Podcasts from the Edge

Nothing is harder to divine in South Africa right now than what true true “balance of forces” are inside the ruling African National Congress. Put another way, who is in charge, the cowboys or the crooks? You can make a plausible case for secretary General Ace Magashule being poised to remove, or begin to move, President Cyril Ramaphosa from power or that Ramaphosa is wholly untroubled by Magashul...

In the latest edition of his Podcasts From The Edge, Peter Bruce speaks to widely-celebrated agricultural economist and government advisor Wandile Sihlobo about South African success in farming, and how that might be built on. We’ve become the second largest citrus exporter in the world. Can we do more of that? When it comes to sorting out deep rural SA, says Sihlobo, both in farming and in local...

Doron Barnes has been fighting for steel for as long as he can remember. When he and his dad were running Barnes Fencing two decades ago he was fighting Arcelor Mittal for steel rod to make wire from. Now he’s the owner and boss of Scaw Metals, one of South Africa’s biggest steel suppliers, and he’s still fighting his corner. This time he’s taken on the scrap metals industry and, as he did with Mi...

Podcasts from the Edge this week sees Peter Bruce talk to former Financial Times Editor Lionel Barber about his new book “The Powerful and the Damned — Private Diaries in Turbulent Times” now widely available in South Africa. The two talk about life in a newsprint newsroom, going full speed for digital subscriptions, the prospect of Donald Trump returning in four year’s time and what it feels like...

The government may be looking at procuring nuclear power and the electricity regulator may just have stopped Eskom from buying in power from eight private sector generators. But that’s just life in South African power generation. UCT’s Prof Anton Eberhard tells Peter Bruce in this fascinating episode of Podcasts From the Edge that he remains quietly confident that the government, distracted and st...

In this episode of Podcasts from the Edge, Former National Treasury Budget Officer director Prof Michael Sachs tells Peter Bruce he doesn’t expect Finance Minister Tito Mboweni to announce tax increases in the budget later this month. Not in the middle of a crisis and not with a resumption in private sector investment the last hope for growth still standing. And because our debt is rand denominate...

Listen to author, former newspaper editor and thinker Songezo Zibi talk to Peter Bruce about how to find the political space in South Africa to get us thinking constructively about the future. “Everybody I know is having the same conversation about change,” Zibi says. But how does it start? When? And who starts it and what does it end up looking like? A fascinating exchange with with one of South...

Why would trade and industry minister Ebrahim Patel slip through a massive 15% import duty on aluminium sheet products in the very last government gazette of 2020? Is it because the state is the biggest shareholder in Hulamin, our only producer of aluminium sheet products and can’t compete? Why is industrial policy happening behind closed doors? It seems inevitable that if you take price pressure...

Top South African vaccinologist Shabir Mahdi strongly advises against any further strengthening of lockdown regulations in this edition of Podcasts from the Edge with Peter Bruce and ahead of President Cyril Ramaphosa’s address to the nation. Tougher restrictions won’t work, he says, and we have to keep people outdoors and in the wind, We will only know in a few weeks whether or not current vaccin...

Veteran columnist and newspaper editor Peter Bruce talks to one of South Africa’s most innovative entrepreneurs in this final edition of his Podcasts From The Edge for the year. Gidon Novick, co-founder of Kulula, began carrying passengers in his new domestic airline, Lift, just last week. Believe it or not but it was the coronavirus lockdown at the start of the year that got him thinking about a...

Veteran newspaper editor and commentator Peter Bruce speaks about the beginnings and future of the Afrikaans language and the people who speak it to Theuns Eloff, priest, academic, entrepreneur and Afrikaner as the DA prepares to campaign for the re-introduction of Afrikaans as a teaching medium at Stellenbosch University. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for informati...

Veteran newspaper editor and columnist Peter Bruce talks to SABC chairman Bongumusa Makhathini about the challenges of trying to run the public broadcaster while politicians are determined to boss him around. He is firm that communications minister Stella Ndabeni-Abrahams cannot stop the corporation’s retrenchment process even though one last independent arbitration will take place in the interest...

Veteran Editor and columnist Peter Bruce continues his Podcasts from The Edge with a frank talk to B4SA chair Martin Kingston, who urges the government please to just focus for once. Without fast, focussed action South Africa is in trouble and our society is at risk. Is localisation damaging businesses? The two discuss the merits of a wider immigration of skills, the absence of time and the ANC al...

Columnist and former Business Day and Financial Mail editor Peter Bruce continues his new Podcasts From The Edge series in a discussion with journalist and veteran ANC watcher Karima Brown. As investors gather for a third round of fund-raising for the country, the President faces a fightback as ANC secretary general Ace Magashule is charged. But does Ace really have the firepower to hurt Ramaphosa...

Democratic Alliance fedex chairperson Helen Zille tells Peter Bruce why it's perfectly fine to compare Julius Malema and the EFF with Nazi Brownshirts, why she wears a mask in public and why Mbali Ntuli still has a future in the DA after losing her party leadership bid to John Steenhuisen. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of...