RATINGS DOWNGRADE
Gordhan: urgent shift may save SA from junk
Avoiding a credit rating downgrade depends on a number of things, says Gordhan who pointed out a change in leadership in December could give the country a break
SA has a chance of averting a credit rating downgrade next week when international agencies Moody’s Investors Service and S&P Global Ratings release their ratings of its sovereign debt, says former finance minister Pravin Gordhan. SA risks falling further into junk status and being eliminated from leading global bond indices, which some economists believe is a certainty, especially after the resignation of the Treasury’s head of budget, Michael Sachs, and a last-minute push by President Jacob Zuma for free higher education. Sachs is the third senior official to resign in 2017 after Gordhan was booted out in a cabinet reshuffle in March. Lungisa Fuzile, who was Treasury director-general, and Andrew Donaldson, the acting head of the state technical advisory centre attached to the Treasury, left several months ago. Speaking to Business Day TV on Tuesday, Gordhan said: “Whilst we might say there are perceptions of state capture, I want to submit that some of it is very real, some of it ...
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