News 17:00

BULLETIN 8 July 5 pm

Good afternoon. I am……..

In this bulletin:

# AfriForum says withheld municipal grants expose governance failures
# Four solar projects get Nersa approval to add 890-megawatts to the grid
# And soccer: Egypt accuses officials of favouritism in their loss to the defending champions

# AfriForum says the National Treasury’s decision to withhold 13.5-billion-rand in funding from 69 municipalities highlights widespread governance failures in local government. The organisation’s Morné Mostert says years of financial mismanagement and poor oversight have led to declining service delivery, warning that withholding funding also affects residents. Mostert calls for stronger intervention, disciplinary action against officials responsible for repeated financial failures and reforms to restore effective service delivery:

# Energy regulator, Nersa, has approved generation licences for four solar photovoltaic projects under the renewable energy independent power producer procurement programme. The projects, located in the Free State and Mpumalanga, have a combined contracted capacity of 890-megawatts and are expected to strengthen the electricity supply. Nersa’s Charles Hlebela says the developments will also support job creation, local industry development and broader economic growth:

# Public Works and Infrastructure MEC Dean Macpherson renewed the use of six state-owned properties in the Western Cape to support gender-based violence and femicide shelter services. The properties in Aurora, Albertinia, Heidelberg, Laingsburg, and Moorreesburg will continue providing safe spaces for victims and survivors. Macpherson says the renewal reflects the government’s commitment to ensuring public assets are used to support vulnerable communities and improve service delivery rather than remain vacant:

# Cubans banged pots to express their anger about the latest nationwide power cut. Fuel shortages have been exacerbated by tight US sanctions and an effective US oil blockade. The latest nationwide outage was the third this year and follows state-imposed rolling electricity cuts aimed at conserving the little remaining fuel. Some rural areas are in the dark for up to 70 hours at a time, with three-hour outages in urban areas. The state electricity company did not say what had caused the latest unplanned interruption.

# Soccer: Egypt accused the match officials of favouritism after squandering a 2-0 lead to lose to Argentina in the World Cup’s round of 16. Cristian Romero only scored the defending champions’ first goal in the 79th minute. It was followed by captain Lionel Messi’s strike four minutes later, and the winner by Enzo Fernandez in stoppage time. That cost Egypt its first-ever quarterfinal spot. Coach Hossam Hassan says his side had been treated unfairly, as there were a lot of questionable decisions on and off the pitch.

# And the financial indicators: The dollar trades at 16-rand-39-cents against the rand and the euro at 18-rand-69-cents. One British pound costs 21-rand-88-cents and Bitcoin trades at 61-thousand-873-dollars. Gold sells at four-thousand-72-dollars-75-cents a fine ounce and Brent crude oil is quoted at 77-dollars-89-cents a barrel.

Stay tuned for more news………….