PARIS (Reuters) &#8211; French oil major Total has signed a $14.9 billion senior debt financing agreement for its massive liquefied natural gas (LNG) project in Mozambique, the biggest project financing ever in Africa, it said on Friday.



The project includes the development of the Golfinho and Atum natural gas fields in the Offshore Area 1 concession, and the construction of a two-train liquefaction plant with a capacity of 13.1 million tons per annum, Total said.



Jean-Pierre Sbraire, chief financial officer of Total, said the signing, which secures the majority of the project’s total investment of $20 billion, shows financial institutions have confidence in the long-term future of LNG in Mozambique.



Mozambique LNG is one of several projects being developed in the country’s northernmost province of Cabo Delgado after one of the biggest gas finds in a decade off its coast. Together, the projects are worth some $60 billion.



Rival Exxon Mobil delayed the final investment decision on its nearby Rovuma LNG gas project due to the coronavirus pandemic, and Mozambique expects the decision next year.



Mozambique LNG’s project financing includes direct and covered loans from eight export credit agencies (ECAs), 19 commercial bank facilities, and a loan from the African Development Bank, Total said in a statement.



UK Export Finance (UKEF) was among the ECAs contributing to the financing, alongside the Export Import Bank of the United States, Italy’s SACE, the Netherlands’ Atradius, the Export Credit Insurance Corporation of South Africa, Japan Bank for International Cooperation, Nippon Export and Investment Insurance, and the Export-Import Bank of Thailand.



Reuters reported last month that UKEF was planning to commit around $800 million of funding &#8211; a contribution that drew criticism from environmental campaigners who say Britain should not be funding fossil fuel projects.



Sealing the Total project financing is a win for Mozambique’s government as it tackles security challenges.



Cabo Delgado has seen an Islamist insurgency with links to Islamic State gather pace over the past year, and suspected Islamist insurgents attacked a town 60 km (37 miles) south of the gas projects late last month.

Mozambique records first COVID-19 death

Total signs $14.9 billion debt financing for huge Mozambique LNG project

LUSAKA (Reuters) &#8211; Glencore’s Zambia subsidiary Mopani Copper Mines on Thursday said the country’s mines ministry rejected its proposal to suspend operations because of low copper prices and disruptions caused by the coronavirus crisis.



Mopani said it would appeal against the decision and will continue mining operations pending the outcome of the appeal process.



Operations were halted at its mines at the start of April, with Mopani citing the COVID-19 pandemic and other problems, but mining resumed a month later after the decision sparked a backlash from the Zambian government.



“Mopani remains of the belief that the only way to protect the company’s value and preserve the option to deliver its growth projects when conditions further improve is to transition the operations to C&amp;M (care and maintenance),” it said on Thursday.



Zambia’s mines minister, Richard Musukwa, said the government had made it clear from the beginning that it wants Mopani to continue and said he was happy Mopani had “responded favourably” to his call not to place the mine under care and maintenance.



Musukwa said that Mopani has cut the number of expatriates working at the mine from 94 to 49 and the company will address concerns over what he described as its high cost of production.



“We are open to dialogue because we want what’s best for the people of Zambia and Mopani is strategic to [our] economic trajectory,” he said.



Mopani Copper Mines, which produced 119,000 tonnes of copper in 2018, is 73.1% owned by Glencore, 16.9% by First Quantum Minerals and 10% by Zambia’s mining investment arm ZCCM-IH.

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Zambia rejects Glencore copper mine’s suspension plan

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) &#8211; South Africa’s state utility Eskom cannot say how long a new round of power cuts that began on Friday will last, its spokesman Sikonathi Mantshantsha told Reuters. Eskom implemented planned power outages for the first time since March on July 10, ending a period of unusually stable power supply thanks to reduced demand during a coronavirus lockdown. The company generates more than 90% of South Africa’s power but has battled to meet demand for years because of faults at its coal-fired power stations, which have interrupted power supplies, hampered economic growth and deterred investment. “The reality is we don’t know which of the coal units are going to fail on any given day, that is true for both the old and the new units,” Mantshantsha said. He said Eskom was sending a team led by one of its senior engineers to try to improve the performance of problem power stations. Morning peak power demand on Wednesday was at its highest this year because of extreme cold weather, compounding the generation shortfall, Mantshantsha added. Eskom said on Wednesday that it would step up load-shedding to “stage 2” from “stage 1” from 1200 GMT, requiring more supply interruptions. Stage 1 allows for up to 1,000 megawatts of the national load to be shed, and stage 2 up to 2,000 megawatts. Despite assurances from the government that it would expedite procurement of new generation capacity late last year, when Eskom implemented some of the worst power cuts on record, additional capacity has not yet been procured. “Once this bout of load-shedding is over, it would be naive to think we are done with load-shedding,” Mantshantsha said. “We don’t have a single extra megawatt since we implemented stage 6 load-shedding during summer.”

