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Rachel Kolisi has spent the past few months on the road in South Africa with Falling Forward, her book and the documentary that followed. Fourteen events and more than 10,000 people later, she is taking the project to London, a move prompted by women who travelled from Europe to attend the South African shows. In an interview with BizNews, she speaks carving out her own identity when brands wanted her at the table as a "two-for-one special," why vulnerability is still judged differently in women and why she will keep preaching financial independence for women until the end of her days. She also names the international women she most admires, with Melinda French Gates at the top of the list. – Linda van Tilburg

Political commentator Solly Moeng tells Chris Steyn that voters who shut the ANC out expect ActionSA and the DA not to cushion it over personal grudges: the ANC belongs on the opposition benches. Sports Minister Gayton McKenzie calls Swimming South Africa one of the country's worst federations, says the Act gives him no power to disband it, and calls Tatjana Smith's switch to the Netherlands a big loss with a big lesson. Plus Dean Macpherson on MK's KZN slide, Haniff Hoosen's 50/50 Durban, Charles Savage on AI writing all Purple Group's code, and Wall Street after Jensen Huang quits.

A year ago, Charles Savage made Alec Hogg a list of promises. This week he came back with Purple Group's best numbers yet: profit before tax up 36%, more than R100 billion in client assets, and nearly R17 billion deposited in a year when markets gave investors far less. So why do some shareholders still want out? Savage made the case that the scale benefits are only starting to show, that his longest-serving clients have grown their wealth faster than Warren Buffett, and that every line of the group's code is now written by AI, without a single job lost. He was also candid about what hasn't worked: a Philippine regulator who still holds the gate, a Kenyan launch that slipped, and crypto dragging on profits. He explained why his own bonus fell in a record year, and gave the advice he'd offer a 16-year-old opening her first account.

Gayton McKenzie spoke to Alec Hogg on the morning the ANC's national executive committee sat to decide its coalition path, and he was ready with a prediction: who would run Joburg, Tshwane and Ekurhuleni, and which party he believed would be left with nothing. Hours later he was due to sit down alone with DA leader Geordin Hill-Lewis, a meeting he traced back to a favour owed to Rob Hersov and a handshake made before a single vote was cast. The Patriotic Alliance more than doubled its council seats yet lost the Eldorado Park ward where it was born, and McKenzie was candid about why he felt it took silver rather than gold. He named the complacency he blamed for George, the one Northern Cape council he said the PA would rather fight a re-election over than hand to the ANC, and the message he sent his own leaders that morning. He closed by taking aim at Swimming South Africa after Tatjana Smith's switch to the Netherlands.

Before the vote, Haniff Hoosen promised to fix Durban by simply not stealing its money. MK then fell well short of a majority, and the DA's mayoral candidate found himself a coalition deal away from the job, or from losing it. He told Alec Hogg whether he'd step aside if his party's head office handed the mayoralty to someone else, why he rated the race a coin toss, which small parties he believed held the city's future, and what he'd tackle first in a city where the taps still run dry. He also named the Durban wards the DA won for the first time, and the ones that slipped away by a few hundred votes.

A month after telling BizNews that MK would fall short in Durban, Dean Macpherson came back to have his crystal ball checked. MK did fall short, and the DA's KZN chairperson said his party, the ANC and the IFP were now just three votes from running eThekwini. But he hadn't forgotten 2021, when small parties promised the DA their support and then handed the mayoralty back to the ANC. He told Alec Hogg how the DA was handling the kingmakers this time, why he believed MK's slide from 45% to about 35% came down to being shut out of the provincial government, what a DA mayor would do in a city with a record budget and 13,000 water leaks, and why he wasn't reading much into reports that Cyril Ramaphosa had cooled on working with the DA.

In his latest interview with Chris Steyn, political commentator Solly Moeng reveals that many “hardcore” ANC members - even ones who have been MPs - voted for ActionSA and the DA in secret so as not to lose their positions or businesses. He says those people now want a coalition between the Action SA and the DA. “So please, political party leaders, forget your personal grudges. Think about why people came to you and not elsewhere. Now, if you take their vote and you decide I'm going to cushion the ANC because I hate the other guys, that's disrespectful...” Moeng also dissects the bombs being dropped at the Madlanga Commission by tenderpreneur Cat Matlala about former Police Minister Bheki Cele, former Deputy National Commissioner Shadrack Sibiya, special leave Police Minister Senzo Mchunu, as well as the President Cyril Ramaphosa’s nephew by marriage, Tembisa tender don Hangwani Morgan Maumela. “There's a lot of accountability that is still not on the table because people have protection at the highest level and the president is not able to speak from a moral high ground about anything because they can also point fingers at him.” Moeng also comments on an alleged plot by IDAC to target whistle-blower General Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi.

A week after the vote, the arguments had moved from the ballot box to the bargaining table. DA leader Geordin Hill-Lewis told Alec Hogg which results caught even his own party off guard, and who he said was now voting DA. ActionSA's Athol Trollip explained why his party wouldn't simply hand its gains to the biggest party in Gauteng, and said the next move was the DA's. William Saunderson-Meyer argued the most telling result came from Howick, where Chris Pappas turned a knife-edge win into a bigger majority by doing the basics. Police committee chair Ian Cameron told Chris Steyn what the acting police minister had admitted about 10111, and what nearly 1.8 million abandoned calls meant for people in danger. Reuters closed the show with Wednesday's Wall Street rally and the AI results that sparked it.

A week after his first election as DA leader, Geordin Hill-Lewis had a queue of rivals telling him what to do. Herman Mashaba wanted Helen Zille out of the picture, Corné Mulder warned against any deal with the ANC, and Julius Malema's lawyers were threatening Zille with court. Speaking to Alec Hogg on the day the 14-day coalition clock started, Hill-Lewis refused to negotiate through the media, but he set out the range of deals on the table, said what the DA's donors want in return, and explained why he believes the party has broken through its glass ceiling with black voters. He also said an early national election was possible from next May, promised to back Zille "to the hilt" in any court fight with the EFF, and named the tests any new metro government would have to pass.

Seven of eight metros hung, the ANC on under a third of the vote, and less than a fortnight to form governments. William Saunderson-Meyer told Alec Hogg that Cyril Ramaphosa had finally run out of road to kick the can down, and that his choice between the ANC's heart and its head would shape the next decade. He argued the most telling result came not from Johannesburg but from Howick, where Chris Pappas grew the DA's majority in a seat everyone expected him to lose. He weighed the odds of an ANC-DA deal, questioned what corporate South Africa got for its campaign money, and suggested the DA might be better off sitting out bad coalitions until 2029. He also gave a blunt verdict on Gayton McKenzie's PA, and on whether new parties stand a chance.

Athol Trollip knows how coalitions end: one made him mayor of Nelson Mandela Bay, another removed him. Speaking to Alec Hogg after ActionSA took dozens of former ANC wards in Gauteng, the party's parliamentary leader argued that the next move belonged to the DA, not ActionSA, and explained why a tidy three-way deal with the DA and the Freedom Front Plus was not the easy answer many expected. He revisited the 2016 Johannesburg negotiations that, in his telling, sit at the root of today's bad blood, pushed back on Tony Leon's and Prince Mashele's readings of the result, and set out what ActionSA wanted in Tshwane, Ekurhuleni and Nelson Mandela Bay. He also explained how a small Karoo town became ActionSA's newest foothold, and why he believed funders who walked away in 2024 would be back.

In his latest interview with Chris Steyn, Ian Cameron, Chair of Parliament's Portfolio Committee on Police, reveals the answer he received from Acting Police Minister Firoz Cachalia on the number of abandoned 10111 calls: almost 1.8 million during the 2025-26 financial year. “That's about 5,000 calls per day. I mean if we really want to try and quantify it and give people an idea of the human impact of that, imagine you've got 5,000 victims calling for help and those calls are abandoned…He (the Minister) then further admits that genuine emergencies go unanswered. He acknowledged that in some cases, people that are literally facing life-threatening situations cannot connect to available operators because of excessive queues, system disconnections, and limited capacity.” Meanwhile, Cameron also expresses grave concern at the lack of progress with analysis of DNA samples from the 12 Ekurhuleni murders. “The response was shocking because the minister actually failed to provide any kind of a clear account... In fact, the reply explicitly says that the information is not readily available. Why not just answer us? So, I must be honest, I'm doubting the forensic process in this case…You can imagine what it feels like to the families of these victims when they hear this type of thing. “

Freedom Front Plus leader Corné Mulder says a DA deal with the ANC in Johannesburg would be the highest form of treason, and that his party would pull out everywhere rather than hand the ANC a lifeline. Analyst Sean McLaughlin reads the result as a step forward: voters rewarded service delivery and punished councils under administration. Herman Mashaba tells Alec Hogg there is no meeting while Helen Zille or Cilliers Brink is in play, while Zille says she is staying out of the negotiations. Plus Tatjana Smith on swimming for the Netherlands, and a hot-CPI selloff.

