Change Starts Now (CSN), the political initiative led by former FirstRand Group chair Roger Jardine, has decided not to contest the 2024 national and provincial elections. This announcement came just days after the party unveiled an ambitious manifesto in Kliptown, Soweto, proposing sweeping reforms to uplift South African society.



In a significant move, the party has cited the primary reasons for its withdrawal. &#8220;The recent Constitutional Court ruling and the barriers it imposes on newly-established political parties means CSN, like several other parties, faces a prejudicial, logistical timetable to qualify for the ballot,&#8221;



Jardine stated.



The Constitutional Court decided last week not to hear a challenge to the Electoral Amendment Act’s requirement for the number of signatures new parties require for the elections, suggesting that CSN might not have met the minimum requirement.



Despite the withdrawal, Jardine has stated that CSN&#8217;s vision remains undeterred, emphasizing that the party will move forward in an attempt to influence the political climate by supporting other registered parties that reflect their own values, &#8220;in the interests of increasing the chances of political change&#8221;.



The withdrawal comes in the wake of the apex court&#8217;s refusal to expedite the review of signature requirements for political parties not represented in the legislature. The court&#8217;s decision not to lower the threshold for new parties, while independent candidates need only 1,000 signatures to register, has been met with criticism from various political entities. The Electoral Commission of South Africa (IEC) has maintained its stance, urging parties to adhere to the nomination submission deadline of March 8.



Jardine, who launched CSN in December 2023 amid what was described as a national crisis, has reiterated the party&#8217;s commitment to continue advocating for the principles outlined in their Change Charter. &#8220;Our research tells us that only 41% of voters want to vote for the African National Congress (ANC),&#8221; Jardine said, signaling a potent demand for new political alternatives. Despite not participating in the upcoming elections, CSN plans to remain an active voice in shaping South Africa&#8217;s political discourse.



The party&#8217;s leadership, including prominent figures like Mark Heywood and Nicole Fritz, has indicated that CSN will persist in its efforts to unite South Africans behind a shared vision. &#8220;A lot of political work is needed to unite South Africans behind a shared vision for the future of our country,&#8221; Jardine stated, pointing out the necessity for cohesive action beyond electoral competition.



Change Starts Now&#8217;s exit from the election race is a poignant reminder of the dynamic and often arduous nature of South African politics for new entrants. Despite the rise of many new independent parties to challenge the dominance of larger participants such as the ANC, Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF), and Democratic Alliance (DA), as the country approaches the most highly-contested election since 1994, the political landscape continues to evolve. The increasing influence of independent influence and coalitions presents a challenge to the traditional framework.



Ends

Change Starts Now Launches Election Manifesto At Walter Sisulu Square

Change Starts Later – New Party Withdraws From 2024 South African Elections

Story curated by Chanel Retief and Nicole Pillay Art Direction: Lucy Nkosi Photography: Katlego Mokubyane ; Assistant: Sbusiso Sigidi Styling: Deneal Van Wyk; Outfits supplied by Fashimo Styles Studio, Ukara, Suited For Her and Preview Accessories Hair &amp; Makeup:Vanessa Unamaca, MakoleMade Location: NewKatz.Studio, Johannesburg



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“I wouldn’t say a ‘power woman’ is fearless because some way, somehow, I do get that fear. But I can say she is a strong woman even though problems approach. She will always be strong and stand up for herself; she has perseverance.”
</blockquote>



In 2023, Nomcebo Zikode was celebrated across Africa, but especially in her home country South Africa after she brought home her first Grammy award with two-time Grammy award-winning flautist, Wouter Kellerman and singer and producer, Zakes Bantwini for their song Bayethe. It was a win she did not think would happen. At the FORBES AFRICA power women photoshoot, Zikode walks in with a big smile, ready to reflect on the journey that led to that moment.



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<iframe loading="lazy" title="Over 30 Under 50: &#039;You Never Know When Your Time Is Coming&#039;-Nomcebo Zikode" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/wID9swsxEAk?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe>
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“I knew that I wanted to be on TV or I wanted to be a singer,” Zikode says. “Becoming an actress was the second thing but being a singer was the first thing, so I&#8217;m living my dream. I&#8217;m really so happy to be recognized, not only in South Africa but abroad, and seeing people loving your work as they do, even though there was a point where I was about to give up because I [was] looking at my age. I was over 30 and this music thing was not happening, so I am really grateful to God.”



Also successful as the founder of record label, Emazulwini Productions, Zikode wants to inspire the youth, especially those from disadvantaged backgrounds. 



