SARS Heralds Efforts to Cut Tax Non-Compliance, Experts Warn Eskom Running Out of Options

LOCAL NEWS

• SARS says its effort to clamp down on tax non-compliance has resulted in R172 billion for the fiscus, drawn across all tax types. However, it warned that tax compliance was under strain, dropping from 65% to 62%.
  • SARS' compliance drive yielded R12 billion in debt collections from large businesses, R42 billion from high wealth individuals, and R6.8 billion from corporates. The balance was collected from the voluntary disclosure programme, outstanding returns and targeted criminal investigations
• Experts warns Eskom is running out of options to stabilise its grid, and that it should consider permanent stage 1 load shedding to do the necessary maintenance to its plants.
  • Load shedding should not be a crisis during the summer months, as this is the period where electricity demand is quite low. In exceptional circumstances, such as a heatwave, demand could spike, but that is not the case right now.
  • There are no short-term solutions to the problem, so Eskom needs to do as much maintenance as possible
• Small kingmaker parties are pressing for mayoral positions in hung metros – placing larger parties in a predicament as they push to get coalitions over the line in the Western cape, KZN & Gauteng.
  • Factional battles over mayoral positions are also playing out in KZN with Ramaphosa's faction submitting Thabani Nyawose while the Pro-Zandile Gumede faction promotes Zama Sokhabase