For Creamer Media in Johannesburg, I’m Thabi Madiba.

Making headlines: Gcaleka's appointment still in limbo as National Assembly defers vote to future date; High loadshedding stages 'temporary', as government assures it has measures to tackle blackouts; And, Zulu says Postbank failures threaten lives

Gcaleka's appointment still in limbo as National Assembly defers vote to future date

While advocate Busisiwe Mkhwebane was removed as Public Protector on Monday, the appointment of her successor is still in limbo.

Acting Public Protector Kholeka Gcaleka has been nominated by an ad hoc committee for this position, but her appointment needs to be approved by 60% of the National Assembly.

With all the opposition parties on the ad hoc committee, bar the Inkatha Freedom Party, indicating that they will not support her nomination, the African National Congress will need all its members to be present to achieve the threshold.

The date of 21 September was mooted for Gcaleka's matter, but Secretary to the National Assembly Masibulele Xaso informed the programming committee today that the Cape Town City Hall would not be available on that date.

High loadshedding stages 'temporary', as government assures it has measures to tackle blackouts

Cabinet has been given the assurance that the current higher stages of loadshedding are temporary.

This is according to Minister in the Presidency Khumbudzo Ntshavheni, who said Cabinet had extensive meetings focusing on the country's energy crisis.

Today, she presented the Cabinet's decisions following a meeting.

Ntshavheni also said that government was confident in its ability to resolve loadshedding, adding that it remains on top of the matter.

More than 45% of Eskom's power generation capacity is offline, with unplanned breakdowns at power plants alone taking 16 200MW from the grid. At the start of winter, Eskom saw a record outage of more than 50%, which pushed South Africa the closest ever to stage 8 loadshedding.

Last week, the brand-new Medupi Power station was hit by a chain break underneath one of its boilers. The chain forms part of a system called a "submerged scraper conveyor", which removes coal ash from the bottom of the boilers.

And, Zulu says Postbank failures threaten lives

Social Development Minister Lindiwe Zulu's admission that technical "failures" at the South African Social Security Agency "threatened the lives" of social grant beneficiaries has drawn calls for recipients to receive their money from private banks.

This comes a week after the older person's grant was meant to be paid out but thousands of recipients are yet to receive their money.

Speaking in the social development parliamentary portfolio committee, Zulu said that, for the majority of beneficiaries and their dependents, social grants are "the only form of income upon which their livelihood is founded".

She was reacting to what she called "failed" Postbank systems that erroneously recorded insufficient funds in thousands of old-age grant recipients' accounts, causing angst among those who depend on the monthly State income. The old-age grant is nearly R2 100.

Zulu said the "technical glitches" began when the SA Post Office and its subsidiary, Postbank, adopted a new payment system in October 2022.

That’s a roundup of news making headlines today

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