Eight weeks before the vote, Corné Mulder promised Alec Hogg a surprise. His Freedom Front Plus delivered its best result since 1994, but Mulder was more interested in what came next. He set out a three-party plan to run Gauteng's metros without the ANC, said it could be wrapped up within a week if a few personality clashes were settled, and drew a hard line: if the DA chose the ANC in Johannesburg, the FF Plus was out everywhere. He then went further, laying out a little-discussed constitutional route that could take South Africans back to the polls well before 2029. Mulder also weighed in on Helen Zille's soft words for Cyril Ramaphosa, ActionSA's township breakthrough, a disappointing night for Gayton McKenzie, and whether the party's Afrikaans name still caps its growth.

In his latest interview with Chris Steyn, Sean McLaughlin, the co-founder of Norsira, takes viewers on a road trip to cities and towns in all the provinces across the country to view the coalition options in a big range of cities and towns in the wake of last week’s Local Government Elections outcome. He takes viewers through the political party options in each one. “From top to bottom of the country, you're going to see a very wide variety of deals. Some may be pretty formal coalitions where they formalise things in writing. They take a proportional number of seats in the executive and share the seats accordingly. Some may have some sort of loose arrangements where they agree to work together, but only in the case of passing budgets and maybe electing the mayor and key executive decisions. The junior partner perhaps stays in opposition. That's one option. Maybe they agree to service delivery milestones or metrics or whatever the case may be…we're going to see a very broad array of deals.” * Norsira is an independent information provider on SA municipalities.

Coalition talks had barely started, and the two people at the centre of the Joburg question were already telling different stories. Herman Mashaba told Alec Hogg he had phoned DA leader Geordin Hill-Lewis with an offer: he and Helen Zille would both step back, the DA would lead Johannesburg and Ekurhuleni, and ActionSA would keep Tshwane. He said his relationship with Zille could not be repaired. Zille told Alec the bitterness came from one side only, and explained why she found his condition absurd. Economist Iraj Abedian gave his verdict on an ANC down to about 31%, including the two decisions he still credited it for. Former Bosasa COO Angelo Agrizzi told Chris Steyn what a minister had told him about the Bosasa evidence, and what he said he could do about it. Reuters closed the show with Wall Street's Monday rebound and the one chip stock that didn't join it.

Cheaper health insurance can look like a lifeline when the cost of living and the cost of medical aid schemes keep climbing. Medical schemes had an average contribution increase of 8.10% in 2026, and new entrants and current members alike are asking whether health insurance could take the place of medical aid. Lee Callakoppen, the principal officer of Bonitas Medical Fund says the difference may only become clear on the day it matters most, with a serious diagnosis, a long stay in hospital or a real emergency. Callakoppen said in an interview with BizNews that health insurance falls outside the Medical Schemes Act and works within set limits and exclusions, while a medical scheme is compelled to pay for prescribed minimum benefits even when your savings have run out. He explains what that gap can mean when you claim, and what to weigh up before you make the switch. - Linda van Tilburg

The DA set out to win Johannesburg, and it did: 91 seats, up from 71, and first place in South Africa's economic heartland. But it fell 45 seats short of a majority, and the two parties that could get Helen Zille into the mayor's office both came with strings attached. ActionSA's Herman Mashaba had made her candidacy a deal-breaker; the ANC had spent the campaign on the receiving end of her attacks. Zille told Alec Hogg why she found Mashaba's condition absurd, why she was keeping her hands off the talks, and why she read the ANC's response to its worst local result as a sign that South Africa's democracy was maturing. She also looked back three decades to a hostile press conference at the Carlton Centre, explained the whiteboard triangle she once drew in the Drakensberg, and set out the DA's next target: becoming the biggest party in the country.

While Namibia drilled its way towards an oil boom, South Africa produced court cases. Economist Iraj Abedian told Alec Hogg that the research needed to change that was finished years ago. He revealed the plan he drew up as a ministerial adviser to turn the Northern Cape into a petrochemical hub, and warned why gas under the Orange Basin may not wait for South Africa to make up its mind. He also took on the ANC's slide to around 31%, whether its leaders would ever vote for an early election, the personal feud stalling Joburg's coalition, and the single habit he said linked the ANC's decline to Donald Trump's midterm hiding.

Herman Mashaba went into the local elections with commentators writing ActionSA off. He came out holding the balance of power in all three Gauteng metros. Speaking to Alec Hogg days after the count, the ActionSA leader revealed the offer he made to DA leader Geordin Hill-Lewis in a private phone call, named the two people whose appointment would end talks before they began, and explained why a DA-ANC pact in Joburg would suit him just fine come 2029. He also set out the price of his support in Tshwane, why he turned down a cabinet post, and what he believes township voters were really saying at the ballot box.

If you wonder why State Capture accused are roaming free, watch Chris Steyn’s interview with former BOSASA COO Angelo Agrizzi. Ever since implicating himself when he blew the whistle on corruption at BOSASA, he has battled to hold accountable politicians also fingered only to now be told that the evidence has been destroyed. “Apparently it was in a courthouse that was affected by a fire or a flood. It's very sketchy details. Naturally it would be sketchy. I've been asking questions for the last two, three years. Why is nothing happening? I've done countless affidavits. I have written countless statements, sworn statements, under oath. I have given all that information. I can recreate all the evidence that they had. It's there. It's on the Cloud. It's available. Why has no one ever contacted me and asked me to assist in reproducing and giving evidence.” Agrizzi vows to “continue fighting and asking questions about what the South African government is doing about the Zondo Commission recommendations, what is going to happen to Nomvula Mokonyane, Gwede Mantashe, Tabang Makwetla, all the people listed in there…I. will continue. If it means I've got to go on the international platform and start doing it there, then so be it.” Meanwhile, Agrizzi describes his dealings with Advocate Glynnis Breytenbach from her time at the NPA; how corruption destroyed his relationship with Gavin Watson; the death threats to try and stop him from exposing the rot; the possible agenda behind his own arrest - and why he will be fighting the State’s R1,6 billion confiscation order.

DA chief whip Glynnis Breytenbach, a former senior prosecutor, tells BizNews that IDAC must be closed down - you cannot build a clean unit inside a corrupt NPA - and that the ANC, sitting on 30%, is getting about 20% more than it deserves. She also says South Africa may be the only country with its entire police top structure suspended or arrested, and wants the criminal justice system reset. Political analyst Mzo Mpolase sees no long game, only an ANC still blaming the voter. Plus Lincoln Mali on pre-loved boots for township rugby, and Wall Street's tech bounce.

Clinton van Breda has never had a boss, and in 21 years at the head of Universal Kitchens he says he has never installed a kitchen himself. He started at about 19 with a long-base bakkie his father chose instead of the double cab he wanted, and an overdraft secured by his father's R500,000. In this sponsored interview, he told Alec Hogg about the post-dated cheques that carried the business through 2008, opening in George weeks before COVID, the push into luxury kitchens against the imported brands, and the May flood at a newly occupied Malmesbury factory that held up payments on eight big jobs. He also explained why he chose not to expand his luxury showrooms nationally, and what his 19-year-old son is now building at the other end of the market.

In this NdB Sunday Show with Chris Steyn, political analyst Mzo Mpolase, says while the DA has increased its footprint in the Local Government Elections, “it was not enough to give it a mandate of governance. It will still find itself in these messy coalitions”. He says the DA's conduct in the GNU has impacted on voting trends. “They had this X factor, unknown factor to the voter. However, them being in coalition with the ANC has stripped that away from them…The whole notion of the DA getting into power and in coalition with the ANC was to pull back the ANC's worst instincts. But then all of these ANC worst instincts still play out…So now the voter is stuck with this thing that there's not that much differentiation between these two because the DA is actually not that responsive and in fact is walking toe-in-toe with the ANC on so many issues.” With the voting results at 99%, Mpolase also gives his take on the performances of MKP, the EFF, the FF Plus, the PA and the SACP. He examines the futures of all eight Metros and weighs in on how the animosity between the DA and Action SA could impact some of these cities.

A former head of IDAC in a police cell. A suspended deputy police commissioner denied bail. A whistleblower general lined up to run the Hawks. And an ANC that has slipped to around a third of the vote. Few people have watched South Africa's criminal justice system unravel from as close up as Glynnis Breytenbach, the former senior prosecutor who is now the DA's chief whip in Parliament. In conversation with Alec Hogg, she said she was "sadly not surprised" by the latest arrests, called the Agrizzi plea deal a travesty, argued IDAC should never have existed and said the acting police minister should simply be appointed. She also set out how long a proper reset of police, prosecutors and courts would take, and who she would like to see behind bars a year from now. Despite all of it, she insisted the country can be fixed.