“Personally, it was never about changing my life,” Zikode explains. “It’s about showing another child who’s currently sitting at home, watching me win a Grammy so they can see that Nomcebo made it possible to achieve her goals, so that where they are sitting – whether they&#8217;re coming from a rural area or from a poor family – they know that it is possible for them!”



Zikode’s admission of wanting to give up – this was before her hit song Jerusalema topped charts across the globe – is not unique to her. To the women who feel that their careers have stunted, Zikode offers the best advice: “Just keep going and respect your craft. You never know when your time is coming.”

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Over 30 Under 50: ‘You Never Know When Your Time Is Coming’-Nomcebo Zikode

Elon Musk’s lack of transparency in updates about his brain implant company Neuralink flouts scientific and ethical norms, raises questions about patient safety and risks setting back the entire field of neurotechnology, experts told Forbes, after the billionaire&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/roberthart/2024/02/20/elon-musk-says-neuralinks-first-brain-chip-patient-can-control-computer-mouse-by-thought/?sh=e072a8d298e2">touted early success&nbsp;</a>in the company’s first human patient last week.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-key-facts">KEY FACTS</h2>



“What truly puzzles me about this is not the technology itself but the way of communicating scientific news,” said Marcello Ienca, a professor of ethics of AI and neuroscience at Technical University of Munich, who stressed information about Neuralink and its work is being disseminated “through casual social media updates” rather than traditional outlets for science like peer reviewed publications, public repositories or even simple pre-prints.



It “seems to sidestep the established protocols that underpin scientific integrity,” Ienca said, preventing experts from evaluating or understanding “the full scope and impact” of any claimed advances.



“A tweet is not exactly a peer-reviewed scientific report,” said L. Syd M Johnson, an ethicist at SUNY Upstate Medical University’s Center for Bioethics and Humanities, adding that Musk’s brief update gave few details on the patient’s recovery, what degree of control they have over the mouse or whether “mouse” actually meant the onscreen cursor.



Most clinical trials are also registered in the public database ClinicalTrials.gov for the sake of transparency, accountability and the benefit of science, said Laura Cabrera, a neuroethicist at Pennsylvania State University’s Rock Ethics Institute, who called for the creation of “more rigorous ways” to hold companies operating in the space accountable, transparent and to make them follow similar reporting standards to federally funded trials.



While it isn’t illegal for Neuralink to not have registered its clinical trial, Ienca said not doing so “violates fundamental ethical guidelines for biomedical research”—notably the Declaration of Helsinki, a cornerstone statement of ethical principles for medical research involving humans—adding that Neuralink hasn’t communicated setting up any internal ethics board or establishing its own code of ethics and has not engaged in any major activities from policy organizations working in the space like the OECD.



Neuralink did not respond to Forbes’ request for comment.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-crucial-quote">CRUCIAL QUOTE</h2>



Ienca accused Neuralink of endangering the entire field of neurotechnology over its opacity and failure to outline its position on important ethical and social issues related to its work while charging ahead with human research. “If you decide to play with fire in a house, you increase the risk threshold not only of yourself but of the whole house,” he said. “My fear is that Neuralink&#8217;s disregard for the ethical aspects of their technology may cause a backfire effect for the entire neurotechnology community.” Ienca warned the potential backlash could slow down the development of a technological innovation that could help millions of people with neuropsychiatric disorders and mental illness, many of whom cannot be cured or even treated effectively with current technology. Given the stakes, “we cannot afford a “Cambridge Analytica” scandal involving the human brain,” Ienca said.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-news-peg">NEWS PEG</h2>



Neuralink secured&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/mollybohannon/2023/09/19/elon-musks-neuralink-wants-volunteers-for-first-human-trial-of-its-brain-implant-chip/">permission</a>&nbsp;in September to recruit patients to test its implantable brain device’s ability to help people with paralysis regain lost functions by controlling computers with their thoughts. Musk&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/roberthart/2024/01/30/elon-musk-teases-first-neuralink-products-after-company-implants-first-brain-chip-in-human/?sh=f3489562ac39">announced</a>&nbsp;the first patient had received the implant in January and last week&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/roberthart/2024/02/20/elon-musk-says-neuralinks-first-brain-chip-patient-can-control-computer-mouse-by-thought/?sh=e072a8d298e2">said</a>&nbsp;they appeared to have made a full recovery and could move a mouse around a screen “just by thinking.” The Tesla billionaire delivered both updates through informal posts on X, the social media platform Musk controversially acquired as Twitter in 2022. Musk has teased that&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/roberthart/2024/01/30/elon-musk-teases-first-neuralink-products-after-company-implants-first-brain-chip-in-human/">Neuralink’s first products</a>&nbsp;will include “Telepathy,” which would allow users to control a phone or computer “just by thinking,” as well as features that could restore sight to blind people. Musk has also been open on his long term aims for Neuralink and hopes the technology will be used more widely to enhance memory and elevate intelligence and ultimately acting as a foil to the&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/roberthart/2023/09/21/elon-musk-says-neuralink-could-slash-risk-from-ai-as-firm-prepares-for-first-human-trials/?sh=300741eb2956">risks of artificial intelligence</a>. The company has been&nbsp;<a href="https://www.reuters.com/technology/musks-neuralink-faces-federal-probe-employee-backlash-over-animal-tests-2022-12-05/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">criticized</a>&nbsp;over its use of animals in experiments and questions have been raised over the&nbsp;<a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/neuralink-elon-musk-animal-testing-conflict-of-interest-researcher-says-2023-5?r=US&amp;IR=T" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">independence</a>&nbsp;of a regulatory board governing its animal research. The company has denied any wrongdoing and&nbsp;<a href="https://neuralink.com/blog/neuralink-s-commitment-to-animal-welfare/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">stressed</a>&nbsp;it is “committed to working with animals in the most humane and ethical way possible.”



