We love our jobs. South Africa is going through a complex, often fraught, but ultimately very exciting transition, and we are right in the heart of the hurly-burly. The paper we bring you each Friday is the product of thousands of decisions, some of them very difficult, and a process of gathering, sifting and managing information on a baffling scale.
Recently Zimbabwean business leaders met President Robert Mugabe in an attempt to persuade him to halt a crackdown that is ruining the country’s economy. This is the first meeting between business and Mugabe since he ordered a 50% cut in prices in June, causing a massive shortage of goods and deepening the country’s economic crisis.
At a National Credit Act conference held recently, National Credit Regulator Gabriel Davel warned credit providers the regulator would undertake a survey of loans that had been rejected and compare them with the credit bureaus’ ratings scores to see if there is a racial undertone in lending Âpractices. Davel says the third-biggest complaint to the regulator in the two months since the Act has been in force has been about the rejection of credit applications.
This week union federation Cosatu declared a dispute with government, setting the stage for a second public service strike in the Western Cape less than three weeks after the end of the biggest civil servant strike since 1994. Cosatu’s provincial secretary, Tony Ehrenreich, said a second strike in the province ”seems unavoidable”.
His job might just be the most difficult in the land: fixing South Africa’s notorious department of correctional services. But Vernie Petersen, the newly appointed national commissioner, is ready for the challenge, and a new drum is already beating through this controversial and much-criticised department.
Cellphone masts do not cause harmful short-term health effects, according to a study of people who say they experience symptoms when they are close to them. The study dealt another blow to the notion that low-level electromagnetic fields from cellphones or base stations are dangerous.
South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) CEO Dali Mpofu this week asked his top 20 managers to sign letters consenting to undergo polygraph tests in an effort to determine the source of the leaked internal audit report the Mail & Guardian was interdicted from publishing last week.
South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) legal services head Mafika Sihlali stands accused of milking the South African Post Office of millions of rands in fees that were not earned. Sihlali’s former legal practice charged more than R6-million to restructure the parastatal — an exercise that came to naught.
Kliptown in Johannesburg erupted recently — and poor service delivery was at the root of the disturbance. Following similar explosions in Deneysville and Metsimaholo in the Free State, Lenasia South, Eldorado Park and the Khutsong area, poor communities have taken to the streets to demonstrate their dissatisfaction with government’s perceived inability to minister to South Africa’s poor.
Although credit life cover plays a very important role in protecting consumers who have taken on debt, not enough has been done to make consumers aware of their rights. Consumers often don’t benefit fully from the protection and peace of mind that credit life products are meant to offer.