Across the Eastern Cape, boys and girls run onto rugby fields in their school shoes or a pair of tekkies. Lincoln Mali, founder of the Mzwandile Mali Schools Rugby Champions League, tells BizNews how a visit by businessman Paul Gardiner to Kwanobuhle township led to Boots for Boys and Girls, a campaign to give pre-loved rugby boots to players who don’t have the right kit. The first collection box was placed at St Andrew’s College in Makhanda, and Mali hopes the drive will spread to other schools beyond the Eastern Cape. His league, which grew out of a tournament he started to honour his father to bring rugby to township schools, now includes 133 schools and is growing to 150 next year. Mali says his main aim is not only to produce rugby players. He wants them to stay at school, get good grades and have families of their own, because rugby gave him “great friendships, a lot of structure, a lot of discipline.”– Linda van Tilburg

Former DA leader Tony Leon tells Alec Hogg the ANC is electorally on life support after this week's local elections, and that thousands of councillors now out of work could make the fight over its next leader very ugly. Solly Moeng says Herman Mashaba must drop the personal angle against Helen Zille and put Johannesburg first, while ActionSA surprises in Tshwane. In a Ricardo portfolio update, Alec asks whether Palantir, with revenue up 96% to more than $2 billion in a quarter, can be worth what the market asks. Plus the Nasdaq's worst day in 19 months.

One day after the Local Government Elections in South Africa, in this interview with Chris Steyn - just after four o'clock and with 43% of the results in - political commentator Solly Moeng says Action SA leader Herman Mashaba and his party leadership need to listen to calls from voters not to go into coalitions with the ANC, but to work with the DA. “They have to find a way to respond to the people of South Africa who are saying we are punishing the ANC…his intentions are good, but I think he needs to take away this personal anger that he has against specifically Zille…they cannot sacrifice the will of the people because of personal feelings…” Moeng also comments on the performance of MKP, the FF, the PA, the EFF and other parties. “At least the people now have spoken. They've said to the ANC, we've trusted you long enough. We're slowly, slowly, slowly pulling the rug from under your feet. And that's the way to do it, slowly, slowly…so that it's not like an overnight thing and then they start blaming, I don't know what else, Jan van Riebeek.” As for US President Donald Trump’s party’s Midterm defeat, Moeng cautions: “...it's not time to celebrate Trump losing. Okay, we can do it. We private people can do it. But I think the people who are running foreign policy must spend more time lobbying…we need to work with America…we need foreign policy that is run by people who are not running around with emotions and old-era, Soviet era ideas about international relations.”

Four companies BizNews owns reported in the same week, so Alec Hogg went back to his own valuations to see whether they still held. Palantir nearly doubled its revenue and its chief executive declared his intent to take "the entire market", yet one number nagged at Alec. Uber delivered a fifth straight quarter of 20%-plus bookings growth while Wall Street priced it as if its best days were behind it. Back home, Lesaka and Exemplar told a different story, and slowing growth forced a harder look at what the Ricardo portfolio was willing to pay. Some numbers went up, some came down, and the pattern said a lot about where growth was coming from.

The ballots were barely a quarter counted when Tony Leon sat down with Alec Hogg, and he had already seen enough. The former DA leader, who helped negotiate the GNU two years ago, explained why a battered ANC still had cards to play, but none it could play for free. He laid out the formula he believed the DA should turn back on the ANC in Joburg, warned what a walkout from the GNU could mean for the rand and bonds, and described a party that had shed votes in its own fortresses. He also reflected on 1994, when his party was stuck "in the cracks", and on how far it had climbed since.

As the count got under way, three guests disagreed on what should follow it. William Saunderson-Meyer told Alec Hogg the vote was a verdict on the ANC, but the coalitions formed afterwards would be the real pointer to 2029, and he wondered how many of the party's true believers were left. Norsira's Sean McLaughlin pointed Chris Steyn to Emfuleni, where the DA had taken a township ward from the ANC in a May by-election and where he expected the ANC to slip further. He said the two largest parties governing together there could be a very good outcome. Cilliers Brink was not convinced that would work in Tshwane. He told Alec he wasn't sure voters wanted the DA at the table with the networks he blamed for the city's decline, and described the pushback he expected the moment reform came up. Reuters closed the show with Wall Street's reaction to the US midterms.

With millions of South Africans having already voted in today’s Local Government Elections 2026 in the wake of a “Blue Wave” striking the United States after its Midterm Elections, Chris Steyn asks Norsira’s Sean McLaughlin what colour wave he thinks might hit the country once the votes have been counted. “Today looks like it could be a very good day for South Africa's Democratic Alliance.” He shares an interactive link https://norsira-website.vercel.app/feature-analysis with viewers to access probable outcomes in 213 municipalities. Meanwhile, he expresses surprise that there has not been more political violence. “I would have expected a lot more trouble, especially as a liberation movement loses power in a country like South Africa. It's a tense time. We may still see more trouble unfold as the ANC loses power - and it is losing power almost by the day in many places in the country. What may happen if the ANC loses control of many, many councils across KwaZulu-Natal? There's competition for resources, there's the possibility of exposure of corruption cases within these municipalities. That may lead to greater political violence and just general unrest within certain nodes of the country. “

On the morning South Africans voted, William Saunderson-Meyer argued that the count would deliver the verdict, but the coalition talks would decide whether anything changes. The Jaundiced Eye columnist told Alec Hogg why so many ANC voters see their party's failings clearly and back it anyway, why a lower turnout may favour the DA, and why the ANC had plastered Cyril Ramaphosa's face across every metro instead of naming its mayoral candidates. He said the DA had been outmanoeuvred in the GNU, that only the election calendar had spared John Steenhuisen a disciplinary inquiry, and that Cilliers Brink may be within reach of Tshwane. He also warned against reading too much into Donald Trump's midterm drubbing, and asked whether South African voters, like a long-beaten donkey, still had the spirit to kick back.

South Africans vote today. Norsira co-founder Sean McLaughlin has run every metro and 213 local councils through a scenario model and tells Chris Steyn only about 45 look safe, with MK's first nationwide local test the great unknown - he expects it down in rural KwaZulu-Natal and in the metros. Legal scholar Dr Martin van Staden says the real problem is how much power sits in Pretoria, and that elites with skin in the status quo fear change. The DA's Cilliers Brink tells Alec Hogg the Tshwane polls understate him. Plus Nelson Mandela Bay's R28bn hole, and Apple dragging the Dow.

On the eve of the local elections, Dr Martin van Staden argued that South Africa's real problem was not who ran its towns, but how much power sat in Pretoria. Freshly appointed to build AfriForum's new Institute for Federalism, the legal scholar told Alec Hogg that communities were already doing the state's job, from policing to diplomacy, and that Citrusdal's farmers could not afford to wait five years for a better vote after Washington's Agoa decision. He accused the DA, IFP and Freedom Front Plus of believing in federalism only "on a sunny day", made the uncomfortable case that failing municipalities should feel the consequences of how they vote, and answered the charge that community federalism is ethnic separatism by another name.

On the eve of the vote, Norsira co-founder Sean McLaughlin told BizNews his firm had run every metro and local council through its scenario model, and found fewer than a quarter of them safe. He walked through how Durban could end up with a DA mayor backed by the ANC and IFP, why Joburg's DA surge might still land in opposition, and where MK could carve deep into the ANC's base in southern Mpumalanga. He also flagged the quieter contests, from Makhanda's collapse to Beaufort West's lesson for Gayton McKenzie, and the IFP's run of by-election wins that made it his dark horse.

Long suffering residents in South Africa's big metros are desperate for new administrations to bring back proper service delivery. In Nelson Mandela Bay, the mayoral candidate for the African Christian Democratic Party (ACDP) Lance Grootboom tells Chris Steyn: “Nothing is working…the state of Nelson Mandela Bay is not looking good. It needs change. It needs stability. And if that doesn't happen on the fourth of November, I think Nelson Mandela Bay is heading for trouble.” Grootboom describes the achievements of his party when it was in coalition rule twice, but says “since we were removed in May of 2023, everything went backwards in the city and we are sitting now where we are with money in the bank that is only for thirty-five days and can't pay our suppliers.” He blames the instability of the current coalition on the leading party, the African National Congress (ANC), but is confident that a new administration can turn the city around. “We did it with the same staff that the ANC gave us. It's people that were employed over the years by the ANC. We used those same people, provided leadership to them, and you saw the delivery. The same people are now there, but they are unable to deliver under the ANC government.”

A day before the vote, Cilliers Brink said the polls that put him well short of a majority in Tshwane had it wrong, or at least not yet right. The former mayor, removed two years earlier, told Alec Hogg that squeezed smaller parties and a weakened ANC election machine could still hand the DA an outright win. He laid the Bronkhorstspruit water crisis at the door of mayor Nasiphi Moya and the ANC-held portfolios in her mayoral committee, explained why he would bring private operators into water, electricity and waste collection without going the formal PPP route, and said the goodwill behind DA-ANC co-operation nationally did not extend to the metros. Then Alec asked him to sell his vision to a Mamelodi resident who had gone a week without water.