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-contra">CONTRA</h2>



In line with other experts Forbes spoke to, Columbia&nbsp;<a href="https://magazine.columbia.edu/article/need-protect-data-our-brains" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">neurobiologist</a>&nbsp;Rafael Yuste said the announcement of Neuralink’s progress is “not news.” It is only reported as such because “a company associated with Elon Musk” is doing it,” he said, pointing to decades of research and numerous&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/roberthart/2023/06/05/elon-musks-neuralink-wants-to-put-chips-in-our-brains---how-it-works-and-who-else-is-doing-it/?sh=d573533babb9">other companies operating&nbsp;</a>in the neurotech field. Yuste said he had “zero concerns” over Neuralink’s latest experiment. It involves a medical device that “has to be approved by the FDA” and “the data collected are protected with HIPAA,” he explained, referring to the series of federal laws governing protected health information. “I welcome anyone who wants to develop medical devices to help patients,” he said. Cabrera expressed a similar sentiment and said it’s unlikely we will need new rights to govern the medical uses of neurotechnology as these should already be well covered by existing regulation.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-what-to-watch-for">WHAT TO WATCH FOR</h2>



While medical uses of neurotechnology may be well covered by existing regulation, Yuste warned “commercial neurotechnology is completely unregulated.” The growing sector—which includes non-implantable tech like external sensors—raises a host of social, legal and ethical&nbsp;<a href="https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/24078512/brain-tech-privacy-rights-neurorights-colorado-yuste" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">questions</a>&nbsp;surrounding privacy, access and freedom of thought, demands a framework of rights to govern neurotechnology and protect human rights from potential abuse or misuse from it (Yuste and others call this framework “<a href="https://neurorightsfoundation.org/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">neurorights</a>”). The use, and potential exploitation, of the vast amounts of brain data generated from implants and sensors is of particular concern, experts warned. Neuralink stands out as a neurotech company that such considerations could apply to, although this would still be a long way in the future. “Neuralink is the only neurotechnology company, to my knowledge, that has publicly confessed that their long-term goal is the development of implantable neurotechnology for human enhancement,” Ienca said. In principle, Ienca said there’s nothing wrong with enhancement—tools that augment or add brain functions like memory or vision for healthy individuals and go beyond natural capabilities—but warned there’s a real risk of creating a “stratified society divided not just by wealth or opportunity, but by cognitive and sensory capabilities.” Johnson, on the other hand, said enhancement “would not change anything.” The wealthy would “have the same advantages and power” as they do now.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-what-we-don-t-know">WHAT WE DON’T KNOW</h2>



Experts told Forbes it is unclear what will happen to Neuralink’s human subjects once the clinical trial for the brain implant is over. “When the clinical trial is over, are they on their own?,” Johnson asked, pointing to the many risks involved with the kind of surgery to place an implant, the possibility the device or performance could degrade over time and the fact that some may simply lose access to their implant once the trial is over.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-chief-critic">CHIEF CRITIC</h2>



“Musk’s talk about helping disabled people – giving full body functionality to tetraplegics – is disingenuous and harmful,” Johnson said, asking whether disabled people even want brain implants or to control smartphones with their thoughts. “It fundamentally says that disabled persons are broken and need to be fixed with invasive brain implants,” Johnson said, noting that there is “so much that societies could be doing right now, but are not doing, to improve mobility, and access to jobs and education and decent places to live for disabled persons.”



