News 09:00

BULLETIN 31 May 9 am

Good morning. I am……..

In this bulletin:

# Nomvula Mokonyane says the ANC is concerned about the results in KwaZulu-Natal
# Israel’s National Unity party files a bill to dissolve Parliament
# And athletics: Akani Simbine and Prudence Sekgodiso star for South Africa

# ANC first deputy secretary general Nomvula Mokonyane says she remains hopeful for an outright majority. Yesterday, the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research said the ANC was on course to win 42-percent of the votes, which would be a sharp drop from 57.5-percent in the previous elections in 2019. Mokonyane says they are concerned about the results coming out of KwaZulu-Natal, which the MK Party is currently leading:

And with just over 50-percent of the votes counted, the ANC remains in the lead nationally at 41.93-percent. The DA is currently second at 23.43-percent and the MK Party at 10.58-percent. In Gauteng, the ANC leads with 33.21-percent followed by the DA at 29.31-percent and the EFF at 12.84-percent. In the hotly contested KwaZulu-Natal, MK is at 44.86-percent, the ANC second with 18.94-percent and the IFP at 17.42-percent. In the Western Cape, the DA leads with 54.63-percent of the votes followed by the ANC at 18.83-percent and the Patriotic Alliance at 9.32-percent.

# The General Industries Workers Union says it strongly opposes the South African Reserve Bank’s attitude to again maintain the interest rates unchanged. Yesterday, the bank’s monetary policy committee decided to hold the repo rate at 8.25-percent, citing elevated uncertainty. The union’s, president, Mametlwe Sebei, says the decision to hold interest rates steady instead of lowering them, despite inflation cooling noticeably since 2022, will not help the suffocating economy:

# Israel’s National Unity Party, led by war cabinet member Benny Gantz, has proposed a bill to dissolve parliament and trigger new elections in the country. Earlier this month, Gantz threatened to withdraw from the government if the war cabinet did not lay out a plan by June eighth to free the hostages and eliminate Hamas. By proposing the bill, the party will now have the opportunity to table it, in which they will hold a vote to decide whether to dissolve parliament in September and hold fresh elections in October.

# Athletics: South Africa’s Akani Simbine stormed to a resounding win in the men’s 100-metres at the Diamond League meet in Oslo, Norway. He clocked in a season’s best of 9.94-seconds to beat Japan’s Abdul Hakim Sani Brown and Cameroon’s Emmanuel Eseme, who finished third. Another South African, Prudence Sekgodiso, won the women’s 800-metres in a time of one-minute-58.66-seconds ahead of Natoya Goule-Toppin of Jamaica.

# And the financial indicators: The dollar trades at 18-rand-78-cents and the euro at 20-rand-32-cents. One British pound costs 23-rand-89-cents and Bitcoin trades at 68-thousand-501-dollars-90-cents. Gold sells at two-thousand-341-dollars-50-cents a fine ounce and Brent crude oil is quoted at 81-dollars-65-cents a barrel.

Stay tuned for more news………….