CANAL+ made its Johannesburg Stock Exchange (JSE) debut on Wednesday, becoming the first French company – and the only global media and entertainment group – ever listed on the South African bourse – the biggest in Africa. The shares opened at R58.50 under ticker CNP and had climbed to R58.80 by early afternoon, signalling investor appetite for a company that now holds the reins of what was once MultiChoice, Africa’s dominant pay-TV operator. But this was never meant to be a purely commercial move. The listing was a regulatory concession, extracted by South African authorities as the price of letting a foreign media giant absorb a national champion. The Deal Behind the Debut CANAL+ completed its acquisition of MultiChoice in September 2025 after South Africa’s Competition Tribunal conditionally approved the roughly $2.9 billion (R35-55 billion) transaction. The French group, which had already built a substantial minority stake over several years, finally secured full control – but not without binding commitments. Regulators demanded a three-year job protection guarantee, continued funding for local content creation, and promotion of small businesses and exporters. They also required 30% black ownership, to be delivered through a separately licensed entity. Most significantly, CANAL+ had to list on the JSE. It was not optional. The company had already secured a London Stock Exchange listing in December 2024 following its spin-off from Vivendi, approved by 97.57% of shareholders at an extraordinary general meeting. Wednesday’s JSE debut makes those shares fully fungible between the two markets. MultiChoice, meanwhile, was delisted in December 2025. CANAL+ effectively took its place in the blue-chip index – just under foreign ownership. Scale and Significance The numbers behind CANAL+ are substantial. The group claims over 40 million subscribers globally, split roughly between 18 million in Europe and 23 million across more than 40 African countries. It operates in over 70 countries, employs 15,000 people, and generates annual revenue of around EUR 9 billion. In Africa alone, content is offered in more than 50 languages – a figure that underscores how central the continent is to CANAL+’s growth narrative. The company is betting on demographic tailwinds: Africa’s population is projected to grow by 800 million by 2050, sub-Saharan GDP is forecast to expand at 4.5% annually through 2030, and connectivity is rising across the continent. The JSE, for its part, gains a globally relevant listing at a critical moment. The exchange now hosts 263 listed companies with a combined market capitalisation exceeding R25.2 trillion. The listing comes under new leadership: Valdene Reddy, appointed JSE Group CEO in April 2026 after serving as Capital Markets Director, has replaced Leila Fourie, who retired in March. JSE Chairman Phuthuma Nhleko has been vocal about positioning the bourse as a gateway for African capital flows. CANAL+ CEO Maxime Saada, who presided over the MultiChoice acquisition, now faces the added dimension of accountability to South African shareholders. What Happens Now? This is not simply a case of a French media giant planting a flag in Africa’s most developed capital market. South Africa’s regulators played hardball and extracted real structural commitments. The JSE landed a listing with genuine global relevance. The question is whether that translates into tangible benefits for rand-based investors. The shares listed Wednesday are not newly issued – they are fungible with the London float. That means local liquidity could remain thin, particularly if institutional investors prefer the deeper LSE market. The real test is whether CANAL+ delivers on its “Africa growth engine” promise, or whether this becomes another foreign trophy listing that South Africans can technically own but not meaningfully influence. What is clear: MultiChoice is gone from the JSE, but its successor is now trading – under French control, regulated by South African authorities, and answerable to both London and Johannesburg shareholders. The dual-listing structure reflects the dual reality of modern African media: African audiences, multinational ownership