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-forbes-valuation">FORBES VALUATION</h2>



We <a href="https://www.forbes.com/profile/elon-musk/?sh=1f50a08f7999">estimate</a> Musk to be worth $207 billion. Musk’s fortune makes him the world’s second richest person, behind French luxury goods giant <a href="https://www.forbes.com/profile/bernard-arnault/?list=rtb/">Bernard Arnault</a> and ahead of Amazon founder <a href="https://www.forbes.com/profile/jeff-bezos/?list=rtb/&amp;sh=4587e17d1b23">Jeff Bezos</a>, worth $229.6 billion and $195.7 billion, respectively.

Tesla Officially Opens Gruenheide Gigafactory

Experts Criticize Elon Musk’s Neuralink Over Transparency After Billionaire Says First Brain Implant Works

Amid economic challenges, the country&#8217;s latest budget speech draws critical analysis from economist Dawie Roodt, shedding light on the fiscal strategies&#8217; impact on economic growth and the path ahead for the nation.



In an era marked by economic turbulence, South Africa&#8217;s fiscal policy comes under scrutiny following the recent budget speech, aimed at addressing the nation&#8217;s pressing economic challenges. The speech was presented by Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana last week. Dawie Roodt, a renowned economist and Director of the Efficient Group, offers a candid assessment of the outlined fiscal measures and their potential trajectory for South Africa&#8217;s economy.



According to Minister Godongwana, the 2024 budget implements strategic expenditure cuts, aimed at achieving fiscal stability and economic resilience. Specifically, it targets a reduction in non-interest expenditure by ZAR80.6 billion ($4.19 billion) over the medium term, as part of a comprehensive fiscal consolidation strategy.



This measure is complemented by revenue adjustments, which have been revised upwards by ZAR45.6 billion ($2.3 billion) over the same period, compared to the 2023 Medium Term Budget Policy Statement projections.



Additionally, the budget proposes a reform of the Gold and Foreign Exchange Contingency Reserve Account. These adjustments are integral to the government&#8217;s efforts to manage the budget deficit and national debt, reflecting a focused approach to fiscal management in response to current economic challenges.



Despite these state efforts to manage the deficit, Roodt critiques the sustainability of the fiscal account, warning of a looming financial crisis if the current borrowing trend continues in the face of a weak economy.



“The fiscal actions are part of the reason why the economy is not growing,” he says to FORBES AFRICA.



“The fiscal account has become unsustainable, and we are heading for a financial crisis,” Roodt adds, emphasizing the urgent need for a shift in fiscal strategy.



Highlighting state inefficiencies, Roodt points out that despite significant spending, outcomes, especially in education, are dismal.



“We spend a lot of money on education&#8230;but the outcome of education is horrible. The primary focus must be on the improvement of the efficiency of the state,” he says.



On healthcare, Roodt is skeptical about the implementation of significant spending towards health, including the National Health Insurance (NHI), citing financial constraints and efficiency issues.



“It&#8217;s simply going to cost too much money. We ran out of money already; and the government simply is not efficient enough to implement this.”



To combat the FATF greylisting, the government has allocated ZAR628 million ($32.7 million) towards implementing the FATF and State Capture Commission recommendations, totaling ZAR2.3 billion ($119 million) dedicated to these efforts. This budget allocation is part of a broader strategy to address the greylisting by enhancing legal and regulatory frameworks to meet international standards on anti-money laundering (AML) and combating the financing of terrorism (CFT).



Roodt, however, remains skeptical, describing the difficulties presented by the FATF greylisting, especially in the financial services industry, and the broader negative effects on South Africa&#8217;s international business relations.



Addressing social grants and public employment as mechanisms to mitigate poverty and unemployment, Roodt argues these measures are unsustainable without economic growth.



“This is totally unsustainable. You need economic growth. You&#8217;re not going to create jobs or mitigate poverty by spending more money on people,” he advises, calling for policies that truly stimulate economic growth.



The 2024 budget speech, amidst South Africa&#8217;s economic challenges, reflects a critical juncture in the country&#8217;s fiscal management. The government faces the dual task of stimulating economic growth while managing its debt and deficit.



Roodt&#8217;s analysis underscores the importance of efficiency and targeted spending, particularly in education and healthcare, to navigate the path toward sustainable development.



As South Africa addresses international concerns such as the FATF greylisting, the emphasis on reform and compliance highlights the broader effort to secure economic stability. The road ahead requires a balanced approach, integrating fiscal responsibility with strategic investments to foster a resilient and inclusive economy.