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South Africa’s Eskom cannot say how long latest power cuts will last

In conversation with Professor Salim Abdool Karim on SA’s COVID-19 outlook

Gauteng government sets out aggressive plan to combat coronavirus

Damilola Ogunbiyi on how to bridge the energy gap in Africa

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South African Airways appointed a new interim CEO and the creditors approved the business rescue plan. In the last few hours the unions have been meeting to discuss their attitude towards this deal. The National Union of Metal Workers for South Africa (NUMSA) holds quite a bit of sway at SAA and therefore is likely to be influential. Phakamile Hlubi-Majola, Spokesperson, NUMSA joins CNBC Africa for more.

Why Numsa is unhappy about the new interim SAA CEO

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The South Africa government has reinstated an alcohol ban and has made adjustments to travel restrictions under level 3 lock-down, in the hope of taking strain off from the healthcare sector and further reopening the economy. Joining CNBC Africa for more is the Black Business Council Treasurer General, Bonolo Ramokhele.

COVID-19 lock-down: Why the Black Business Council supports alcohol ban

<h3 class="has-text-color wp-block-heading" style="color:#0007a3">KEY POINTS</h3>



<ul class="wp-block-list"><li>The move to prohibit alcohol comes just three weeks after an initial three-month ban, implemented to curb emergency room admissions and domestic violence, was lifted.</li><li>In an address to the nation Sunday, President Cyril Ramaphosa also announced that masks are now mandatory in public, as the number of confirmed cases in the country exceeded 276,000.</li></ul>



<figure class="wp-block-image alignwide"><img decoding="async" src="https://image.cnbcfm.com/api/v1/image/105890506-1556873307484cyrilramaphosasa.jpg?v=1556873385&amp;w=678&amp;h=381" alt="South African President Cyril Ramaphosa addresses the crowd gathered at the Miki Yili Stadium, ahead of the celebrations for the 25th anniversary of Freedom Day, in Makhanda, Eastern Cape Province on April 27, 2019."/><figcaption>South African President Cyril Ramaphosa addresses the crowd gathered at the Miki Yili Stadium, ahead of the celebrations for the 25th anniversary of Freedom Day, in Makhanda, Eastern Cape Province on April 27, 2019.MICHELE SPATARI | AFP | Getty Images</figcaption></figure>







South Africa has reintroduced a ban on alcohol sales and imposed a nighttime curfew as it looks to curtail a rapid surge in new coronavirus cases.



In an address to the nation Sunday, President Cyril Ramaphosa also announced that masks are now mandatory in public, as the number of confirmed cases in the country exceeded 276,000. The curfew will be in effect between 9pm and 4am local time from Monday, with a national state of emergency extended until August 15.



The move to prohibit alcohol comes just three weeks after&nbsp;<a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2020/04/15/south-africa-extends-lockdown-but-offers-roadmap-for-reopening.html">an initial three-month ban</a>, implemented to curb emergency room admissions and domestic violence, was lifted.



“There is now clear evidence that the resumption of alcohol sales has resulted in substantial pressure being put on hospitals, including trauma and ICU units, due to motor vehicle accidents, violence and related trauma,” Ramaphosa said.



He noted that the rate of infections in the country currently sits at around 12,000 per day, but also said that South Africa has one of the lowest mortality rates in the world, at around 1.5% compared to the global average of around 4.4%. At least 4,079 South Africans have died as a result of the coronavirus since the pandemic arrived in the country in March.



The government has made an additional 28,000 hospital beds available for Covid-19 patients, but Ramaphosa emphasized that the country still faces a “serious shortage of more than 12,000 health workers, mostly nurses, doctors and physiotherapists.”



“The coronavirus storm is far fiercer and more destructive than any we have known before,” Ramaphosa said. “It is stretching our resources and our resolve to their limits.”