On the eve of the local government elections, three of Johannesburg's smaller parties told Chris Steyn what living in the city had become: friends idle on beer crates at noon, a CBD too unsafe to walk, and suburbs now complaining as loudly as townships. Frans Cronje said ordinary South Africans already agreed on how to fix the country and wanted their parties to work together, and explained who he believed was standing in the way. Prince Mashele said he was very worried about what an MK win could mean for KwaZulu-Natal, and named the ANC result he would count as bad news. Willem Els told Chris Steyn why an acting police minister had moved now on Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi and the Hawks, and whether the general's KZN formula could work in an investigations unit. Reuters rounded off the show with the latest from Wall Street.

Small parties wield big power in South Africa's coalition political landscape. Chris Steyn speaks to Move SA President and Jo’burg mayoral candidate Rali Mampeule, ALJAMA-A’s Jo’burg Mayoral candidate Ashley Mama and the African Transformation Movement (ATM) Youth Leader Bafana Tshabalala. They each share their worst experiences of living in Johannesburg, their visions of saving the city, and their desire for cooperation - instead of hostility - between parties. “All politicians should be like bishops and pastors, that their whole sole aim is to make sure that they preach the word of God. I get very surprised when politicians go and they debate and they hate each other. And I ask myself, when do they have the time to go on the ground and actually help the people that need the help”, Mampeule says. Tshabalala adds that coalition negotiations and agreements should not have at its centre “who gets to benefit from the benefits of Blue Lights”, but about ensuring that the city works and ensuring that the services are delivered to the people. “It should not matter who gets to deliver those services”. Meanwhile, Mama urges citizens to be more active, because “it does not help you to lament the situation. Because if you keep leaving the situation currently as it is, there will be a revolt that we won't be able to control.”

Political analyst Prince Mashele tells Alec Hogg the ANC needs 35% nationally for a good night, that anything in the upper 20s would be a catastrophe, and that with the vote days away Johannesburg voters still have no idea who its mayoral candidate is. SRF chairman Dr Frans Cronjé says South Africa is halfway through a two-step regime change, and only a DA-ANC deal uniting the middle class and the aspirant middle class holds the country together. Willem Els weighs Paul O'Sullivan's bid to block Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi at the Hawks.

Platō Coffee, a well-known South African brand founded by brothers Stephan and Petrus Bredell, started in a shipping container in Irene and is now heading for almost 180 shops, with expansion overseas under way. In an interview with Biznews, Bredell explains why the brand’s clean, modern white design and friendly baristas who know your name and your order have proved its biggest edge in London. When somebody remembers your name and order, he says. it matters in the AI age. He also talks about the success of their Harare shop, their collaboration with UK matcha brand PerfectTed and their plans to open in the US. And what does he put the success of Platō, and of Slingshot, the hospitality group he is now building with his brother, down to? Connecting the dots of failure, he says, and a healthy dose of “delusional confidence” as an entrepreneur.

In this week’s NdB Sunday Show, Chris Steyn and Willem Els of the Security Initiative for Africa (SIA) cover Acting Police Minister Firoz Cachalia’s announcement that he will seek Cabinet approval for the appointment of General Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi as the National Head of the Directorate for Priority Crime Investigation (DPC) (The Hawks) followed by a threat from forensic investigator Paul O'Sullivan to go to court to stop the appointment; the arrests of former IDAC Chief Advocate Andrea Johnson and sacked Crime Intelligence (CI) Deputy Chief Major General Feroz Khan; sacked Ekurhuleni Metro Police Chief Lieutenant Julius Mkhwanazi being hit with another charge, this time in relation to the murder of Witness D; the Special Investigating Unit (SIU) hunting luxury vehicles allegedly being hidden by tender don Hungwani Morgan Maumela; as well as the Pretoria High Court order that former BOSASA COO Angelo Agrizzi has to pay the State R1,66 billion in proceeds linked to corruption.

With five days to go before the local government elections, Prince Mashele told Alec Hogg what a good night and a catastrophe would look like for the ANC, and why he expected neither. He was blunt about Herman Mashaba, whose biography he wrote, and set out the offer he believed could tip ActionSA towards the ANC rather than the DA in Johannesburg. He dismissed Gayton McKenzie's kingmaker ambitions, said he was worried about what an MK win would mean for KwaZulu-Natal, and explained why South Africans stay loyal to parties the way they stay loyal to soccer clubs. Then he turned to his own plans: a movement due to launch in Soweto in March, with a leadership line-up he said would not shy away from talking about race.

Alphabet and Amazon both reported faster growth this week, and Wall Street still wiped roughly half a trillion dollars off Google's parent in a single session, its worst day since listing in 2004. In this Ricardo portfolio update, Alec Hogg explained what had really spooked investors: a cash machine that now needs shareholders' money, and an Amazon spending more on data centres than its business brings in. He set out why the Ricardo portfolio was holding on, the bear case he couldn't dismiss, and the very different picture back home on the JSE, where Reinet kept buying back its own shares and Prosus locked in a payout most investors could collect tax-efficiently by doing nothing at all.

South Africans had lost faith in the old order, Frans Cronje told Alec Hogg, but had not yet found a new one to trust, and Wednesday's vote would not close that gap. The SRF chairman set out the one deal he believed could hold the country together, why he thought voters were already there while the politicians were not, and how the ANC could come back to 55% if it made a choice it had avoided for a decade. He also turned a sceptical eye on the DA's record in Tshwane, Johannesburg and even Cape Town, explained why Helen Zille's Joburg run mattered more for 2029 than for next week, and described a country quietly reorganising itself into enclaves, from illegal miners under Johannesburg's streets to middle-class estates.

Victory Research CEO Gareth van Onselen tells Alec Hogg that no poll gives the DA a majority in Johannesburg, but it should be the largest party - and the closer it gets to 40%, the harder it is to justify shutting it out of coalition talks. Solly Moeng says everything points to Bejani Chauke, the former presidential adviser the Madlanga Commission wants answers from, having acted for Ramaphosa, while stressing nothing is proven. Donald MacKay wants fuller JSE disclosure on a case that could cost 10% of turnover. Bonitas on joining a medical aid early. Plus Alphabet's worst day.

In their weekly chat Chris Steyn and political commentator Solly Moeng dissect President Cyril Ramaphosa’s tough week on several fronts: The Madlanga Commission of Inquiry is seeking answers from his very influential former adviser, Dr Bejani Chauke, particularly in relation to WhatsApp chats with a notorious late taxi boss; his close friend and CODESA co-star, US Ambassador Roelf Meyer has been accused of political interference in Apartheid-era prosecutions; and election pollsters predict former President Jacob Zuma’s MKP could be heading for an outright majority KZN in next week’s Local Government Elections (LGEs). “I think that the only way that South Africa and the Presidency of South Africa can be saved, can be rescued, would be for serious political change, for people to go in there and change the system so that nobody ever comes in there with charming English, who wants to be hugged and who can hug you, and then who goes rogue on us and there's nothing we can do about them because the systems protect them,” says Moeng. Meanwhile, the President has resorted to door-to-door campaigning in KZN.

Six days before the vote, four serious pollsters could not agree on who was winning Johannesburg. Gareth van Onselen, whose Victory Research polls have drawn fire from the ANC and ActionSA alike, told Alec Hogg why the metro numbers diverged, why turnout could swing a party by up to five points, and why the real result would only emerge from two weeks of coalition bargaining after 4 November. He set out the test he believed eThekwini would pose for every other metro, the squeeze facing the DA in Cape Town, an idea for running Gauteng's three metros as one, and the ANC strongholds that, if they cracked, would mark a change not seen since 1994. He also had a blunt verdict on Herman Mashaba's claim to Soweto, and a word on the eight weeks his own Joburg tap had run dry.

In this interview with Chris Steyn, Donald MacKay, the CEO of XA Global Trade Advisors, describes how anti-competitive behaviour is rewarded when investigations drag on. He was speaking out amid a long wait to find out whether the Johannesburg Stock Exchange (JSE) will be hit with a penalty of ten percent of its annual income following a complaint by a secondary stock exchange against the JSE for anti-competitive behaviour. MacKay predicted that should the JSE lose at the tribunal, “it will force a fundamental change in how stock exchanges operate” in South Africa. As to whether the tribunal would hand down specific directives in addition to the possible penalty, MacKays says: “Well, we don't know that. This is why the tribunal has to wrap this up and take a decision now, but it would be implied in all of this that if you're guilty of anti-competitive behaviour, you can't buy your way out of that by paying a fine. You have to stop the anti-competitive behaviour that started all of this in the first place.” Meanwhile, “many” alternative exchanges have “not even survived” while others are “on the verge of closing down”. MacKay adds that the problem has become “severe”. The JSE has categorically denied all the allegations.

