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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…

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…

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.”…

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…

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…

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…

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…

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,…

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…

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…

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.…

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.