While commending much of the national effort, Ramaphosa lambasted portions of the population who have been attending mass gatherings such as parties, funerals or visiting family without face coverings.



“Scientists and other scenario planners have presented us with models that project that South Africa may have between 40,000 and 50,000 deaths before the end of this year,” he said.



“We must make it our single most important task to prove these projections wrong.”



Some of the restrictions in place during the&nbsp;<a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2020/03/24/south-africa-deploys-police-and-army-for-3-week-coronavirus-lockdown.html">lockdown period in the country</a>&nbsp;have continued to be eased, however. Parks are now open for exercise but not gatherings, while auctions will now be permitted. Local taxis will be able to operate at 100% capacity, with long distance taxis capped at 70% capacity, providing mask and sanitizing protocols are upheld. Family visits are still prohibited for now.

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South Africa reintroduces alcohol ban as coronavirus cases surge

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) &#8211; The Foschini Group (TFG) is set to buy 371 stores and selected assets of Jet for 480 million rand ($28.7 million) from Edcon’s administrators, it said on Monday, allowing the South African retailer to expand into the budget apparel market.



Edcon, which also owns 91-year-old department store chain Edgars, applied for bankruptcy protection in April as it seeks to salvage parts of a group that has featured on South African shopping streets for nearly a century but failed to forge an effective e-commerce strategy and compete with international fashion chains such as Sweden’s H&amp;M and Spain’s Zara.



TFG, which owns 29 retail brands that trade in fashion, jewellery, accessories, sporting apparel, cellular, homeware and furniture, said that Edcon’s administrators have accepted the terms of its conditional offer.



ADVERTISEMENT



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“This acquisition also allows TFG to establish a value retail pillar &#8230; that would be costly and difficult to replicate organically,” TFG said in its statement.



The proposed deal includes acquisition of the Jet brand, a minimum of 371 commercially viable stores, a distribution centre in Durban and certain stores in Botswana, Lesotho, Namibia and Eswatini.



TFG will also buy the Jet Club membership programme and all existing stock holdings with a minimum stock value of no less than 800 million rand, it said.



The company also reported retail turnover down 43% for the three months to June 27, citing the impact of coronavirus lockdowns in South Africa, the UK and Australia.



($1 = 16.7292 rand)

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South African retail group TFG to buy Jet assets from Edcon

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) &#8211; Zindzi Mandela, daughter of former South African president and liberation hero Nelson Mandela, has died, the spokesman of the ruling African National Congress (ANC) said on Monday.



Zindzi Mandela, whose mother was anti-apartheid activist Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, rose to international prominence when she read out Nelson Mandela’s rejection of then-president P.W. Botha’s offer for freedom in 1985.



State broadcaster SABC said the 59-year-old, who was serving as South Africa’s ambassador to Denmark, died in a hospital in Johannesburg. It did not say why she had died.



“This is untimely. She still had a role to play in the transformation of our own society and a bigger role to play even in the African National Congress,” said ANC spokesman Pule Mabe.



Mabe said further details would be provided in due course.



The Nelson Mandela Foundation did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

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Zindzi Mandela, daughter of Nelson Mandela, has died – ANC spokesman

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South Africa’s first clinical trial of a COVID-19 vaccine is entering its fourth week, with around 2000 volunteers participating. However, following the start of the trial, anti-vaccine protestors took to the streets to convey their concerns and sentiments with vaccine testing. Thabani Maphosa, Managing Director for Country Programmes at Gavi spoke to CNBC Africa for more.

COVID-19: Understanding anti-vaccine sentiment in South Africa

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Zindzi Mandela &#8211; the youngest daughter of Nelson and Winnie Mandela &#8211; has died aged 59. She had been South Africa&#8217;s ambassador to Denmark since 2015. Reports say she died this morning in a Johannsburg hospital. South Africa&#8217;s foreign minister Naledi Pandor said Zindzi would not only be remembered as the daughter of struggle icons but as a struggle heroine in her own right. Sello Hatang, CEO of the Nelson Mandela Foundation joins CNBC Africa for more.

Zindzi Mandela dies at 59

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The people who bring us the unfettered truth are becoming thinner and thinner on the ground. In these days of COVID-19 journalist jobs are disappearing faster than most. Ten years ago there were 10,000 journalists in South Africa. In March this year there were 5,000. In the last three months that number has dwindled to just 2,500, according to the South African National Editor&#8217;s Forum. What next? Hopewell Radebe, Journalist with SANEF joins CNBC Africa for more.