Africa’s development debate is too often framed as a search for money from elsewhere. The frame is outdated.  The continent commands vast pools of capital, yet too much of the money remains invested abroad while Africa struggles to finance the infrastructure and industrial transformation it urgently needs. That argument is no longer confined to academics or financiers. At the Presidential Dialogue on African Union Financial Institutions held on the margins of the 37th Ordinary Session of the Assembly of Heads of State and Government in Addis Ababa, former Ghanaian president Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo proposed redirecting 30% of African sovereign reserves, held in foreign banks, to African institutions such as the African Development Bank and Afreximbank.  It was a provocative suggestion and a revealing one: it captured a broader frustration that African capital continues to do too little for Africa. The numbers make the case harder to dismiss. Africa’s central bank reserves rose to about $530 billion in 2025, up from roughly $480bn in 2024. More importantly, the continent’s non-bank domestic capital pools exceed $2 trillion, surpassing the roughly $1.7 trillion in cumulative external flows recorded between 2014 and 2024. Africa is not short of capital in absolute terms. It is short of mechanisms to deploy that capital productively and at scale. The paradox is stark: African savings are parked in low-yield foreign assets, while African governments and firms return to international markets to borrow at far higher costs. In effect, the continent lends cheaply to the rest of the world and borrows back expensively to finance its own development. The same contradiction runs through long-term institutional savings. Africa’s pension and insurance assets have crossed $1 trillion. Yet much of the money remains concentrated in low-risk instruments, including government securities and offshore placements, rather than channelled into long-term productive investment. Part of this is regulatory. Part of it is prudence. Fund managers operating in shallow markets and uncertain governance environments are behaving rationally. Why is African capital not working harder for Africa? A large part of the answer lies in risk. Data quality matters. Policy credibility matters. Politics matters. Where investors and fiduciary institutions cannot form a reliable view of risk — because data are weak, regulation is inconsistent or political interference is too visible — capital will move abroad. That is not irrational. It is the predictable consequence of uncertainty.  If African countries want more of their own savings to remain on the continent, they must reduce the uncertainty premium that keeps pushing capital outward. The second problem is intermediation. Africa does not need only capital; it needs stronger channels through which savings can be converted into productive investment. Whether through continental financial institutions or deeper domestic capital markets, the machinery remains underdeveloped.  Better regulation, stronger oversight, more harmonised rules and better-connected markets would make it easier to turn African savings into infrastructure, industry and long-term development finance. This is why governance is not a side issue but the heart of the financing question. Africa will not mobilise its own capital at scale without credible rules, institutional independence and effective supervision. Infrastructure and structural transformation require time horizons that extend well beyond electoral cycles. Investors and fiduciary managers must be able to see a stable horizon, not one clouded by arbitrary intervention, opaque decision-making or shifting political priorities. What, then, should be done? The emerging African Credit Rating Agency is a major step, though not a sufficient one. A credible African-owned ratings institution could help correct persistent distortions in how African risk is priced and understood. But credibility will be everything. If it is to win the confidence of central banks, pension funds and global investors, it will need methodological rigour, transparency and genuine institutional independence. Stronger intermediation through continental institutions also matters. Afreximbank’s Central Bank Deposit Programme, launched in 2014, was designed to mobilise a share of African foreign-exchange reserves and recycle them into African trade and development finance. It is a serious institutional innovation — and proof that the idea of putting African savings to work for African priorities is not merely rhetorical.  The case for directing more capital through the African Development Bank is equally strong. But the agenda cannot end with two institutions. Africa also needs deeper stock exchanges and bond markets and better links between them, so that domestic capital can move more efficiently, transparently and across borders. None of this will work if sovereign reserves and pension assets are steered by short-term politics. Strong laws, independent enforcement and credible safeguards are essential. Central banks and pension fund managers have fiduciary duties; they cannot be asked to substitute patriotism for prudence. Where governance is weak, they will continue to prefer foreign placements. That is not a failure of commitment. It is a rational response to institutional risk. Africa has more capital than the old development narrative allows. The real challenge is not whether the money exists but whether institutions are strong enough to keep more of it at home and deploy it well. That means reducing political interference in finance, improving risk assessment, strengthening governance and building the channels that can turn savings into investment at scale.  If African countries did that, the continent would no longer need to ask first what the world can finance for Africa. It will be able to ask what Africa is prepared to finance for itself. Anthony Ohemeng-Boamah is an expert on African development and socio-economic transformation.

The " abacost" has a closed-front jacket, often with a Mao-style collar and worn without a tie, ideal for the sweltering equatorial heat.

Residents of Trenance Park, north of Durban, are being pushed to their limits by relentless water outages.

