Breakfast Edition: 8 September 2015
WATCH & LISTEN: Here's a recap of this morning's top news stories.
COMMUNITY MEMBERS GO ON THE RAMPAGE: A group of protesters, believed to be sacked Medupi construction workers, have gone on the rampage overnight in Marapong near Lephalale in Limpopo. According to police, 21 buses, municipal offices, and a library were severely damaged after the group of protesters set it alight overnight.
Construction of Medupi power station is meanwhile expected to be completed in 2019, and will cost at least R105 billion, Eskom's head of group capital said on Sunday. "We do reviews on projects, in terms of scope, completion time, costs, and so on. R105 billion is what has been approved through governance structures for Medupi. There has been reports that the project would cost R300 billion… we do not know where that figure comes from," Abram Masango told journalists during the official launch of unit six on site at Medupi.
Police spokesman, Malesela Ledwaba says the group started gathering at 6 last night.
The protest action took place at the Marapong village, and not at the Medupi power station.
— Eskom Media Desk (@Eskom_MediaDesk) September 8, 2015ROODEPOORT PRIMARY SET TO REOPEN: Teachers are expected to start arriving at Roodepoort Primary school this morning, after the Gauteng authorities closed the school last month due to violence, racism and teacher intimidation. The mediation team that was appointed by the Gauteng Education MEC and premier, David Makhura have made several short and long-term recommendations to restore peace in the Davidsonville community and school.
Community spokesman, Ronald Dyers says everybody is committed to stabilising the situation and getting the children's schooling back on track. Our reporter, Silindelo Masekane is at Roodepoort Primary.
RAND STILL STRUGGLING: The rand is still heading south this morning after losing against major currencies since China's GDP cut on Monday. The world's second largest economy this morning released more negative stats: China's exports fell 6.1% year-on-year to around $188 billion in August. Imports are also down by 14% year-on-year.
ZUMA TO CONVENE A MEETING IN THE MINING INDUSTRY: President Jacob Zuma will this morning convene a meeting of the Mining Sector National Consultative Forum at the presidential guest house in Pretoria. The forum aims to bring together government, business and labour to talk about developments and problems in the mining sector. Maryke Vermaak reports.
BEST NEWS THIS MORNING: The best news this morning must be Kevin Anderson's US Open Tennis success last night, over 3rd seed Andy Murray from Britain. The 15th seed South African beat Murray in four sets to advance to the quarter finals of the US Open, for the first time in his career. It's the first time in 13 years that South Africa has a player in the final 16 in New York since Wayne Ferreira managed to do it in 2002. Anderson was clearly overjoyed and admitted that he had to work very hard for the win.
