More than 1.5-million people will be able to return to work once SA relaxes one of the world’s most stringent lockdowns to limit the spread of the coronavirus, according to a briefing by trade & industry minister Ebrahim Patel on Saturday.

The move into stage 4 is slated for May 1 and will equate to the return of a large number of employees who have been unable to do their jobs during phase 5, which imposed a near complete stop to economic activity and had economists rushing to downgrade their already gloomy predictions for 2020...