Cy Jacobs has lived in Johannesburg all his life, and he told Alec Hogg he feared the city was close to the point of no return. The 36ONE co-founder explained why he had stepped into the election, why he believed Helen Zille had earned the city's thanks, and why another 50,000 to 100,000 voters could change the outcome. William Saunderson-Meyer said this election felt different, with the country in desperate straits and voters more disillusioned than ever, and he had strong words for anyone planning to spoil their ballot or stay home. And Willem Els brought Chris Steyn some good news: Angola and Uganda had joined South Africa, Mozambique and Tanzania in a regional push against drug trafficking, at a time when local labs appeared to be producing far more than the country could use.

In June, Cy Jacobs predicted SpaceX would one day buy Tesla. Now that the boards are looking at it, he explained why he still wouldn't buy either, and how passive money may be doing more to hold up Elon Musk's valuations than profits. Then he turned to the city he has lived in all his life. The 36ONE co-founder warned that Joburg was close to the point of no return, said who he thought would win the mayoralty, explained what a change in government could mean for the city's bonds, the rand and house prices, and answered whether he would take a job in a new administration.

Asked for the ANC's best-case scenario, William Saunderson-Meyer couldn't find one, only least-worst options for a party he said may be in terminal decline. A week before the local government elections, the Jaundiced Eye columnist told Alec Hogg why the neatest deal on paper, an ANC-DA partnership that most voters of both parties say they would accept, may be the one the ANC can't bring itself to sign. He likened ANC power-broking to feudal barons around a king, explained why the feud with MK runs deeper than any rivalry with the DA, and argued MK was likelier to win eThekwini outright than the DA was to take Joburg alone. He also weighed whether Joburg's polls are underselling the DA, whether Tshwane's water crisis will cost ActionSA, why spoiling a ballot this time would be "a complete sacrilege", and why Gayton McKenzie's charm keeps working in the Western Cape.

Security analyst Willem Els tells Chris Steyn that the collapsed plea deal behind Cat Matlala's unsigned 25-page statement, which throws former deputy national commissioner Shadrack Sibiya and former police minister Bheki Cele under the bus, hands investigators a money trail even if it can no longer be used in evidence. Alec Hogg tells the BizNews Premium community what stood out from his Enoch Godongwana interview: Transnet's private rail lines, Eskom's turn, and the push to fix South Africa's exploration record. Pick n Pay's Sean Summers hits back at talk of slowing momentum. Plus Boeing's worst day in 18 months.

In this interview with Chris Steyn, Willem Els of the Security Initiative for Africa (SIA), comments on the R2,7-million legal bill racked up by special leave Police Minister Senzo Mchunu and President Cyril Ramaphosa’s continued failure to sack him. “He was supposed to be the saviour of the ANC and gather a lot of support in the province (KZN). And I think that is one of the reasons why it’s very difficult for the president to let him go.” With former President Jacob Zuma’s MKP predicted to triumph in the upcoming LGEs in KZN, Els describes how Zuma used intelligence apparatus to further his political ends during his tenure - amid current court revelations that he even had State Security Agents (SSA) agents infiltrate and spy on EFF leadership. As for allegations in an affidavit by tenderpreneur Cat Matlala of payments to former Deputy National Commissioner General Shadrack Sibiya, Els says: “That just tells you how valuable General Sibiya was for the syndicates...I think his legal woes and his problems have only started.” Lastly, Els shares good news in the fight against drug trafficking. “It is very interesting that a lot of these seizures …happened after the Madlanga Commission started to expose the political protection and also the operational protection of these syndicates.”

Pick n Pay CEO Sean Summers tells Alec Hogg the consumer is stretched by fuel, electricity and rent, and defends pushing break-even to 2029: you cannot wish for profit first and sales second. He has closed almost 200 stores in three years while the main rival opened 800. City Power whistleblower Stephanus Fourie tells Chris Steyn Johannesburg is practically bankrupt, questions where two bailouts are going, and says nothing changes until looters are jailed and their assets recovered. Dr Carla Mitchell on Africa's first moon mission, delivered for under half a million dollars. Plus Anthropic's IPO filing lifts Wall Street.

Three years ago, Sean Summers said, the talk at South African braais was whether Pick n Pay would survive at all. On results day, with the supermarket business still losing R516 million in six months and break-even pushed out to 2029, he told Alec Hogg why he wasn't in a hurry. He explained how the five-month stand-off with SACCAWU ended in a deal rather than retrenchments, what he said finally brought "seriousness into the room", and why he believed Pick n Pay was now outgrowing rivals that have opened hundreds more stores. He also took on the hard questions: whether being CEO of Pick n Pay and chair of Boxer is a conflict, why the market values the group at less than its Boxer stake, and what Spencer Sonn inherits when he arrives in February. His message to investors was blunt: it's not if, but when.

In this interview with Chris Steyn, City of Johannesburg whistleblower Stephanus Fourie warns that a new administration will not be able to root out entrenched mismanagement and corruption without drastic action. “Unless you catch the criminals and you lock them up and you take back everything that they've taken from the ratepayers, nothing will change.” Fourie believes that any person who steals from the government should be found guilty of terrorism, sent to prison without a term, given hard labour to earn back money to refund the taxpayer, and get released only “once every cent that you stole has been recovered”. Meanwhile, Fourie takes viewers behind the scenes at City Power where he was fired after he discovered “that there were anomalies that were non-consistent with the MFMA (the Municipal Financing Management Act)...And the biggest one was that they wanted to outsource sourcing. And not only outsource sourcing, the whole warehouse.” He has been reinstated following a court order, but City Power is still resisting his return. “One of the senior managers made a comment to say if he kept his mouth shut - referring to me - he would have been back at work…In front of witnesses.”

For more than 13 years, Dr Carla Mitchell has chased a dream she once believed belonged to Americans and NASA. Now she is leading Africa’s first space exploration mission to the moon in 2029. Africa2Moon will ride on China’s Chang’e 8 lander and deploy three 30 centimetre antennas, fondly known as BALLS, to pick up low frequency radio waves that our atmosphere blocks from Earth. A mission that should have cost more than $100 million is now expected to cost less than half a million dollars, because South African companies and universities took on the production at no cost and more than 30 scientists and engineers volunteered their time over a decade. Dr Mitchell, the mission director and Africa programme manager at the South African Radio Astronomy Observatory, told BizNews how it came together, and why she believes Africa is ready to lead in space exploration. – Linda van Tilburg

Analyst Wayne Sussman tells Chris Steyn something unprecedented has happened: across all six metros polled by eNCA MarkData, the ANC has not come out on top once, with Tshwane putting the DA just under 34% against the ANC's 25%. Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana tells Alec Hogg his target is 3% growth, not the 1.2% now forecast, and points to environmental and mining rules holding the country back. Political analyst Mzo Mpolase says a cartel was already running the country. Plus Lesaka's Ali Mazanderani on what a R5,000 loan costs, and Donald MacKay on 40-month tariff probes.

In today's NdB Sunday Show with Chris Steyn, Political Analyst Mzo Mpolase slams President Cyril Ramaphosa's latest utterance on the looming loss of AGOA. "You're running a country here, you're not running some ANC ideological office. This is the fate of the economy, the fate of many jobs, which you promise every time. So to hear this, it's almost as if … how low can we go as a country that our president will basically do running commentary of something that they stand right in a position where they can change. And then he speaks as if it's God's will that it will be this way…all it needed was decisions from you, political will from you, and a sense of diplomacy and a sense of understanding what our national interest is." Mpolase says South Africa needs a "never-again" moment. Dissecting testimony before the Madlanga Commission, he says: "When you look at some of the individuals that have thus far been implicated or are having court cases now, you do feel that there is perhaps a hand behind these individuals…the almost strategic targeting of provincial, local government, by entities…there has to be some power behind it orchestrating all of this." Mpolase also looks at the future of coalition rule.

Two days after telling Parliament that South Africa had emerged from the fiscal wilderness, Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana gave up part of his weekend to explain what that did and didn't mean. He conceded the tax burden had reached levels no finance minister should be comfortable with, and that growth of 1.2% was a long way from where he wanted it. His answer was not more tax, but cleaner spending and a hard look at the rules he said had stopped gas explorers in South Africa before they struck in Namibia, and left mining exploration far behind Canada and Australia. He also defended sending more money to failing municipalities, signalled a rethink on crypto, and set the record straight on his clash with the Reserve Bank governor.

