JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) – South Africa’s new vehicle sales fell by 14 percent year-on-year to 47,631 units in March, data from the trade and industry department showed on Friday.
Exports slipped 18.5 percent to 27,714 units compared with the same month last year, the department said.
(Reporting by Mfuneko Toyana; Editing by Tiisetso Motsoeneng)
ABUJA (Reuters) – Nigeria’s President Muhammadu Buhari will check the 2016 budget bill passed last week “ministry by ministry” before signing it, he said on Thursday, signaling further delays before the legislation takes effect.
The budget for Africa’s top oil producer has been held up for months as Buhari had to withdraw his original bill, which set spending at a record $30 billion, in January, due to an unrealistic oil price assumption and flaws in the draft.
Lawmakers approved an amended bill last week that Buhari has yet to sign as parliament has so far only sent highlights of the new document to his office, a government official told Reuters on Tuesday.
“Some bureaucrats removed what we put in the proposal and replaced it with what they wanted,” Buhari said, according to a statement from his office.
“I have to look at the bill that has been passed … ministry by ministry, to be sure that what has been brought back for me to sign is in line with our original submission.”
On Thursday, the information minister said there was no rift between the executive and legislature on details of the budget. A day earlier, a senior lawmaker said parliament might need another week to work out details of the budget.
Buhari hopes the bill will revive the economy but officials have left open how it would be funded. The government has said it might sell Eurobonds or sign a loan deal with China and the World Bank but no deal has emerged.
Oil revenues, which make up about 70 percent of Nigeria’s income, have slumped, hammering the naira currency, halting development projects and leaving budget funding uncertain.
Nigeria has been trying to restart outdated refineries in Port Harcourt, Warri and Kaduna to end its dependency on costly fuel imports for around 80 percent of its energy needs.
Three of its four state-owned refineries were closed for five months in 2015 due to maintenance issues and vandalism.
On Thursday, the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation
(NNPC) said it was committed to boosting refining capacity as it opened the technical bid for the location of new refineries within the nation’s existing refineries.
Anibo Kragha, NNPC chief operating officer for refineries, said the open bidding exercise demonstrated the determination of the government and state oil company to increase the country’s refining capacity from 445,000 barrels per day to 650,000.
“The aim is to leverage on the existing facilities to fast track the take-off of the refineries as soon as possible,” he said. NNPC said nine companies submitted bids.
($1 = 198.8000 naira)
(Reporting by Felix Onuah and Camillus Eboh; Writing by Ulf Laessing and Alexis Akwagyiram; Editing by Tom Heneghan)
NAIROBI (Reuters) – Kenya’s economic growth is expected to accelerate both this year and next, helped by low oil prices, improved agricultural output, a supportive monetary policy and infrastructure investments, the World Bank said on Thursday.
However, the bank also warned of possible risks, stemming partly from uncertainty over Kenya’s presidential, parliamentary and regional government elections scheduled for August 2017.
“These (risks) include the possibility that investors could defer investment decisions until after the elections, that election-related expenditure could result in a cutback in infrastructure spending and that security remains a threat, not just in Kenya, but globally,” it said in a report on Kenya.
Other risks to the outlook include subdued prices of coffee and tea, key hard currency earners, the World Bank added.
Kenya’s gross domestic product will increase by 5.9 percent in 2016 and by 6 percent in 2017, above an estimated 5.6 percent expansion last year, the bank said.
The east African nation’s government expects the economy to grow by 6.0 to 6.5 percent in 2016.
The World Bank cited the benefits of cheaper oil, good weather that is supporting farming, an appropriate monetary policy stance and sustained investments in roads and railways.
But while Kenya’s economy is faring better than others on the continent, it is still struggling to create enough jobs, which means a large section of the population is not enjoying the benefits of the economic expansion, the bank said.
Most of the jobs being created are of low productivity in the informal services sector, the World Bank said.
In the next decade, nine million young people are expected to join the labour market, with most of them getting work in small businesses due to a scarcity of formal sector jobs, it added.