What lies ahead for the COVID-19 hit journalism industry?

#VodacomDurbanJuly: What the launch of the Durban Virtual July Experience means for tourism

Veteran Zimbabwe farmer Ben Freeth poured cold water on a plan that’ll see trainers from the former Soviet republic of Belarus train a thousand farmers to till the soil in the former breadbasket of Africa.



This month a huge load of farm machinery is on its way across the Indian Ocean, in the bowels of a transport ship, on its way to Zimbabwe. A $58 million deal six grain harvesters, 100 tractors, 16 seed drills, five fifth wheel trucks, five semi-trailers are on their way from Belarus to the ports of Beira in Mozambique and Durban in South Africa. The shipment is expected by the end of July. Fourteen grain harvesters and 36 units of seed drills are already in Harare. Ships will bring another 20 grain harvester, 340 tractors and 138 seed drills to Zimbabwe by December 2020.



“Belarus is not known for its agricultural productivity.&nbsp; Their climate, soils, crops, pests and diseases and systems of production are different to ours.&nbsp; It’s difficult to believe how effective they will be in teaching us to farm,” says Freeth, &nbsp;the &nbsp;executive director of the Mike Campbell Foundation and a former regional executive officer of the Commercial Farmers’ Union, in Zimbabwe.



“Belarus tractors have never been known for their quality or power.&nbsp; They were never bought by Zimbabwe farmers in the past. Training up 1000 Zimbabwe farmers isn’t the answer.&nbsp;&nbsp; There are thousands of brilliant Zimbabwe farmers already.&nbsp; What we need is property rights and the rule of law.&nbsp; Sadly this Belarus scheme will fail the same as every other scheme has failed because property rights and the rule of law are so insecure and tenuous.”&nbsp;



The idea has been nurtured by the consul general for Zimbabwe in Belarus &#8211; Alexander Zingman. He is the head of AFTRADE DMCC and spends much time travelling between Zimbabwe and the country of his birth. The project is being financed through the Development Bank of Belarus supported by The Eastern and Southern African Trade and Development Bank. The export credit facility has been provided on a long-term basis with competitive interest rates.



&#8220;The aim is to totally mechanize agriculture in Zimbabwe using a comprehensive set of machinery &#8211; tractors, planters, harvesters and trucks &#8211; to cultivate and harvest maize and wheat. This will prevent the harvest losses that Zimbabwe normally faces. It will boost Zimbabwe&#8217;s food security and save the country valuable foreign currency. We will train each farmer who uses this modern equipment. More than 1,000 farmers will get special training courses in Zimbabwe. 10 specialists from Zimbabwe will also be sent to Belarus for two months for training at our manufacturing plants, “he says.



Ten trainers from Belarus are also in Harare, with five more on the way, in a year of training of farmers in Zimbabwe that is hoped will kick start a struggling industry that was once the pride of Africa.



The irony is that 30 years ago such a programme would have been looked upon as an agricultural equivalent of teaching your grandmother to suck eggs. In the 1980s and for most of the 90s Zimbabwe was the breadbasket of Africa with a small, efficient, band of mostly white farmers who fed Southern African and exported food to Europe. It couldn’t last amid the lack of a clear plan for organised land reform and growing political pressure.&nbsp; &nbsp;



When the farm invasions were unleashed by the people in power in 2000, it led to bloodshed and random confiscation that reaped a bitter harvest of lost production and exports that persists until this day. That year, with all of its fumbling fury, fuelled with the idea that to get rich you merely had to own a farm, is always seen as a turning point for the industry. It created a large slice of the country’s GDP and as it fell, so did the fortunes of Zimbabwe.



The World Bank Zimbabwe production figures for maize – that used to feed the region – tell the story. In 1996 Zimbabwe was growing more than 2.5 million mt of maize; by 2016 that figure had dropped to a mere 500,000 mt of maize. A further sign of lean times, according the World Bank, is that the fertilizer industry was at 75% capacity before 2000 and as low as 30% now. In the halcyon days of 1996, many Zimbabweans would have been incredulous at the idea of trainers and combine harvesters making their way half round the world to teach them farming. In difficult times for the Zimbabwe and its economy almost anything is worth a try.