South African Minister Godongwana Delivers 2024 Budget Speech In Cape Town

South Africa’s Budget Speech: A Fiscal Reality Check

Internal privacy experts worried that not having a corporate records retention policy could violate U.S. and EU laws. Years later, the company still doesn’t have one.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



<abbr>T</abbr>ikTok’s parent company ByteDance&nbsp;may have broken laws in the U.S. and EU because it has no internal corporate records retention policy, according to seven current and former ByteDance employees and hundreds of internal documents and chat logs reviewed by&nbsp;Forbes.



The internal materials show TikTok’s legal and policy experts clearly warning senior leaders, including Global Chief Security Officer Kim Albarella, that ByteDance’s lack of a policy for managing internal records could threaten its ability to operate in the U.S. and EU. One, from spring 2023, shows an internal privacy policy expert expressing relief that regulators had not yet noticed that the company was out of compliance.



Employees expressed concerns that the company could be out of compliance with the United States FTC Act and Europe’s privacy regulation GDPR. Rules around corporate record retention and deletion, while seemingly mundane, are critical because they prevent companies from scrubbing their records of evidence of wrongdoing and protect the privacy of people whose information is stored in corporate records.



The seven sources told&nbsp;Forbes&nbsp;that ByteDance lacked such a policy for years, an oversight with potentially dire consequences for a company already under investigation by the U.S. government and that has faced global scrutiny for its data privacy practices. Some worried it could also jeopardize the company’s fast-growing ecommerce business, centered on TikTok Shop, which launched in the U.S. last September and is targeting revenue of $17.5 billion this year.



In communications viewed by&nbsp;Forbes, employees explained that not having a records retention policy put the company out of compliance with the International Payment Card Industry (PCI) Data Security Standard, which — if discovered — could have halted its ability to process credit card transactions entirely. A document from late 2022 stated that TikTok Live had been “launched without consideration of PCI compliance.”



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Preservation of corporate records —&nbsp;and the accessibility of those records by U.S. Government officials&nbsp;— has high stakes for TikTok.
</blockquote>



The internal materials reviewed by&nbsp;Forbes, many of which are attorney-client privileged, reveal a scramble to create and launch a stopgap policy for credit card-specific documents in early 2023 to ensure the company was compliant with the requirements. But in March 2023, Albarella told employees they were not going to fast-track a cardholder data-specific policy, and instead, would proceed with building and launching a comprehensive policy, the materials show. The problem: her staff said that process would take 1-2 years to operationalize, and in the meantime, the company was still not compliant, the materials show.



In response to a detailed list of questions about the internal materials, TikTok spokesperson Alex Haurek sent the following statement: &#8220;We believe these assertions are based on outdated documents, which were predominantly prepared by employees who are no longer with the company, who did not have visibility into all our work in this area, and who are now attempting to advance an agenda without regard for the facts.&#8221; Haurek said the 1-2 year timeline “was pulled from a document prepared by a single former employee and was not validated.”



Responding to the internal document about TikTok Live’s PCI compliance, Haurek wrote: &#8220;This unauthorized statement does not accurately reflect the PCI compliance status of these products. It was entered into the report &#8211; after final review &#8211; by an employee who has since left the company.” ByteDance spokesperson Mike Hughes added: &#8220;We follow industry standards on apps subject to PCI standards.&#8221; When asked directly whether ByteDance is in compliance with the FTC Act and GDPR today, Hughes wrote: “We continuously strive to meet our legal obligations related to data governance.”



Neither spokesperson responded to questions about which country or countries their corporate records were stored in.



Hillary Sale, a professor of leadership and corporate governance at Georgetown Law School, told&nbsp;Forbes&nbsp;that any company of TikTok’s size should have a retention policy, and that these are systems that every startup should implement as they grow. Companies should have “an understanding of how and when to retain documents, and ensur[e] that people across the company understand that importance,” she told&nbsp;Forbes&nbsp;in an interview.



Preservation of corporate records — and the accessibility of those records by U.S. Government officials — has high stakes for TikTok, as it is in the midst of multi-year&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/emilybaker-white/2023/08/21/draft-tiktok-cfius-agreement/">negotiations</a>&nbsp;with the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States. The Biden Administration last year threatened that it would force ByteDance to sell TikTok or face a ban of the app in the U.S. (Disclosure: In a previous life, I held policy positions at Facebook and Spotify.)



