News 09:00

BULLETIN 2 February 9 am

Good morning. I am……..

In this bulletin:

# Theminister in the Presidency says the National Health Insurance Bill is likely to be signed into law before the elections
# Government is making progress in addressing youth unemployment and scarce skills
# And, progress is made in containing several fires in the Cape Winelands

# Minister in the Presidency, Khumbudzo Ntshavheni, says president Cyril Ramaphosa is likely to sign off on the National Health Insurance Bill before this year’s general elections. Both houses of Parliament passed the controversial bill last year and is now on the president’s desk to be signed into law. The bill seeks to introduce universal public healthcare in South Africa. Ntshavheni says given the lessons learned during the Covid-19 pandemic, it is a priority that the NHI Bill be signed so that the full implementation can be taken in the seventh administration.

# Deputy Higher Education, Science and Technology minister Buti Manamela has highlighted progress in addressing youth unemployment and scarce skills. Speaking at the World Skills South Africa National Competition in Durban, he said over 200 artisan skills are contested by young people from various regions, with winners advancing to the World Skills competition in France in September. Manamela underscores the event’s role in learning from international practices and facilitating immediate employment for graduates through workplace placements:

# The Cape Winelands Municipality says firefighters made excellent progress in containing the fires in Worcester, Wolseley, and Rawsonville yesterday evening. The municipality’s spokesperson, Jo-Anne Otto, says the majority of the fire lines that required active firefighting have been contained. She says only the fire line running on the Brandvlei mountains in the direction of the prison still has active flames:

# A former Central Intelligence Agency software engineer, Joshua Schulte, has been sentenced to 40 years in prison for leaking classified materials to the whistleblowing agency WikiLeaks. The US Justice Department says the 35-year-old shared some eight-thousand-761 documents to Wikileaks in 2017, amounting to the largest data breach in the history of the CIA. He denied the allegations. US Attorney, Damian Williams, says Schulte betrayed his country by committing some of the most brazen, heinous crimes of espionage in American history.

# Rugby: Four capped Junior Springboks, Zachary Porthen, JF van Heerden, Litelihle Bester, and Jurenzo Julius, are amongst a group of 35 players who will attend this year’s SA Rugby Academy Programme in Stellenbosch from Monday. This is to continue preparations for the international season, which includes the inaugural Under-20 Rugby Championship in Australia, and the World Rugby Under20 Championship in South Africa. Coach Bafana Nhleko says they are pleased with the composition of the group, 21 forwards and 14 backs, adding that the hard work will now start in earnest.

# And the financial indicators: The dollar trades at 18-rand-56-cents and the euro at 20-rand-19-cents. One British pound costs 23-rand-67-cents and Bitcoin trades at 42-thousand-968-dollars-58-cents. Gold sells at two-thousand-54-dollars-88-cents a fine ounce and Brent crude oil is quoted at 79-dollars-5-cents a barrel.

Stay tuned for more news………….