Ramaphosa Gives Tourism a Boost; Unions Concerned About BEE Vaccine Preferences

LOCAL NEWS

• Ramaphosa announces R1.2bn tourism equity fund aimed at boosting the tourism sector in the wake of Covid and will be managed by SEFA (small Enterprise Finance Agency) for an initial 3-year period before being handed to the Dept of Tourism.
• Capital of R540m from Dept of Tourism, R120m from SEFA & R594m from commercial banks allocated to the project
• Solidarity union writes to the WHO raising concerns that Ramaphosa's plan's to promote black empowerment (BEE) through the rollout of vaccines could be problematic.
• Says the threat to life and time-sensitive nature of the matter should mean that no differentiation or discrimination based on race or gender should be made
• Eskom suffers a second court defeat over cutting power to indebted municipalities as a means of trying to extract payment for debt.
• Court says Eskom must exhaust all other measures such as getting the energy regulator and Treasury involved before cutting power. This precedent is a bit of a blow for Eskom's payment extraction push