BizNews Radio

In this edition of the NdB Sunday Show, Chris Steyn and intelligence Analyst Alwyn Swart of Fulcrum Analytics talk about the instrumentalisation of the intelligence apparatus by administrations across the ideological spectrum; as well as the links between high-ranking officials and external parties using South Africa as a proxy, not only for political influence but also to do business in the international crime space. As for the fixation on the so-called Big 5, Swart says: “I would say the Big Five are merely line middle managers. They are connected to their influencers outside the borders of South Africa and it is difficult to arrest one and think the problem is gone.” Asked whether there are links between the international crime cartels and the international influencers of South African politics, he says: “Definitely. Although something like that has been viewed as very politically sensitive - and I do not think that will be exposed in the media. I do not also think that will be stated in high-end inquiry reports due to the threat that it has for stability in South Africa.” Swart also gives his take on the relationship between the United States and Israel amid the Iran War, and South Africa’s post-Cold War significance in the event of World War III.

Three weeks after BNC#9 in the Drakensberg, Stafford Masie is back in the interview chair, this time as interim CEO of Africa Bitcoin Corporation. His predecessor Warren Wheatley, founder of Africa's first listed Bitcoin treasury company, along with his wife Tatum Keshwar-Wheatley and chief investment officer Akshay Karan, have just been handed 20-year debarments by the FSCA, longer than the ban handed to Gupta-linked Transnet figures Eric Wood and Niven Pillay. Masie insists the ruling has nothing to do with the business itself, and that operations, funders and the loan book are unaffected. But he won't say how big the alleged share manipulation was, and he can't say whether Warren Wheatley is coming back.

Sasol's oil hedges are built for a $50-a-barrel world, its Qatar plant has been switched on and off every three weeks by fighting near the Strait of Hormuz, and its biggest customer market just hit it with a 30% tariff. CEO Simon Baloyi sits down to unpack how a company this exposed to global chaos stays standing, what a $12 billion bet on Louisiana is actually returning, and why he thinks South Africa is about to miss out on its own offshore gas boom.

He's a businessman with eight companies and 400 staff who says politics was the last thing on his mind, until the DA picked him to take Overstrand's top job from its first black executive mayor. Clinton Lerm has already survived a Hawks investigation, a standing court interdict with a rival party leader, and a question about political stability he still calls "strange." In this conversation with Alec Hogg, Lerm opens up on why he says he'll "never sell his soul," what he actually asks his municipal manager for, R100 million houses going up next to families who can't afford a daily meal, and whether Helen Zille can pull off the rescue of Johannesburg.

At BNC#9 in the Drakensberg, Public Works Minister Dean Macpherson sat down for a wide-ranging Q&A on why R100 billion in municipal infrastructure grants gets sent back to Treasury every year, unspent, and what he's doing to stop it. He unpacks the layered structure of the construction mafia, explains why his department is about to auction off nearly a thousand state properties, and lifts the lid on a R6 billion-a-year office leasing bill that once let a fraudulent tender through the back door. Along the way, he makes a case for why the 4 November local elections could reshape South African politics from the ward up, not the top down. Watch for his read on Cape Town's infrastructure model, the uMngeni turnaround, and why he thinks a Durban by-election result is a preview of what's coming.