BusinessLIVE - For Your Ear

UK will ask US again to drop tariff on whisky and other goods

London — Britain said it would step up demands for the US to drop tariffs on goods such as single malt Scotch whisky after the industry warned a decision by Washington to retain the levy was putting its future at risk. The US government said on Wednesday it would maintain…

13 Aug 2020 11AM 1 min

LETTER: Doctors need an employment benefit model

It is ironic that in a time when healthcare is most needed and is demonstrating its immense value in the fight against Covid-19, many GPs are reportedly seeing a drop in patient numbers that threatens the livelihood of their practices. GPs have an important role in supporting the psychosocial well-being…

13 Aug 2020 11AM 1 min

LETTER: SAA and Pravin Gordhan will cost SA a fortune

Department of public enterprises spokesperson Sam Mkokeli, writing in his personal capacity, tied himself in a knot of propaganda in his response to my letter (Letter about Pravin Gordhan was incorrect (, August 10). Mkokeli’s response is classic revisionist “whataboutery”, but unfortunately he says nothing of substance. According to Mkokeli,…

13 Aug 2020 11AM 3 min

LETTER: SA’s young people are worried about destruction of the economy

With the number of businesses and jobs being lost daily due to the lockdown, one begins to wonder whether the government's policy will save lives from Covid-19 but lose them due to hunger, depression, poverty and overindebtedness. The measures that are currently in place as a result of the state…

13 Aug 2020 10AM 1 min

Mass arrests in Ethiopia raise fears of a return to the iron fist

Addis Ababa — Ethiopia has detained more than 9,000 people after deadly clashes last month, the state-run human rights commission told Reuters, raising fears that a government hailed for reforms is returning to the iron-fist tactics of past administrations. Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, who came to power in 2018 promising…

13 Aug 2020 10AM 3 min

LETTER: Anti-smoking advocate sponsored by tobacco giant

Interesting though Dr Derek Yach’s mini-bio is (People trust the state less than doctors, which is where smoking comes in (, August 12) I do think we should have been told that his Foundation for a Smoke-Free World is currently completely funded by Philip Morris International, the well-known cigarette manufacturer!…

13 Aug 2020 10AM 1 min

LAURA DU PREEZ: Imagine how much better we would be with money on equal pay

While Women’s Day — or women’s month as it has become — is supposed to be a celebration of women, the articles and speeches about women and their finances seldom celebrate anything. Instead they tell us the depressing things we already know — that we earn less and pay the…

13 Aug 2020 10AM 4 min

Beijing’s relations with Africa head for a reset after Covid

As the Chinese authorities scrambled to respond to Beijing’s first coronavirus outbreak in 50 days in mid-June, locking down residential compounds and sealing off a seafood market after at least 200 fell ill, an unruffled President Xi Jinping broadcast to African leaders to express solidarity in their own fight against…

13 Aug 2020 10AM 13 min

TikTok and WeChat show up Silicon Valley apps

The jockeying by Microsoft and possibly other US companies to buy TikTok’s US operations shines a harsh light on how the country’s domestic technology giants are falling behind on innovation in social media and other areas of opportunity. Both ByteDance’s TikTok and Tencent’s WeChat are living on borrowed time in…

13 Aug 2020 10AM 4 min

Time for a Boeing-Airbus settlement

New York — The long-running trade dispute between Boeing and Airbus has been a source of political grandstanding for years, but with the US’s aggression reaching new levels of hypocrisy, the time may finally be right for a settlement. The US trade representative’s office announced late on Wednesday that it…

13 Aug 2020 9AM 4 min

EDITORIAL: Abel Sithole faces huge challenge at PIC

The long road to recovery for the embattled state-owned asset manager took flight last week with the Public Investment Corporation’s (PIC’s) first permanent successor since Daniel Matjila rolling up his sleeves and sliding his shoes under the desk for the first time on Monday. The challenge facing new CEO Abel…

13 Aug 2020 9AM 3 min

LETTER: ANC-led national government has destroyed much Western Cape industry

In the absence of an immediate relaxation of the lockdown regulations that are stifling economic activity in the Western Cape, the DA as the governing party in the province should take urgent action to restore a state of viability to the economy and the wellbeing of its citizens. For too…

13 Aug 2020 9AM 1 min

LETTER: Don’t Zim lives matter?

After decades of quiet diplomacy with Zimbabwe, which achieved nothing and allowed Zanu-PF to destroy the country and repress its people, SA has again whispered when it should have been shouting damnation and applying real pressure for change. However, just as the ANC places far more importance on solidarity and…

13 Aug 2020 9AM 1 min

LETTER: Musings on capitalism

Tom Eaton’s perceptive, accurate and this time not humorous analysis of the ANC was conflated with musings on capitalism (“Yes, the ANC is a dud but show us the money, opposition parties”, August 10). The latter deserves more space. Perhaps next week? People are, with few exceptions, essentially concerned first…

13 Aug 2020 9AM 1 min

LETTER: Corruption is more complex than black vs white

Steven Friedman’s main argument in his most recent column is that the R1-trillion worth (at least) of corruption that happened during the Jacob Zuma era is because “the political deal of 1994 left much of the economy untouched” and in white hands (New ways are needed to deal with deeply…

13 Aug 2020 9AM 3 min

LETTER: Envoy diplomacy will fail in Zimbabwe

Your editorial on Zimbabwe was erroneous and ignores the complicity of the ANC-led government since Thabo Mbeki in underwriting the pitiless regime north of the Limpopo (“SA’s impotence means more repression in Zimbabwe (”, August 11). There is a belief in this SA government that a free Zimbabwe would set…

13 Aug 2020 9AM 1 min

LETTER: Disappointed in Batohi

I want to express my gratitude to your publication for finally deciding to take up the task of exposing our ineffective and seemingly hapless national director of public prosecutions, Shamila Batohi. We hoped she would be a breath of fresh air to our disabled prosecuting authority when she took over,…

13 Aug 2020 8AM 1 min

LETTER: Hiroshima message

A year ago Jean Michel Bouvier, one of your regular contributors, reminded readers of the August 6 1945 dropping of the first atomic bomb. A terrible event, but no more terrible than the treatment and torture suffered by thousands (many more than those who died in the bomb attacks) between…

13 Aug 2020 8AM 1 min

UK finance firms mobilise to address domestic abuse

London — Some of Britain’s biggest financial and legal firms have stepped up support for staff and customers suffering domestic abuse as the coronavirus lockdown sheds new light on the scale of a problem affecting millions nationwide. Legislation now progressing through parliament suggests this costs Britain £66bn a year, with…

13 Aug 2020 8AM 4 min

LETTER: The curse of Eskom

Eskom is one of SA’s many curses. That we are back to power outages annoys everyone. Call a spade a spade and not a garden implement. Load-shedding my big toe! All the time, when there was ample opportunity for maintenance to be carried out during the hard lockdown, everyone was…

13 Aug 2020 8AM 1 min