Belarus equipment reaches Zimbabwe 1

Veteran Zimbabwe farmer pours cold water on $58 million mission from Belarus with love.

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) &#8211; The South African government is “on course” to provide a funding commitment for the restructuring of loss-making South African Airways (SAA), a senior official said on Friday.



The comments by the acting director-general of the Department of Public Enterprises (DPE) will ease concerns at the airline after the finance ministry told lawmakers last week it would not provide any new money.



SAA’s creditors are due to meet on July 14 to vote on a restructuring plan that envisages scaling back the airline’s fleet and shedding jobs but requires at least 10 billion rand ($592 million) of new funds to work.



If the government has not made a commitment on funding soon after the vote, the plan could have to be reworked or rescue efforts abandoned.



“The first thing we need to do is give an indication to the business rescue practitioners by the 15th that we are in a position to provide funding,” the DPE’s Kgathatso Tlhakudi told Reuters. “That we are on track to be able to achieve.”



Tlhakudi said the DPE, the ministry responsible for SAA, was currently “socialising the idea” within government that it needed to do the initial heavy-lifting to clean up SAA’s balance sheet.



“There are very few investors that will want to come and clean up, deal with the legacy issues, so in our engagements within government we are getting that position across.”



SAA has already taken more than 20 billion rand in bailouts in the last three years alone.



Tlhakudi said the DPE was cognisant of the country’s fiscal constraints and was speaking to potential investors to try to ease the burden on public finances.



The government has been approached by a major airline interested in working with SAA, but those discussions are at an early stage, he said, giving no details on what sort of partnership was under discussion. There was also interest in SAA’s maintenance, catering and cargo operations, he said, without elaborating.



He said observers should not read much into the slide in a finance ministry presentation that said no more funds would be provided to SAA. “We should rely more on statements that have been made by cabinet, because that’s where ultimately the call will have to be made.”



The cabinet said last month that it supported efforts to restructure SAA and mobilise funds from a variety of sources, including equity partners.



($1 = 16.8943 rand)

Southern Africa

Total signs $14.9 billion debt financing for huge Mozambique LNG project

Zambia rejects Glencore copper mine’s suspension plan

South Africa’s Eskom cannot say how long latest power cuts will last

In conversation with Professor Salim Abdool Karim on SA’s COVID-19 outlook

Gauteng government sets out aggressive plan to combat coronavirus

Damilola Ogunbiyi on how to bridge the energy gap in Africa

Why Numsa is unhappy about the new interim SAA CEO

COVID-19 lock-down: Why the Black Business Council supports alcohol ban

South Africa reintroduces alcohol ban as coronavirus cases surge

South African retail group TFG to buy Jet assets from Edcon

Zindzi Mandela, daughter of Nelson Mandela, has died – ANC spokesman

COVID-19: Understanding anti-vaccine sentiment in South Africa

Zindzi Mandela dies at 59

What lies ahead for the COVID-19 hit journalism industry?

#VodacomDurbanJuly: What the launch of the Durban Virtual July Experience means for tourism

Veteran Zimbabwe farmer pours cold water on $58 million mission from Belarus with love.

South Africa set to make SAA funding commitment, official says

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Southern Africa

Total signs $14.9 billion debt financing for huge Mozambique LNG project

Zambia rejects Glencore copper mine’s suspension plan

South Africa’s Eskom cannot say how long latest power cuts will last

In conversation with Professor Salim Abdool Karim on SA’s COVID-19 outlook

Gauteng government sets out aggressive plan to combat coronavirus

Damilola Ogunbiyi on how to bridge the energy gap in Africa

Why Numsa is unhappy about the new interim SAA CEO

COVID-19 lock-down: Why the Black Business Council supports alcohol ban

South Africa reintroduces alcohol ban as coronavirus cases surge

South African retail group TFG to buy Jet assets from Edcon

Zindzi Mandela, daughter of Nelson Mandela, has died – ANC spokesman

COVID-19: Understanding anti-vaccine sentiment in South Africa

Zindzi Mandela dies at 59

What lies ahead for the COVID-19 hit journalism industry?

#VodacomDurbanJuly: What the launch of the Durban Virtual July Experience means for tourism

Veteran Zimbabwe farmer pours cold water on $58 million mission from Belarus with love.

South Africa set to make SAA funding commitment, official says

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