The verdict in the Usindiso building fire trial has been delayed, with the Gauteng High Court in Johannesburg postponing its judgment in the case against self-confessed arsonist Sthembiso Lawrence Mdlalose to next month. Mdlalose is facing multiple serious charges, including murder, attempted murder and arson, linked to the devastating blaze that tore through a hijacked building in Marshalltown on 31 August 2023. The tragedy claimed 76 lives and left numerous others injured, marking one of the deadliest urban fires. Usindiso building fire trial postponed The postponement follows a request by prosecutor Thami Mpekana, who indicated that additional steps were needed to comply with a directive issued by the court. The order requires both the prosecution and defence to resolve discrepancies between post-mortem findings and photographic evidence from the crime scene. “As per the directives, we need to visit the mortuary as well as get a photographer,” Mpekana said. The parties have agreed on 21 July as the new date, although the defence has urged the court to treat the postponement as final. Accused eager for outcome Before court proceedings began, Mdlalose stressed that he wanted to know his fate. “I can’t wait for the judgment; it’s about time. Probably even the public is ready for the judgment; to see the outcome,” the accused told journalists on Wednesday. He also maintained his innocence. “I’ve never dreamt of getting a verdict that is guilty. I’ve never dreamt wearing an orange uniform. I’ve never dreamt being sentenced. “So, if you have never dreamt it, you can never live it. I’ve always dreamt of being outside. I know that I am an innocent man,” he said. Mdlalose initially admitted to starting the fire before a commission of inquiry, chaired by retired judge Sisi Khampepe, in September 2023. However, he later retracted this statement during trial, claiming he made it under distress to avoid homelessness. He reportedly also told the court he was under the influence of drugs at the time he deposed his confession statement before a magistrate. Last September, Mdlalose walked out of court as the state questioned him over his “contradictory” evidence. State’s version of events According to the National Prosecuting Authority, the incident began with a violent confrontation between Mdlalose and another Usindiso resident, identified only as “KB”. Prosecutors allege the dispute was related to money from drug sales, with Mdlalose accused of assaulting KB until he lost consciousness. Believing the man to be dead, the accused allegedly attempted to cover up the incident. The state claims Mdlalose bought petrol, returned to the building, and set KB alight after dousing his body with fuel. The fire is said to have spread rapidly throughout the building, leading to the mass casualties.

The Lions are hopeful that if more of their players can gain Springbok experience, it will help the team continue to grow and improve, after their best ever United Rugby Championship (URC) campaign came to an end last weekend. It was the first time in five seasons of the competition that the Lions reached the top eight, with the Joburg-based side finishing seventh to qualify for the URC play-offs, but that was as good as it got as they were unceremoniously dumped out in the quarterfinals by defending champs Leinster. Their impressive run has, however, seen quite a bit of interest on the national front for a number of Lions players, and that could see a few more of them feature for the Springboks in the coming international season. The Springboks have held two alignment camps ahead of the start of their season later this month, when they take on the Barbarians in Gqeberha, followed by the Nations Championship in July where they will take on England, Scotland and Wales. Nine Lions players were invited to the two camps, with Morne van den Berg, Ruan Venter, Asenathi Ntlabakanye, Haashim Pead, Batho Hlekani and Quan Horn invited to the first, while Francke Horn, Siba Mahashe and Henco van Wyk were added to the invites for the second. Lions Boks Van den Berg has already become an established member of the Bok squad over the past couple of seasons, while Ntlabakanye, Venter and Quan Horn have all made their debuts. But Francke Horn, Van Wyk, Hlekani, Mahashe and Pead all have yet to feature for the national side, and it will be interesting to see if they can make the cut. Unfortunately for the Lions, Ntlabakanye has received an 18 month doping ban, so will not feature for them or the Boks for the next year and a half, while Venter and Van den Berg suffered serious injuries that have ruled them out until at least the end of the year when they could be included again. But the other six players all have a chance of being in the mix over the coming campaign, especially for the first game against the Barbarians, as the SA A team will be playing Zimbabwe on the same day, so two squads will be needed for those matches. Lions coach Ivan van Rooyen said they were happy with the representation in the national setup, and that it would only improve the team going forward, if players continued to get into the Springbok mix. “Through consistent performances, more players can get there. Two or three seasons ago we only had one or two players in the alignment camp and now we’ve got eight or nine,” said Van Rooyen. “It’s fantastic for the players and for the union. The experience they bring back makes the whole group stronger. It does create different challenges because you have to manage workloads and opportunities, but those are good problems to have.”