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It remains unclear whether even a TikTok-specific retention policy is now in place.
</blockquote>



TikTok is also&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/emilybaker-white/2023/03/16/fbi-doj-investigating-bytedance-tiktok-surveillance-journalists/?sh=ed4fd8a6fc2a">under criminal investigation</a>&nbsp;by the U.S. Department of Justice for surveilling journalists,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/emilybaker-white/2022/12/22/tiktok-tracks-forbes-journalists-bytedance/?sh=c5f64247da57">including this reporter</a>, and was served a subpoena for documents related to that investigation late last year. Previously,&nbsp;Forbes&nbsp;reported that ByteDance&#8217;s own anti-fraud experts&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/emilybaker-white/2022/11/28/tiktok-inaccurate-government-inquiries-internal-bytedance-risk-assessment/?sh=276e46223fed">warned</a>&nbsp;the company that it was incapable of ensuring that their responses to law enforcement requests, like subpoenas, were accurate, in part because of the company’s irregular data preservation practices. At the time, the company said: “This document was created within one department nearly two years ago, never presented internally beyond that, and is largely inaccurate, with outdated details which are made irrelevant by regular updates to our practices in the years since.”



In fall 2022, a lawyer for TikTok told colleagues that he was working with one product team on an electronic discovery feature that would enable the company to better respond to requests for company records, but warned colleagues that it would be a lengthy process, according to documents reviewed by&nbsp;Forbes. At the time, the task of developing a policy had been given to TikTok’s Data Defense and Access Assurance team, but that team deprioritized it in favor of more pressing work. The project was then given to data compliance experts within the company’s Global Security Organization (GSO).



Also in 2022, ByteDance hired Redgrave LLP, a firm specializing in corporate information governance, to help it create a document retention policy. One of the first questions the outside attorneys raised was whether the policy should be written to cover just TikTok, or all of ByteDance. In a conversation from mid-2022, TikTok’s former global lead for security compliance told Albarella, the company’s acting Chief Security Officer, that the policy would need to be ByteDance-wide, because “ByteDance’s internal system cannot be separated between products.”



Policy drafts from early 2023 authored by Redgrave counsel show that while the attorneys originally intended the draft policy to cover all internal ByteDance documents, they subsequently narrowed it to cover only documents owned by TikTok. (Redgrave did not respond to a comment request.)



Still, it remains unclear whether even a TikTok-specific retention policy is now in place.&nbsp;Forbes&nbsp;asked both TikTok and ByteDance whether they today have comprehensive, enforced data retention policies.



&#8220;Like any company, we retain records to meet legal obligations,” Hughes replied. Haurek added: “We have policies and procedures in place that govern the retention of TikTok user personal information.”



Neither answered a follow-up question asking to clarify whether TikTok and ByteDance have corporate records retention policies today.

In this photo illustration the TikTok logo seen displayed on

TikTok’s Lawyers Repeatedly Warned Executives It Could Be Breaking Data Laws

FORBES AFRICA had a unique opportunity to check this out and more at MWC Barcelona.



From robotic dogs to dancing humanoids and baristas on-demand, you didn’t know where to look at mobile technology trade show, Mobile World Congress (MWC) Barcelona, being held at the Fira de Barcelona Gran Via in Spain, from February 26-29. And yet, one of the most futuristic experiences at the event had to be driving a car using one’s eyes – or rather, using Honor’s AI eye-tracking feature.



The Magic 6 Pro smartphone that supports this feature made its global debut in Barcelona but was introduced to the Chinese market in January. The AI eye-tracking feature works using the notifications screen, if you look at it long enough.



This writer tested it on an unmarked, wrapped vehicle parked at a warehouse in the Spanish city. The app used to control the car required a quick calibration before the car could be ‘driven’.



It supports four basic commands: engine start, engine stop, backward and forward.



The AI eye-tracking registers what you’re looking at for at least 1.8 seconds and, once the status bar fills up, it takes another 1.8 seconds to take effect. At times, one has to look at the button for longer than the 1.8 seconds but, for the most part, it worked.



Honor’s AI eye-tracking car feature was purely demonstrative, and is nowhere near going live; neither is Honor speaking to car manufacturers about it. But it does pose questions on both privacy, and accessibility for the hearing impaired.



Xiaomi shows off its electric car



The Xiaomi stand in Hall 3 at MWC drew some of the biggest crowds as its first electric car, the SU7, made its global debut outside of China.



A Porsche Taycan EV rival, the Xiaomi SU7 is part of the company’s ‘Human x Car x Home’ ecosystem that runs on its HyperOS platform.



The single-motor SU7 model is equipped with a 73.6kWh battery developed by Xiaomi and promises up to 668km of range, according to China’s Light-Duty Vehicle Test Cycle (CLTC). It goes from 0-100km/h in 5.28 seconds, and has a top speed of 210km/h.



The dual-motor SU7 Max has a larger 101kWh battery with up to 800km of range (CLTC), with a top speed of a 265km/h. It goes from 0-100km/h in 2.78 seconds, beating out the Taycan Turbo S’ 2.8 second acceleration.



