News 13:00

BULLETIN 27 October 1 pm

Good afternoon. I am……..

In this bulletin:

# The IEC will have the ballot papers ready by Friday after a court ruling
# The American Justice Department charges former FBI director Comey for a third time
# And cricket: Steve Smith withdraws from the Australian side for the Newlands Test against South Africa

# The Electoral Commission aims to have all ballot papers ready by Friday ahead of next week’s local government elections. Chief electoral offical Sy Mamabolo told eNCA the reprinting of millions of ballots follows a Constitutional Court ruling in favour of the ANC. The party challenged the exclusion of its candidates whose lists were not submitted on time. Mamabolo says the IEC is racing to reprint ballot papers to ensure candidates appear on election day:

# President Cyril Ramaphosa has received the panel report into the naval exercise known as Exercise Will of Peace. He established the panel in February to investigate the circumstances surrounding the Chinese-led exercise held at False Bay in the Western Cape. This followed concerns Ramaphosa’s instruction for the Iranian Navy to withdraw was not followed. Presidential spokesperson Vincent Magwenya says due to national security considerations, the panel’s work and report will remain confidential:

Moving abroad:

# The US Justice Department has charged former FBI director James Comey for a third time, accusing him of leaking national defence information. The case stems from an alleged disclosure of classified information to New York Times in 2016, while he was head of the FBI. A previous case over Comey’s Congressional testimony was dismissed last year. He faces a separate criminal charge where he is accused of threatening president Donald Trump. Comey maintains his innocence:

# Cricket: Former Australian captain Steve Smith is missing out of the third Test against South Africa at Newlands in Cape Town, which was the scene of his infamous participation in the sandpaper scandal of 2018. He injured his neck in the second encounter in Gqeberha, which the Proteas won comprehensively to square the series. Quick bowler Gerald Coetzee returns to Test action for the first time in two years in place of injured Anrich Nortjé. Australian captain Pat Cummins won the toss and selected to field. At lunch, South Africa reached 140 without loss.

# The financial indicators: The dollar trades at 16-rand-68-cents and the euro at 18-rand-58-cents. One British pound costs 22-rand-20-cents and Bitcoin trades at 79-thousand-588-dollars. Gold sells at three-thousand-996-dollars-80-cents a fine ounce and Brent crude oil is quoted at 116-dollars-32-sents a barrel.

# And finally: A study has ranked Johannesburg and Cape Town among the world’s most cost-competitive cities for data centre construction. Other African cities include Lagos in Nigeria and Nairobi in Kenya. Research by professional services firm Turner and Townsend attributes this to lower labour costs, access to land and improving local supply chains leading to investor interest. But the report warns power shortages and a lack of skilled workers remain major obstacles. Growing demand for artificial intelligence and cloud services is driving investment in data centres worldwide.

Stay tuned for more news………….