“Formal firms will not create jobs for all young Kenyans,” the bank said in its twice-yearly Kenya Economic Update.
The World Bank said in another report in early March that while Kenya’s economic growth in the past decade may be remarkable by Kenyan standards, it was not even close to stellar when viewed from a broader perspective.
(By George Obulutsa. Editing by Duncan Miriri and Gareth Jones)
WINDHOEK (Reuters) – Namibia’s economy grew by 5.7 percent in 2015 compared with a revised 6.3 percent expansion in 2014, data on the statistics agency’s website showed on Thursday.
The manufacturing sector is estimated to have declined by 7.1 percent during 2015, while mining industry recovered, shrinking by only 0.1 percent compared to 6.2 percent decline in the previous year, Namibia Statistics Agency said.
(Writing by Mfuneko Toyana; Editing by Olivia Kumwenda-Mtambo)
COPENHAGEN (Reuters) – The world’s third largest port operator APM Terminals said it will invest 758 million euros ($858.3 million) in a new transhipment terminal in Tangier, Morocco, that will be the first automated terminal in Africa.
The new container terminal will have an annual capacity of five million 20-foot equivalent units (TEU), and APM Terminals has the right to operate the port for 30 years.
APM Terminals, a unit of Denmark’s shipping and oil group A.P. Moller-Maersk, is currently operating a port facility in Tangier that handled 1.7 million TEUs in 2015.
A.P. Moller-Maersk also controls the world’s largest container shipping company, Maersk Line and it has committed to use the new facilities.
“At a time when the container shipping industry is in crisis due to low global growth and too many vessels for too few goods to move it is important we are able to invest in bigger and more effective port facilities,” Chief Executive Kim Fejfer from APM Terminals said.
Tangier is the second-busiest container port on the African continent after Port Said, Egypt and the location of Tangier provides a natural transhipment location for containers carrying anything from flat-screen televisions to sportswear from Asia to Europe and Africa.
APM Terminals also see high growth in Africa will demand more and better infrastructure on the continent.
“Significant investment in port and transportation infrastructure will be required to meet the anticipated needs of the expanding African population and corresponding economic growth,” it said.
APM Terminals is the largest port operator in Africa with 12 facilities operational in 10 countries.
(Reporting by Ole Mikkelsen, editing by David Evans)
JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) – South Africa has issued its first stock exchange operating licence in more than 100 years, paving the way for a local company to compete with the Johannesburg Stock Exchange (JSE).
ZAR X Stock Exchange said on Wednesday it would start operating in September after securing approval from the Financial Service Board (FSB).
The bourse will be the second exchange after the more than a century old JSE, Africa’s biggest and most liquid stock market.
ZAR X plans to facilitate listings of restricted share schemes, currently trading over-the-counter (OTC), which the FSB ruled were in contravention of capital markets regulations.
(Reporting by Nqobile Dludla; Editing David Evans)
LUSAKA (Reuters) – Glencore will invest over $1.1 billion in Zambia to sink three copper mine shafts with new technology that will extend mine life by over 25 years, pushing the kwacha to its highest in two months.
By 1040 GMT the currency of Africa’s number 2 copper producer had gained 1.3 percent to 11.1100 per dollar, its firmest level since Jan. 19.
“The news from Glencore obviously sent a positive signal but overall we are seeing a lot of dollar supply with very little demand,” analyst Maambo Hamaundu said.
Glencore plans to make the investments between now and 2018 and it was expected that Mopani Copper Mines (MCM) would be turned into a world-class mining operation by 2023, it said.
“We firmly believe that we shall be able to overcome the challenges that we face today as a company and become profitable and operationally efficient,” Mopani said in a statement.
Glencore was fully committed to Mopani and had invested over $3 billion in upgrading infrastructure and in major capital expansion programmes since 2000, Mopani said.
An electricity shortage in the southern African country and weaker copper prices have put pressure on Zambia’s mining industry, threatening output, jobs and economic growth.