Pricing and international availability is to be confirmed.



Lenovo’s ‘world-first’ transparent laptop



Straight out of a science fiction movie at MWC was Lenovo’s futuristic transparent laptop.



The ThinkBook Transparent Concept features a 17.3-inch Micro-LED see-through display that is borderless with a transparent keyboard that appears to have a floating footpad design.



As you open applications and the screen fills up with images, the less transparent it becomes.



Lenovo explains that the laptop blends the virtual and real worlds using AI-generated content to unlock new ways to work. The keyboard also doubles up as a drawing board with a supported pen.



Motorola demos a rollable wrist phone



Motorola has shown off yet another rollable phone concept at MWC, but completely different to last year’s Rizr, which rolled open from a 5-inch to a 6.5-inch display.



This year’s Rollable Concept Phone can wrap around your wrist thanks to its flexible back fabric and magnetic design.



While no official specs have been shared, it can be rolled and propped upright or sit on a magnetic strap worn on the wrist, as demonstrated at their stand.&nbsp;



The display adjusts according to screen orientation, and the wallpaper can adjust to match your clothes once you snap a photo of them. It will offer an array of options that make it a matching wrist accessory.

IMG_1066

Driving A Car Using Your Eyes? A Good Look At The AI Eye-Tracking Feature At Global Mobile Tech Show

Handshake is creating a social media-style feed for its popular jobs platform for college students, adding video tools for employers to match less buzzy companies with young job seekers—and connect with a generation that lives by the medium.



On TikTok, there are more than 2.6 million posts with the hashtag #WorkLife—videos providing&nbsp;<a href="https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZT8vyL8w2/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">“PTO hack” advice</a>&nbsp;for taking time off, outtakes discussing career buzzwords like “<a href="https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZT8vyYPeq/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Bare Minimum Mondays</a>” and short clips describing a “day in the life” at companies like Google or Deloitte. Most recently, young workers have even been filming themselves getting laid off, posting wildly viral videos of the once-private moments and creating&nbsp;<a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-02-05/executives-fear-tiktok-backlash-in-era-of-sweeping-job-cuts?srnd=work-shift" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">new headaches for employers</a>. For Gen Z, online video is as much a part of their work lives as it is their personal experiences.



And yet, the job search platform perhaps most associated with college students—Handshake,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/kristinstoller/2022/12/01/how-to-get-a-first-job-if-you-arent-linkedin/?sh=60bc63044b1f">which counts some 15 million of them as users of its platform</a>—has been designed more like a job board without video than a social media tool filled with it. Until now. On Tuesday, the popular platform is&nbsp;<a href="https://joinhandshake.com/blog/our-team/our-next-chapter/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">launching</a>&nbsp;a “feed”-like interface and new video features it hopes will give companies a more direct line to communicating with Gen Z candidates in the style they prefer—and job seekers a more centralized place for discovering opportunities they might not otherwise find.



<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/kristinstoller/2022/12/01/how-to-get-a-first-job-if-you-arent-linkedin/?sh=60bc63044b1f">Garrett Lord</a>, Handshake’s cofounder and CEO, hopes it will “level the information playing field,” he told&nbsp;Forbes&nbsp;in an interview. “It feels a bit disconnected on Reddit or TikTok,” he says of employers’ videos about their companies. Handshake aims to be “the place where all the jobs, career fairs and conversations come together.”



<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/emmylucas/2023/04/07/bosses-are-training-employees-to-be-influencers-after-long-discouraging-social-media-posts-about-work/?sh=1b742a9c6d8e">Employers have already hopped on the social media trend</a>, creating their own “day in the life” videos and promotional clips that cater to young job seekers. But in a digital world of content overload and an endless choice of platforms like Glassdoor and TikTok to find employee reviews and interview insights, it can be hard for candidates to find those videos unless they’re actively seeking out a specific employer’s career site or TikTok handle.



Rolling out the new design amid a tumultuous job market and continued layoffs—particularly in the tech and media sectors—is a feature, not a bug, Lord says. While full-time job posts on Handshake, like many job boards, were down 24% in 2023 thanks in part to the tech sector’s slowdown, and revenues were just above $120 million—up 10% from 2022—Lord says he’s continuing to see “an incredible amount of demand” for college students. The new features could also help less buzzy employers find tech workers concerned about job security in that industry.



“Some companies are doubling down in this environment because Big Tech isn’t hiring as much,” Lord says. “That could mean there are more great software engineers for automotive or finance companies to hire.”



