For Creamer Media in Johannesburg, I’m Lumkile Nkomfe.

Making headlines: Ramaphosa says Trump’s Afrikaner refugee programme is misguided; BLSA to launch policy reform tracker tool; And, Listeriosis class action firms laud Tiger Brands’ early settlements of some claims

Ramaphosa says Trump’s Afrikaner refugee programme is misguided

Dozens of White Afrikaners are scheduled to arrive in the US today, the first beneficiaries of a controversial resettlement programme instigated by President Donald Trump that his South African counterpart says is misguided.

Tensions between Washington and Pretoria have been running high since Trump began his second term in January, accused the South African authorities of seizing land from White Afrikaners and offered to resettle them as refugees in the US Elon Musk, the president’s Pretoria-born billionaire backer, has meanwhile spread a conspiracy theory that there is a “genocide” of White people in the country.

There have been no official land seizures in South Africa since apartheid ended in 1994, while police statistics show young Black men bear the brunt of violent crime. About 7% of South Africa’s 63-million people are White, and 11% of the population speak Afrikaans as their home language.

President Cyril Ramaphosa, who’s been trying to mend relations with South Africa’s second-biggest trading partner, said he told Trump in a recent conversation that the US had been misinformed about a “fringe group” of Afrikaners who wanted to leave — and that they didn’t fit the description of refugees.

BLSA to launch policy reform tracker tool

Business Leadership South Africa will, in the third quarter, launch a new online tool to track progress on all Operation Vulindlela policy reform areas.

This comes after the launch last week of Phase 2 of Operation Vulindlela, which added three new reform priorities to the existing four.

BLSA will work with research partners Krutham to analyse and provide insights into where progress is being made and where there are blockages with the various reforms, CEO Busi Mavuso points out in her latest weekly newsletter.

This will enable both government and business to understand where progress is being made swiftly, or not, and to rally efforts to unlock future progress, she adds.

The BLSA Tracker will garner contributions from the organisation’s members related to their experiences on the ground of the effectiveness of the reforms. Mavuso says the effectiveness of the reforms can ultimately be tested through the impact of changes in the everyday lives of workers, communities and businesses.

She confirms that the BLSA Tracker will be an important contribution to the national efforts of achieving growth ambitions.

And, Listeriosis class action firms laud Tiger Brands’ early settlements of some claims

The representative law firms of the listeriosis class action of 2017/18, Richard Spoor Incorporated and LHL Attorneys, have welcomed fast-moving consumer goods producer Tiger Brands’ renewed and demonstrable commitment to victims of the outbreak while a comprehensive resolution of claims is under way.

The outbreak marked the largest listeriosis outbreak in South Africa’s history, having killed 218 people and impacting more than 1 000 people, including pregnant mothers whose children now have developmental delays.

The ST6 variant of listeriosis was traced to Tiger Brands’ Polokwane meat processing facility as the only source of the outbreak. The company has since sold its value-added meat business, including the Polokwane facility where it produced polony under the Enterprise brand, to a company called Country Bird.

While Tiger Brands had already announced in February that it would provide interim relief to certain claimants with urgent needs, the company and its lead insurer QBE Insurance Group will now proceed to make settlement offers to specific named persons.

These include claimants who contracted, or whose mothers contracted, listeriosis caused by the ST6 strain; claimants whose legal breadwinners, on whom they were legally dependent, died of listeriosis caused by ST6; and claimants whose legal dependants, who were in their care, contracted listeriosis caused by ST6.

Tiger Brands will pay the claimants’ proven or agreed compensatory damages as soon as possible, despite the ongoing court process to determine Tiger Brands’ liability.

That’s a roundup of news making headlines today

Don’t forget to follow us on the X platform, at the handle @PolityZA