Africa's consumer confidence fell further in the second quarter, according to a survey released on Thursday, as the country struggled with soaring fuel and food prices and higher interest rates.

The consumer confidence index, sponsored by the First National Bank (FNB) and compiled by the Bureau for Economic Research, fell to a reading of minus 25 points, from minus 23 points in the first quarter of 2023.

South Africa has been battling high inflationary pressures and local power cuts that have led to a rise in diesel consumption by households relying on back-up generators.

The June-quarter reading is the second-lowest on record since 1994 and indicative of concerns among consumers about economic prospects in South Africa and household finances, according to the survey.

"Further interest rate hikes, rand depreciation and concerns about South Africa's diplomatic relations with the rest of the world in all likelihood compounded the negative impact of the electricity crisis on high-income confidence," said FNB chief economist Mamello Matikinca-Ngweny.

A vast majority of consumers expects a deterioration in South Africa's economic growth over the next 12 months, and considers present time as highly inappropriate to purchase durable goods such as furniture, vehicles and household appliances.

The confidence levels of high-income households fell to a record low of minus 40 in the quarter, and they were far lower compared to low- and middle-income confidence, and even below the extraordinarily depressed levels attained during the height of the Covid-19 pandemic.

"The further deterioration in the confidence levels of high-income consumers does not bode well for the retail sector, as affluent consumers have the greatest spending power among the different income groups," the survey added.

The South African central bank in May revised its headline inflation estimate for 2023 up to 6.2% from 6%, and raised its bank rates by 50 basis points to a 14-year high, as domestic food price inflation remains elevated.

President Cyril Ramaphosa has placed Justices Tshifhiwa Maumela and Nomonde Mngqibisa-Thusi on suspension following allegations of misconduct by excessively delaying the handing down of a significant number of judgments.

The Judicial Service Commission took a decision during a meeting in April to advise the President to suspend the judges pending a tribunal process as laid out in the Judicial Service Commission Act.

The President informed Chief Justice Raymond Zondo and the suspended justices of his decision in accordance with the Constitution, which empowers him to suspend a judge on the advice of the Judicial Service Commission (JSC).

In January, the JSC accepted a recommendation by the Judicial Conduct Committee that there were reasonable grounds to suspect that the judges were guilty of misconduct in delaying the handing down of a significant number of judgments.

Both judges are suspended subject to the condition that they finalise their part-heard matters.