Episode three of the Not Sorry podcast, titled “Our Parents Broke Us,” aired on 31 May. In this emotional and honest discussion, the hosts opened up about their family dynamics. The podcast is hosted by four talented and beautiful young ladies, namely Seemah Mangolwane, Nomthandazo Nkosi, Rei Nkuna, and Munaka Muthambi. THE GIRLIES OPEN UP ABOUT THEIR MOTHERS The hosts spoke about experiences with their parents, especially their mothers. They recounted memories of feeling unheard, beaten with a hosepipe, called offensive names such as “straatmate”, and feeling neglected after a mother remarried. Viewers marked this episode as the most relatable and profound thus far, and they appreciated how vulnerable and open the hosts were. 1. SEEMAH: ‘I WISH MY MOM LISTENED TO ME MORE’ Seemah, who previously hosted Spreading Humours, admitted her struggle with self-expression as her mother didn’t always encourage her to speak up. She also noticed a concerning pattern between her mother and grandmother, where they usually spoke unkindly to one another, and this cycle is now trickling down into her own relationship with her mother. However, she is determined to break this cycle. “I wish my mom listened to me more. I also feel like she has an impact on me, not being able to articulate myself,” she began. “My mom didn’t allow me to speak. When I go to my granny’s place, I see how they speak to each other there,” she added. “And I understand why you are (her mother) like this. But now you’re making me that person. And I don’t want to be that person,” she said. View this post on Instagram A post shared by notsorryza (@notsorryza) 2. NOMTHANDAZO: ‘THERE’S A LEVEL OF CONTROL’ The outspoken Nomthandazo revealed that her mother, now in her forties, wants to live vicariously through her, since she had her at a very young age. “There is a level of wanting to live through your kids. There is a level of control that she doesn’t want to let go of,” she said. “This is where I am now, and parents are not comfortable with you not apologising because they want you to apologise that they’re hurt, and as if you’re not going to do it again,” she added. View this post on Instagram A post shared by notsorryza (@notsorryza) 3. REI: ‘MY PARENTS DON’T CELEBRATE ME AT ALL’ Rei extensively spoke about the relationship dynamics with her mother, stating how her mother is hardly satisfied with her efforts and even called her a straatmate at some point. “My parents don’t celebrate me at all. They don’t say things like I’m proud of you, you did good,” she began. “It took me so many years to love myself because with my mom, you could never do enough with her,” she added. View this post on Instagram A post shared by notsorryza (@notsorryza) 4. MUNAKA: ‘THEY DID NOT DISCUSS HOW TO RAISE A CHILD Lastly, Munaka came through with her own mother and daughter experiences, revealing how her mother struggled to raise her while being remarried after her parents divorced. “I would rather stay divorced for the rest of my life than to bring another man to raise my kids. Because I feel like they did not discuss how to raise a child, and sometimes growing up, I felt like she chose him (stepfather) because she was trying to balance that dynamic of, I really want to have a husband, but I also want to be a mom.”

Former Orlando Pirates Thulasizwe Mbuyane is convinced that the Buccaneers’ head coach Abdeslam Ouaddou is being approached by North African teams. The 47-year-old coach won a treble with Pirates in his first season but has not committed his future at the club. When asked if he would continue next season with the Soweto giants, Ouaddou said he would need to reflect, citing fatigue as the reason he needs a break. Speaking to KickOff, Mbuyane felt offers were made for the Moroccan coach following his successful season with the Sea Robbers. “Personally, I feel Ouaddou has got an issue somewhere,” the former Pirates star said. “There might be a job for him somewhere [that] he thinks will suit him better. “It was the same when Jose Riveiro left Pirates. After winning everything and building his CV, he decided to go work elsewhere, and it didn’t work out the way he had planned. “The same thing is happening now with Ouaddou; he’s being courted somewhere in North Africa.” Mbuyane suspects Ouaddou might ditch Pirates for North Africa The ex-striker rubbished Ouaddou’s comments, where he made it clear that money was not an issue at Pirates.  “I feel his name is being discussed somewhere. What kind of coach makes comments like, ‘the difference between me and other coaches is I don’t need money?'” Mbuyane asked. With Pirates having won the league, they will now compete for five trophies next season. It looks likely that they will have to defend their three trophies under a new coach. Will Ouaddou leave for North Africa?

Fresh from its JSE listing, Canal+ has locked in rugby, football and other premium sports rights for DStv.

NielsenIQ data shows smartphone sales falling as buyers hold onto handsets and trade down as prices tick higher.