(Reporting by Chris Mfula; Editing by Susan Thomas)
ABUJA (Reuters) – Nigeria is in talks with oil majors Chevron, France’s Total and Italy’s ENI to get help revamping the ailing refineries in Africa’s top crude producer, its oil minister said on Tuesday.
The West African nation has been trying to restart its outdated refineries in Port Harcourt, Warri and Kaduna to end its dependency on costly fuel imports. For weeks, motorists across the country have been queuing to get petrol.
Emmanuel Ibe Kachikwu, who also heads state oil firm NNPC, said OPEC member Nigeria wanted to privatize the refineries within 12 months following repairs.
“We have gotten commitments from some of the majors. (ENI’s) Agip has indicated interest to work with us on Port Harcourt, Chevron on Warri,” he told the Senate or upper house. “We are talking to Total on Kaduna.”
Kachikwu has previously said NNPC was looking at partnerships or takeovers.
“We are advertising just in case there are better terms out there,” he said, adding that NNPC was also seeking partners to run pipelines and fuel depots as joint ventures.
NNPC had managed to repair the pipelines feeding the Port Harcourt and Warri refineries, he said. Kaduna is fed by a pipeline from Warri.
Kachikwu said that from next week on fuel queues would disappear.
He said NNPC had reached deals with oil majors, with which it works in joint ventures, to help make up for a shortage of dollars due to a slump in oil revenues hindering fuel imports.
“The major international upstream oil companies have indicated their willingness to support major oil marketing companies with some of the required foreign exchange,” Kachikwu said.
“As of today, we have been able to work, in collaboration with the majors…with them to see how they can sell us foreign exchange for the naira components they require for their local operations,” he said, without giving details.
In February, Kachikwu told Reuters NNPC was in talks with oil majors and banks to raise capital for new drilling and to repay its debt accumulated from years of mismanagement. The debt had fallen to $3 billion by December, down from $3.5-$4 billion, he said on Tuesday.
President Muhammadu Buhari fired the NNPC board and appointed Kachikwu last year to overhaul the company, whose opaque structures have allowed corruption and oil theft to flourish.
(Reporting by Camillus Eboh; Writing by Ulf Laessing; Editing by Hugh Lawson)
JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) – The boss of South African utility Eskom has ruled out for now issuing bonds to help fund $21 billion of new power plants, saying on Tuesday the credit market was not favourable.
The state-owned company, which provides virtually all of South Africa’s electricity, is building three new power plants to help shore up power reserves, and expects to add 5,620 megawatts (MW) to the network by 2018.
“We will only issue a bond based on market conditions. At the moment they don’t seem very favourable,” chief executive Brian Molefe told Reuters on the sidelines of a company function.
Molefe, drafted in last April from state rail and freight firm Transnet to stabilise the power producer and help it keep the lights on, said Eskom was instead in talks with banks about multi-lateral loans.
“We have the option of going to banks and DFIs (development finance institutions) for multi-lateral loans, which is what we are negotiating now,” he said.
But Molefe said the Eskom, whose Ba1 credit rating is under review by Moody’s for potential downgrade, was not under any liquidity pressure because it had raised enough money to cover its capital needs for both the 2016 and 2017 fiscal years.
Eskom faced a crippling cash crunch last year that forced the government to inject nearly 80 billion rand in equity. The utility also had to impose almost daily rolling power cuts that hurt economic growth to prevent the grid from collapsing.
Eskom has said it does not expect power cuts this year.
($1 = 15.4771 rand)
(Reporting by Tiisetso Motsoeneng; Editing by Mark Potter)
ACCRA (Reuters) – Bank of Ghana governor Henry Kofi Wampah will retire at the end of March, he told Reuters on Tuesday, cutting short a four-year term during which he struggled to rein in inflation and stem the decline of the cedi currency.
Wampah, whose term officially ends on Aug. 5, said he had informed President John Mahama of his intention to leave early, adding that it would give his successor time to settle in before presidential and parliamentary elections planned for November.
(Reporting by Kwasi Kpodo; Editing by Joe Bavier)
