Author: Staff Writer

The National Credit Regulator (NCR) has urged consumers to be careful of fake credit provider scams, as South Africa continues the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic. “The NCR is warning consumers to be careful of scammers who act as legitimate credit providers, preying on vulnerable consumers during this period of COVID-19 pandemic. The impact of this pandemic has unfortunately left many consumers desperate for money with some having to resort to borrowing,” said the NCR Chief Executive Officer, Nomsa Motshegare. She said criminals have spotted an opportunity to exploit vulnerable people by posing as legitimate registered credit providers and offering loans…

South Africa’s parliament will resume its business with immediate effect after the Presiding Officers announced on Thursday that the leave period for Members of Parliament has been cancelled. This follows the suspension of the programme of Parliament’s two Houses last month, as a precautionary measure to curb COVID-19 by drastically limiting the numbers of people at the precincts in Cape Town and at off-site parliamentary activities. Briefing the media on the resumption of the business of Parliament on Thursday, Parliament Presiding Officers — National Assembly Speaker Thandi Modise and National Council of Provinces (NCOP) Chairperson, Amos Masondo — noted that…

If you are stuck at home with a burst pipe, you can now call your plumber to come to fix it. This is just one of the changes made to regulations governing the extended COVID-19 lockdown. The announcement was made by the Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs (Cogta) Minister, Dr Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, who was addressing the country on Thursday. “Today, we’re not coming with many new regulations. We’re extending the regulations that exist because the lockdown was extended,” she explained. This comes after President Ramaphosa extended the 21-day lockdown until the end of April to contain the spread of the…

Government has begun the process of bringing certain industries on stream in an orderly manner, including that of mining, in a phased approach to easing the nationwide COVID-19 lockdown. To this effect, government has amended the Disaster Management Regulations governing the lockdown to include a number of industries as essential trade. Through this amendment, certain sectors will return to operation under strictly controlled conditions. “I am confident that these amendments initiates and lay the foundation for the risk-adjusted measures the President announced last week.  In the coming days, the proposals already made by various stakeholders will be considered in our planning…

Work continues to map South Africa’s future – with Cabinet asking all clusters to work together to produce one consolidated document on key priorities regarding the country’s economic recovery plan that will used post the COVID-19 national lockdown. The call was made during a virtual Special Cabinet Meeting held on Wednesday to discuss the socio-economic recovery plan, post the COVID-19 national lockdown. This follows the announcement made by President Cyril Ramaphosa two weeks ago, that Cabinet have a full discussion to come up with an economic recovery plan for the country. During the meeting, five presentations were received from the…

How long has it been since you drove your car? For many South Africans during this lockdown, the car has mostly been used to go to the shop to buy groceries. Momentum Short-term Insurance (MSTI) will offer car insurance rebates to customers because fewer motorists are on the road as a result of the coronavirus outbreak. The insurer said in a statement on Thursday that it realises that clients are less exposed to vehicle accident risk during the national lockdown as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic and have therefore implemented additional measures to provide financial relief. “We acknowledge that the…

As the impacts of the Coronavirus (COVID-19) begin to take their toll on South African citizens, Vodacom has partnered with the Unemployment Insurance Fund (UIF) to zero-rate its uFiling website. The Vodafone owned company said in a statement that this will give employers and employees who have been affected by the COVID-19 lock down the ability to get information about the UIF and/or apply for UIF benefits, including the COVID-19 TERS Benefit – without incurring any charges for doing so on the Vodacom network. The UIF recently announced that it had committed R10 billion for payouts this financial year to deal…

The number of COVID-19 related deaths have risen to 34 in South Africa, with infections now at 2 506. This comes after Health Minister Dr. Zweli Mkhize on Wednesday confirmed seven more deaths. Mkhize confirmed the increase during a press briefing in which government received much-needed personal protective equipment from Multichoice, Orlando Pirates and Kaizer Chiefs. Confirmed cases overnight rose to 2 506 from the 90 515 cases since the country began conducting tests. Gauteng continues to have the highest number of infections at 930. The province is followed by the Western Cape and KwaZulu-Natal with 657 and 519, respectively.…

Government has set-up a hi-tech monitoring and evaluation platform in an effort to ramp up state capacity to monitor and respond to misinformation and fake news proliferating during the COVID-19 outbreak. In a statement, acting Communication Minister Jackson Mthembu said the intervention is being put in place to assess complaints and reports from the media, the public and other sectors of society. The platform has the ability to take down fake news items on a range of platforms and submit cases to the SAPS for investigation and prosecution. This solution is a unique collaboration between the Department, the Government Communication…

Huawei has donated high tech solutions to help South Africa’s fight against COVID-19. Health Minister Dr Zweli Mkhize received the company’s donation of four Huawei Cloud, Artificial Intelligence (AI) diagnostic systems and four thermal scanning systems at the company’s Johannesburg headquarters. The AI Cloud solution allows for fast, highly accurate diagnosis of coronavirus pneumonia by analysing CT scans of a patients’ lungs. Huawei SA CEO Spawn Fan says, “Early detection helps to reduce the spread of the virus and to flatten the curve. Speeding up diagnosis time from hours to minutes with a 98% accuracy rate is a powerful tool…