Latest news and views in Brief
By Wayne Cole SYDNEY (Reuters) – Asian stocks tracked sideways on Tuesday as Wall Street turned cautious ahead of the corporate reporting season while earnings guidance from regional tech heavyweight Samsung came in well short of forecasts. Investors could also be forgiven for feeling a touch of altitude sickness after many indexes recently hit all-time … Read more
JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) – Two unions representing some of Telkom SA’s workers said on Tuesday they would take the South African landline provider to court over possible retrenchments. The South Africa Communications Union (SACU) said it believed Telkom was about to let go of about 9,000 of its 19,000 employees over the next six months, a claim the company … Read more
JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) – South Africa’s National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) said on Tuesday that state-owned power utility Eskom was “sitting on a time bomb” by not allowing its workers to strike. Eskom staff cannot down tools to demand higher wages as they are deemed to provide an “essential service”. “If doctors can strike in South Africa, why can’t Eskom workers strike?” NUM general secretary Frans … Read more
JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) – South Africa’s business confidence remained subdued in June due to labour unrest which has hurt an already fragile economy, a survey by the South African Chamber of Commerce and Industry showed on Tuesday. The Sacci business confidence index edged up slightly to 89.7 in June from 88.9 in May, but was still below the 90 … Read more
JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) – South Africa’s Impala Platinum said that 2,000 workers at its Marula mine who had been on strike for better wages returned to work on Tuesday. “They are all back to work. We are now engaging with them about their concerns,” Implats spokeswoman Alice Lourens said.
From Sapa President Barack Obama is urging Israelis and Palestinians to restrain themselves and put an end to acts of retribution in the recent round of violence. In an op-ed piece in an Israeli newspaper, Obama calls it a “dangerous moment.” He’s lamenting both the murder of three Israeli teenagers and the killing of a … Read more
From SAPA Slain SACP leader Chris Hani’s daughter, Vanessa, has terminated her Cope membership, the Sowetan newspaper reported on Tuesday. She left the ruling African National Congress last June to join Mamphela Ramphele’s new party, Agang SA, saying the ANC had betrayed her father’s legacy. But at the beginning of this year, Vanessa Hani left … Read more
JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) –Â South Africa’s rand weakened against the dollar on Monday after flirting with a month-low as a strike by over 200,000 engineering sector workers entered its second week and employees at Impala Platinum continued with a wild-cat strike. The rand was trading at 10.7930 rand per dollar at 1531 GMT, 0.2 percent weaker than … Read more
JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) –Â South Africa’s main stock index set a record high on Monday before losing steam to end slightly lower, as investors took their cue from a downbeat mood in major overseas markets. But African Bank Investments (Abil) surged after the lender said it was in talks to sell its money-losing furniture retail unit. One … Read more
By Wendell Roelf CAPE TOWN (Reuters) – South Africa’s metalworkers union said wage talks to settle a week-old strike would resume on Tuesday, offering some hope to an industrial sector plagued by disruptions as a separate but smaller wildcat stoppage by miners showed no sign of ending. More than 200,000 National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (Numsa) members downed … Read more