In the latest Electoral Road Show with Chris Steyn and analyst Wayne Sussman, he shares the eNCA-MarkData Local Government Elections Survey results for eThekwini and Tshwane. It shows that former President Jacob Zuma's MKP is polling at 48% and heading for an outright majority in eThekwini with the ANC way below at 14,5% while the DA came in at 25,2%. "The ANC is on track across KwaZulu-Natal, not just eThekwini, to lose about five hundred councillors on election day…This is going to be a devastating result." Sussman adds that having reviewed the six major metropolitan areas in South Africa, "not once has the African National Congress been the leading party in our polls… this is absolutely unprecedented." Another unprecedented result is that now "the DA is bigger in Johannesburg than in Tshwane". In Tshwane, the poll has the DA in the lead at 33,9% to the ANC's 24,9%. Listen to Sussman unpack these latest poll results in detail and give an election preview with six Metros surveyed.

Lesaka grew out of Net1, whose subsidiary's social grants contract ended up before the Constitutional Court. Now it wants to take deposits from the same grant recipients it lends to. In a follow-up to their strategy conversation, Alec Hogg put the harder questions to executive chairman Ali Mazanderani: who carries the legacy of Cash Paymaster Services, what borrowers really pay on a R5,000 loan, and who protects the customer when one company is both banker and lender. Mazanderani gave little ground. He called the banker-and-lender criticism nonsensical, argued that for many rural borrowers the real alternative is a loan shark, and asked why a loan is fine for someone with a city job but not for someone living on a grant.

A tariff investigation in South Africa is meant to take six months. Donald MacKay, whose XA Global Trade Advisors released its latest import duty report this week, told Alec Hogg the average had stretched to 40 months, and that the oldest open case was old enough to start school. He explained why the International Trade Administration Commission was only part of the problem, how a groundnut processor gave up waiting and shut its factory, and why ArcelorMittal had become the most protected company in the country while the businesses downstream paid for it. He was also unusually calm about losing AGOA, called Washington's demands badly delivered but not irrational, and warned that secret deals attached to tariff decisions created exactly the conditions where corruption could take root, though he stressed he had no evidence it had.

ActionSA leader Herman Mashaba tells Alec Hogg he will work with any party where the numbers make sense, but if the DA wants a Johannesburg coalition, Helen Zille and Cilliers Brink must go first, calling both untrustworthy. He is wary of MK's instability but rules no one out. A BizNews Premium portfolio update asks whether Clicks is a bargain or a trap after a 47% slide, with headline earnings up 4.4% and just 2.7% once buybacks are stripped out. Plus Dr Carla Mitchell on Africa's half-million-dollar moon mission, and Wall Street's AI selloff.

A fresh poll had Herman Mashaba running more than twice as strong as his own party in Johannesburg. He called it laughable. Thirteen days before the local elections, the ActionSA leader told Alec Hogg he would be disappointed with anything under 30% in Joburg and set himself a target of half of Soweto's wards. He explained what the 2024 election cost ActionSA, why he stayed out of Parliament to rebuild, and which two DA figures would have to go before he would share a council with the party. He also laid out his three conditions for any coalition partner, his plan to fold Joburg Water and City Power back into the city, and a blunt message for the officials he says crept back in after he left office. And he explained why a professional fisherman never bothers with the dam.

Alec Hogg went into this episode wanting to sell two shares. The rules he built for the Ricardo portfolios talked him out of at least one. In the first of a new run of Premium portfolio updates, he put four fresh sets of results through the same valuation test: Afrimat, whose iron ore profits all but vanished while its quarries quietly earned their keep; Clicks, a business still growing that had turned into a valuation problem; Chubb, the insurer walking away from business it thought was underpriced; and Teledyne, the sensor maker that had just posted the best quarter in its history. One share was put on probation with three tripwires. Another was left hanging until the next Ricardo webinar, along with a new rule and a JSE share the market had priced for a decade of decline.

Enoch Godongwana told Parliament that South Africa had emerged from the fiscal wilderness. Dawie Roodt agreed the corner had been turned, then explained why the reasons should worry anyone who pays tax. William Saunderson-Meyer asked who really gained from 547 parties crowding the 4 November ballot, Ian Cameron described what he found inside three Tshwane police stations, including a motorbike parked in a kitchen, and ACDP deputy president Wayne Thring set out how much water and money eThekwini was losing. Reuters rounded things off with the latest from Wall Street.

In his latest interview with Chris Steyn, Ian Cameron, the Chair of Parliament's Portfolio Committee on Police, shares the shocking findings of his latest oversight visit. He describes finding, at one station, over 30 detectives sharing an office container with only three chairs and one laptop and no official detective telephones. He also details horror findings at two more stations. Cameron says SAPS members are pleading for help. “I've already submitted the reports this morning to both the Minister and the National Commissioner and we will be following it up...” Also discussing the biggest shocks from the Budget Review, Cameron says: “...Only one out of 10 murders are actually detected properly. Remember, it doesn't necessarily mean it is solved or that there's success or prosecution. This is just a complete detection process. So I am extremely concerned.” Lastly, he says police members are hailing the downfall of former Deputy National Commissioner Shadrack Sibiya and former Crime Intelligence deputy chief Feroz Khan. “...Really dedicated ground level members are saying, but this is good riddance. They've been wishing for resolve for so long.”

Enoch Godongwana told Parliament that South Africa had emerged from the fiscal wilderness. Dawie Roodt agreed the corner had been turned, just not for the reasons the minister would want. Debt had stabilised and the primary surplus was growing, but the improvement came from a commodity windfall, an aggressive SARS and a tax burden Roodt said was the highest it had ever been, rather than from growth. Speaking to Alec Hogg hours after the mini budget, the Efficient Group's chief economist took aim at the money flowing to badly run municipalities two weeks before the local vote, the politics behind the fuel levy cut and the social grant court case still hanging over Treasury. He finished with blunt advice for taxpayers, investors and ratepayers.

Johannesburg twice handed its mayoralty to a party that won less than 1% of the vote. With 547 parties and almost 137,000 candidates chasing 10,526 council seats on 4 November, Jaundiced Eye columnist William Saunderson-Meyer argued that most of those names were vanity projects or job-seekers, and that the big parties quietly benefited from the clutter. He told Alec Hogg why ActionSA's Herman Mashaba could end up a kingmaker but not a queenmaker in Joburg, how two party leaders reached powerful parliamentary posts on well under half a percent of the national vote, and why a cross next to a no-hoper might end up somewhere the voter never intended.

With Local Government Elections looming, all eyes are on KZN. In this interview with Chris, Steyn, eThekwini Mayoral Candidate and Deputy President of the African Christian Democratic Party (ACDP), Wayne Thring, describes how his party resisted bribery involving millions and even an offer of an ambassadorship. “Our councillors were offered incentives, millions of Rands, to join a particular coalition bloc which was with the ANC and the current coalition bloc in eThekwini. And they resisted, they refused. And that's the calibre. I myself was enticed with positions when I was serving in 2013. I was enticed with positions at a national level. I was offered an ambassador position if I would resign from the ACDP to join the ruling party. I refused.” As for his party’s decision to stay out of the Government of National Unity (GNU), he said: “We were invited and positions obviously were forwarded for the ACDP. But because of the tainted track record that the ANC have, we would have found ourselves having to defend, like the coalition partners are now having to defend at a national level, some of the policies of the ANC. Or if not defending, having to be quiet and silent so as not to rock the boat.” Thring is adamant that his party would never go into a coalition with the ANC, MKP and the EEF. “We have boots on the ground currently in all of the wards across eThekwini to ensure that a party like the MKP, and I must add ANC and EFF, amongst some of the others…we are working hard to ensure that political parties like these do not cause more damage, bring more chaos to South Africa…”

Cape Independence Party leader Jack Miller tells BizNews what a good night looks like on 4 November, and how a five-megabyte upload limit on the IEC's portal kept Cape Exit off the 2024 ballot entirely. Security analyst Willem Els says the secrecy around the trial of Jacob Zuma's former spy boss Thulani Dlomo, accused with a fellow SSA official of looting R12 million in secret funds, is no surprise, and may be only the tip of the iceberg. Orion Minerals CEO Tony Lennox explains why Glencore as both funder and sole buyer suits Prieska.

Nineteen years after turning a Facebook group into a political party, Jack Miller still hadn't won the Cape its independence, and he told Alec Hogg he had made his peace with the possibility that he never might. What he hadn't given up on was the leverage. With the Cape Independence Party fielding candidates in almost every Western Cape ward on 4 November, Miller set out how a small slice of the vote could push the DA below 50% and turn CapeXit into a kingmaker with a single price: referendums. He described being carried out of the Cape Town council chamber, argued that voters' fear of the ANC was misplaced, explained why the Referendum Party ended up in the FF Plus rather than with him, and named the parties he would and wouldn't work with. He closed with a claim about South Africa's governments that few would share: that each has a shelf life, and the current one is nearing the end of its own.

