President Cyril Ramaphosa has appointed Tito Mboweni to the post of finance minister after accepting Nhlanhla Nene’s resignation.
Ramaphosa welcomed his new finance minister to the crucial position on Tuesday‚ moments after Tito Mboweni‚ a former South African Reserve Bank governor‚ took his oath of office.
Mboweni became the sixth finance minister in the last five years after Nhlhanhla Nene resigned from the position on Tuesday morning following controversy over his apology for multiple meetings with the Gupta family at their private home in Saxonwold‚ Johannesburg.
“In the wake of Mr. Nene’s resignation, I have decided to appoint Mr. Tito Mboweni as minister of finance with immediate effect,” Ramaphosa said. “Mr. Mboweni takes on this responsibility at a very critical time for our economy.”
Mboweni, who trained as an economist, served as head of the South African Reserve Bank for a decade until 2009 and for four years as labor minister in former President Nelson Mandela’s cabinet. His major achievement at the central bank was building the nation’s foreign-exchange reserves to almost $40 billion from less than $10 billion.
The rand gained 0.6% to R14.76/$ by 16:51 in Johannesburg, reversing an earlier decline of as much as 1.4%. Yields on benchmark 2026 government bonds fell six basis points to 9.22%.
Source – News24