Former President Jacob Zuma's “super spy”, the once feared and powerful Thulani Dlomo, has gone on trial in great secrecy with a fellow former spy boss for allegedly making off with R12 million of State Security Agency (SSA) funds under false pretenses. In this interview with Chris Steyn, Willem Els of the Security Initiative for Africa (SIA) and the Institute for Security Studies (ISS) says: “If you look at the sheer amounts of money that are actually moving around and being moved within these agencies, this 12 million is maybe just sort of the tip of the iceberg.” Dlomo’s trial is the first major criminal action against the SSA in the post-Zuma era. In another major first, the Madlanga Commission of Inquiry laid criminal charges against a subpoenaed witness for dodging his appearance, resulting in the airport arrest of former African National Congress (ANC) moneyman Suliman Carrim. “It is very crucial that Mr Carrim needs to come and answer some questions,” says Els. He also weighed in on President Cyril Ramaphosa’s belated reinstatement of National Police Commissioner Fannie Masemola after the National Prosecuting Agency (NPA) dropped charges against him. “I think there was a lot of pressure on the Presidency to reinstate him and they had to do so because it seems that legally they did not have any leverage to further his suspension.” He urges for the SAPS Reset to “cut deep and hard”.

A copper mine that had sat idle and flooding for 35 years finally had its first Glencore tranche unlocked, and Orion Minerals CEO Tony Lennox argued that South Africa's reputation as a near-impossible place to mine had been overdone. Michael Marchant of Open Secrets explained why Wicknell Chivayo flaunted Rolls-Royces and cash while millions of Zimbabweans struggled, and what that showmanship may really have been buying. Wayne Sussman's walk through the latest Johannesburg poll held a surprise about Helen Zille and a blunt message from residents about how their city is run. Reuters rounded things off with Wall Street's return to chip stocks after a bruising week.

The Prieska copper-zinc mine had stood idle for 35 years, its lower workings filling with water. After eight months of negotiation spanning South Africa, Australia, Switzerland and Canada, the first US$40m of Glencore's US$250m package finally became unconditional, with money due to flow from the end of October. Orion Minerals chief executive Tony Lennox told Alec Hogg what that first cheque unlocked, what still stood between Orion and the far larger Deeps, and why he believed the story that South Africa makes mining near impossible was overrated. He also took on the risk of selling everything to a single buyer, the exit of a long-standing shareholder, BHP's interest in the Northern Cape, and whether a junior sitting between two giants could keep rowing its own boat.

Analyst Wayne Sussman unpacks an eNCA/Markdata survey putting the DA on 35% in Johannesburg and the ANC just under 22%, in a city the ANC has always led, with MK, the EFF and ActionSA all above 10%. Commentator Solly Moeng says Patriotic Alliance supporters must decide whether they are backing Gayton McKenzie’s voice or real change. Magda Wierzycka tells Alec Hogg she turned down a $1.4 trillion offer for her Anthropic stake. Rally driver Max Smart charts his climb from motocross to the world stage. Plus Wall Street’s AI-led slide.

In this edition of Electoral Roadshow with Chris Steyn, analyst Wayne Sussman unpacks the latest results from the eNCA MarkData Election Survey. In Johannesburg, the Democratic Alliance (DA) is way out in front on 35% of the vote, the African National Congress (ANC) second on 21,8%, uMkhonto weSizwe (MKP) third on 12,5%, the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) fourth on 11.9% followed by ActionSA on 10.3%, and the Patriotic Alliance (PA) well below on 3.7% Here, the DA’s Helen Zille is the most popular mayoral candidate at 30,6% with ActionSA’s Herman Mashaba second at 23.4%. In Cape Town, the DA came in at 52,6% followed by the ANC at 23,6%, the EFF at 6.5%, the PA at 3.9%, and MKP at 1,5%. Here, the current mayor, the DA’s Geordin Hill-Lewis polled the highest at 55,4%. The elections survey results for Ekurhuleni and Nelson Mandela Bay were discussed in last week’s show. The results for eThewini and Tshwane will be out next Sunday. The voters go to the polls in the Local Government Elections (LGEs) on 4 November.

In today’s NdB Sunday Show with me, Chris Steyn and political commentator Solly Moeng talk about the politicians who have not sold their souls, those who have, those who are fit for office, those who not. Moeng gives his frank appraisal of politicians like Ian Cameron, Gayton McKenzie, Fadiel Adams, Paul Mashatile, John Steenhuisen, Herman Mashaba, Mmusi Maimane, Songezo Zibi, Duduzane Zuma…He explains why it would be unwise for Geordin Hill-Lewis to become a Minister. He comments on the ANC’s Constitutional Court’s victory that saw Fikile Mbabula collapse, possibly from relief. He also talks about the rumours that the late Ambassador Nathi Mthethwa’s family is moving to France where the former Police Minister died from a mysterious fall from a hotel. Lastly, he damns the conduct of former General Shadrack Sibiya. “I always say when you become powerful, you need a whisperer. You need somebody who's able to stand in front of you and say, But you can't do that. And you know that it comes from a good place. This person is not trying to destroy you. They know what you're capable of, or they know that you can be blind to certain things. So they're there to say, Don't do it. Let's go home. Let's go and have coffee, let's go and have tea, but don’t get involved because anything can happen.”

A week before Sygnia shareholders vote on an expanded share incentive scheme, Magda Wierzycka was not playing defence. Responding to a Financial Mail report that cast the plan as an enrichment scheme, she told Alec Hogg it was about holding on to a long-serving executive team and being able to hire a CFO, or a successor CEO, at today's market rates. Then she went further. With 30 days' notice and no restraint of trade, she said a weak vote would leave her asking whether she still wants to work for other shareholders, at a time when she believes stakes in private giants like Anthropic, OpenAI and SpaceX can make her more than Sygnia has in 20 years. She also said the dispute with former partner Andre Crawford-Brunt was settled, previewed a fund giving South African investors access to those companies, and warned that every division at Sygnia would have to be rebuilt for the AI era.

South African rally driver Max Smart won Africa’s place in the FIA Rally Star Programme, where he raced for three years, and went on to the Junior World Rally Championship. Now competing in Spain, he leads the Spanish Gravel Rally Championship for PCR Sport by a single point going into the final round in Granada. In an interview with BizNews, Smart talks about winning a stage on ice in Sweden having never seen snow, and how he has come up with a way to finance the R600,000 a rally cost of competing, which includes his 20 Club sponsorship programme and learning the skills of a mechanic in his team’s workshop. And where did it all start? With a video game, and a momager who helps him keep it going. As a young driver going it alone, he is still building the partnerships that will keep his Ford Fiesta Rally2, “an absolute monster” of a car, on the road. - Linda van Tilburg

Wicknell Chivayo handed out Rolls-Royces, posed with piles of cash and bought a R160 million home in Clifton. Then, days after Open Secrets asked the Hawks to investigate how R800 million from a Zimbabwean election contract landed in his South African accounts, his helicopter came down outside Harare. Michael Marchant, head of investigations at Open Secrets, traced how a man with a fraud conviction and a decade of damaging headlines moved money through South African banks, estate agents and luxury car dealers, and why the presidents who praised him at his funeral may have their own reasons to keep the myth alive. He argued this was never only Zimbabwe's problem: with his estate now up for grabs and a fresh FATF review looming, the Chivayo case had become a test of whether South Africa can stop being a parking lot for the continent's dirty money.

William Saunderson-Meyer tells Alec Hogg that MK will outlast Jacob Zuma: dead or alive, Zuma has shaped South African politics, and any ANC recovery has to run through a party he expects to grow and to take control of Durban's council. Patriotic Alliance co-founder Charles Cilliers hits back after the DA's Tertuis Simmers called the PA a criminal enterprise, accusing him of insulting poor voters. Open Secrets' Michael Marchant traces how the late Wicknell Chivayo's inflated R1 billion Zimbabwean election contract pushed R800 million into South African accounts. Plus the latest from Wall Street.

Is Jacob Zuma the glue holding MK together, or has the party already outgrown him? In the first of his weekly conversations with Alec Hogg on BizNews, William Saunderson-Meyer, whose Jaundiced Eye column has run every week since 1993, said he didn't buy the common wisdom. He argued that MK had tapped a deep well of grievance against the ANC, that it stood to grow in the local elections, and that the ANC's road back to power may run through MK. He sized up Duduzane Zuma as heir apparent, compared the family's split to Romulus and Remus, and described Gayton McKenzie as a hyena of the political wilderness. Then he laid out one set of numbers he keeps coming back to, and why it should worry anyone counting on a weaker ANC.

Earlier in the week, the DA's Tertuis Simmers sat in the same BizNews studio and called the Patriotic Alliance a criminal enterprise dressed up as a party. Charles Cilliers, the PA co-founder and former newspaper editor who wrote Gayton McKenzie's life story, came back with his reply. He told Alec Hogg what he made of the vote-buying claims in George, why he believes the DA cannot lead a coalition, and his version of the Joburg deal that collapsed over a single mayoral committee post. He took on the Beaufort West fundraising questions and the "coloured nationalist" label, and explained why the PA would still hold its nose and work with a party it finds nauseating. He would not say what the PA's first demand will be if it holds the balance of power after 4 November.

The company once known as Net1 has just posted its first full-year profit and is telling the market to expect adjusted earnings to compound at more than 40% a year. Executive chairman Ali Mazanderani, who says he has helped build seven multibillion-dollar fintechs from Brazil to Europe, told Alec Hogg why he believes South Africa's big banks are structurally unable to win the township economy, and why local capital has been too cautious to back the challengers. He also set out what the pending Bank Zero deal would do to Lesaka's debt, why nine in ten South African merchants still don't take card payments, and why he accepted a pay deal that only works if the share price does.

Nelson Mandela Bay has been through nine coalitions in ten years by Retief Odendaal's count, and the DA's mayoral candidate said he would not try to run a ten-party government again. Political scientist Professor Mcebisi Ndletyana, co-author of The Zuma Effect, explained why Jacob Zuma's comeback came as no surprise to him, and why he believes MK is as chaotic as the man who founded it. Lesaka executive chairman Ali Mazanderani argued that the market was already waking up to the fintech's story, and that cash was not coming back. Reuters rounded off the show with the latest from Wall Street.

Jaco Zuma’s ambition to become president of South Africa was rooted in personal interests: to evade the law and assuage his dire financial circumstances - and his faction used chilling tools to get and keep him in power for as long as possible. So says political scientist Professor Mcebisi Ndletyana, the co-author of the “The Zuma Effect”, a five hundred-page work regarded as the definitive work on the Zuma era. In this interview with Chris Steyn, he describes what happened behind the scenes with the making of a personality cult, the remaking of the African National Congress (ANC), the disbandment of The Scorpions, the manipulation of the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) and other law enforcement institutions, as well as Zuma’s “intelligence project” Public Protector Busisiwe Mkhewebane. “So you have these series of undeserving people who don't expect to have these positions on their own merit. They're shocked that they're even appointed. So they spend most of their time paying back this debt to the president for doing something that they never thought they would ever achieve in their lives.” As for Zuma’s “revenge” MKP, Professor Ndletyana says: “MKP couldn't escape Zuma's personality because JZ believes in personalised rule. So he's formed the party in his own image. When Zuma dies, the party dies.”

Retief Odendaal ran Nelson Mandela Bay for eight and a half months before a no-confidence vote removed him in 2023. Three weeks out from the 4 November local elections, with a new poll putting the DA and ANC almost level in the metro, the DA's mayoral candidate told Alec Hogg why his party has gone to court to make mayor Babalwa Lobishe personally liable for leasing a R25m municipal transformer to a private company. He laid out how a metro with cash in the bank keeps handing infrastructure money back unspent, why he says its top management posts sit empty, and why he will not sign up for another ten-party coalition. He also explained why, despite all of it, he still calls Nelson Mandela Bay the country's most fixable metro.

Freedom Front Plus leader Corné Mulder tells BizNews the government of national unity could technically run to 2029, but Parliament can dissolve itself from May next year and a new ANC president elected in a year's time could recall Cyril Ramaphosa. Mulder also reveals the DA agreed early on to leave international relations to the ANC, and says the FF+ has declared a dispute under the GNU's deadlock-breaking mechanism over the US standoff. Plus DA Western Cape leader Tertuis Simmers on the premiership, Donald MacKay on what really hollowed out manufacturing, Willem Els on the Ballito teen, and Wall Street.

A six-year-old girl was critically injured in a school stabbing this morning allegedly by a former pupil who also planted a homemade bomb at a Ballito Mall in March. Describing the attack, Willem Ells of the Institute for Security Studies and the Security Initiative for Africa, says: “He was armed with a homemade firearm as well as a kitchen knife with a six-inches long blade. And apparently he discharged the firearm and it did not function. So there could have been some more fatalities there, but then he attacked the little girl.” Els recalls a previous interview in which he spoke to Steyn about how the “Lone Wolf” teenager had “idolised the Columbine shooters in America and that he wanted to do the same in order to cement his name in history…” As for why this teenager was roaming the streets after the failed bomb attack, Els - who is also an explosives experts - charges: “I think we need to ask those questions high up and more questions should be asked because what we gathered is that the police that attended the scene handed the IED back to his parents. That is completely, completely against the law to do that. “

A week after an ANC committee chair floated treason and suggested stripping critics of their citizenship, Corné Mulder joked that the state had better move fast, because his tax return was due. Then he got serious. The Freedom Front Plus leader told Alec Hogg why he believed the threat had no constitutional footing, why he had moved to invoke the GNU's deadlock-breaking mechanism rather than fight it out in a cabinet he called stacked against his party, and why he thought the ANC was misreading Washington. He also told the story of a grandfather sentenced to death for a killing that never happened, set out who he would and wouldn't govern with in Tshwane, Joburg and the Western Cape, and explained why he expected the FF+ to be the good story of the 4 November vote.

The DA finished first in Ekurhuleni, the metro that once carried the ANC over the line in Gauteng, but by less than two percentage points, and with no party anywhere near a majority. Wayne Sussman took Chris Steyn through the first eNCA MarkData metro poll and explained why the East Rand mattered more than many people assumed. In Hermanus, the DA's Western Cape leader Tertuis Simmers told Alec Hogg he would never govern with the Patriotic Alliance. Asked whether the DA took coloured voters for granted, he answered with job-seeker databases, housing lists and a lottery draw for public works jobs, and described the message he believed the PA was selling. Boxer chief executive Marek Masojada described what happened in his stores once grant-week money ran out, and what his shoppers had stopped putting in their trolleys. Reuters closed with oil's jump after attacks on a Saudi airport, a reminder of the fuel costs Masojada said were already squeezing South African households.

Boxer's shoppers fill their pantries in grant week and run short by mid-month. Diesel has pushed up taxi fares, rice is selling for a fifth less than a year ago, and like-for-like sales barely moved. Yet the discounter sold nearly 4% more goods, opened its 600th store and cleared its long-term bank debt. On results day, chief executive Marek Masojada told Alec Hogg what his customers are leaving on the shelf, how AI went from taking meeting minutes to the core of the business in six months, how deals with controlling shareholder Pick n Pay are kept at arm's length, and what stands between Boxer and a thousand stores. He also named the question he expected investors to press hardest.

With 23 days to go to the local government elections, the DA's Western Cape leader Tertuis Simmers sat down with Alec Hogg in Hermanus and drew a hard line. He said he would never govern with Gayton McKenzie's Patriotic Alliance, and described what he said he had seen with his own eyes during the by-elections that cost the DA three wards in George. He spoke about the 2024 building collapse in George that killed 34 people, why no one has yet been charged, and the one outstanding report he said is holding up the police. Simmers set out the party's battle plan town by town, from Knysna, which he called a blueprint for poor local government, to Bitou, where the DA has twice missed an outright majority by fewer than 30 votes. He also owned up to the biggest mistake of his ministerial career, and answered the question he said follows him everywhere: does he want to be the next premier?

In this edition of the Electoral Road Show with Chris Steyn and analyst Supremo Wayne Sussman, he unpacks the polling results of the first two of six metros surveyed in the highly scientific eNCA MarkData 2026 election poll. In Ekurhuleni, the DA emerged first with 31.2% of the vote, the only party to breach that 30% mark. Second was the ANC with 29.4%. A distant third was MKP at 11.5%. The EFF came in fourth place at 9.2%. In Nelson Mandela Bay, the DA is in the lead with 37.7% of the vote just ahead of the ANC on 37.4%. Coming in third is the EFF at 8%. “The job for the DA as the leading party is how can they stretch that lead in the coming weeks. The job for the ANC is to re-emerge, try to re-emerge as the largest party in Ekurhuleni. And the other parties will be looking at these polls and saying, look, this is a golden opportunity. The ANC is not doing well. What can they extract from the ANC? There's a lot to play for, for each and every single one of the major parties over the next few weeks.” Sussman says questions about service delivery and other key issues produced “very worrying responses for those in government, for those leading. The electorate is not satisfied with the state of local government, with the way our cities are being run.” In next week’s show, the polling results for Johannesburg and Cape Town will be unpacked.

Intelligence analyst Jasmine Opperman warns Chris Steyn that instability ahead of the local elections could expand beyond the state's capacity to control, with the military underfunded and crime intelligence unable to pay sources. David Shapiro and Alec Hogg return to the Dimension Data Campus saga, asking why Jason Goodall would sign away R350 million, and whether the remaining directors' defence that NTT's Japanese owners knew all along can hold. Alec also unpacks Africa Bitcoin Corporation, where the board has publicly opposed its own 76% shareholder bloc's push for two new directors. Plus Wall Street's Friday rally.