Handshake’s new features include a redesigned app—which only advertised job postings and recruiting events before—that now acts as a scrollable feed similar to other social media platforms. It allows students to swipe through job postings, events such as career fairs, alumni reviews and advice, as well as short-form videos created by employers, another new tool. “This is very much in the zeitgeist of what students want and expect,” Lord says.



The idea is to provide job seekers with a more engaging view of the companies they’re applying to and interviewing for—one that goes beyond bullet points on a job board or a slickly produced video of managers boasting about strong company culture. For Gen Z, video is king, says Adam Robinson, founder and CEO at recruiting software company Hireology. “More often than not, the first page a job seeker views after looking at the list of jobs are the case studies and videos,” he says.



Yet that also means it’s a high-stakes move for employers, one that can backfire if the videos come across as too promotional or lacking in credibility. Young job seekers, says Robinson, “can see through a scripted, choreographed and overly produced video” with surprising ease.



Arizona State University junior Mehul Kumar Srivastava says videos have been key when looking for internships. “Job descriptions don’t really tell you what’s actually happening at a company,” the computer science major says, adding that the “day in the life of an intern” videos show him what to expect. “That’s really motivating, because you want to be there.”



Christine Cruzvergara, chief education strategy officer at Handshake, says the “feed” and social media-style scroll features are designed to add a level of serendipity to college students’ job search process, giving those who may not know what type of career they want or what employer they want to work for a way to discover new roles and companies. “The old setup put a lot more onus on the student to know what they wanted to find and to have a clear idea of what they want to look for in a specific job,” she says.



Handshake’s new interface uses students’ profiles—their major, selected location, companies of interest and the college they attend—to curate the jobs and posts they see in their feeds, showing students employers they may not have considered before or connecting them with alumni for advice. For employers, the new interface is designed to connect employers with a wider range of candidates.



Companies including TikTok, Teach for America and L’Oréal have been testing out Handshake’s short-form video option, which is being released Tuesday as an early access program that all of its 900,000 employers on the platform can now request to join at no added cost.



At L’Oréal, group vice president of talent acquisition Emma Shuttleworth says the move is part of a larger effort at the company to attract young workers. She says the marketing team enlists a Gen Z taskforce to help inform young applicants and make videos they’ll actually watch. On Handshake, the beauty company shares videos about their hiring process and longer-form “masterclass” videos about specific skills such as how to run a new marketing campaign. Shuttleworth hopes “it allows us to be at the forefront of students’ minds,” she says, “and in front of students who maybe have never considered applying to L’Oréal before.”

Young man on a video call in a cafe

This Gen Z Jobs Site Wants To Give Employers A TikTok Alternative

<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-topline">TOPLINE</h2>



Mediators attempting to broker a truce agreement between Israel and Hamas to pause the fighting during Ramadan and release some of the hostages taken by Hamas have made progress on an agreement, <a href="https://apnews.com/article/israel-hamas-war-news-02-25-2024-f3e4ea708548689cf8d9d404c3ee94ee" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">multiple</a> <a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/in-paris-israel-and-mediators-agree-on-outline-for-hostage-deal-pending-hamas-okay/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">outlets</a> <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/israel-hamas-skirmish-throughout-gaza-talk-truce-resurfaces-2024-02-25/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">reported</a> Sunday.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-key-facts">KEY FACTS</h2>



The agreement would mean a pause in fighting for six weeks during the holy month Ramadan, which begins March 10, and would mean the exchange of about 40 of the 130 Israeli hostages held by Hamas, a senior Egyptian official&nbsp;<a href="https://apnews.com/article/israel-hamas-war-news-02-25-2024-f3e4ea708548689cf8d9d404c3ee94ee" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">told</a>&nbsp;the Associated Press, for up to 300 Palestinian prisoners being held by Israel.



It also would mean hundreds of trucks filled with aid could reach Gaza, the official&nbsp;<a href="https://apnews.com/article/israel-hamas-war-news-02-25-2024-f3e4ea708548689cf8d9d404c3ee94ee" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">told</a>&nbsp;The AP.



Intelligence chiefs briefed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s war cabinet Saturday night after they returned from a meeting with U.S., Qatari and Egyptian mediators in Paris over the weekend.



During the meeting, the war cabinet voted to send a delegation to Qatar to continue discussing the potential agreement, the Times of Israel&nbsp;<a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/in-paris-israel-and-mediators-agree-on-outline-for-hostage-deal-pending-hamas-okay/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">reported</a>.



Hamas has yet to publicly comment on the reports of an updated agreement but senior Hamas leaders met with mediators in Egypt this week, NPR&nbsp;<a href="https://www.npr.org/2024/02/23/1233356379/israel-hamas-gaza-ceasefire-negotiations-paris-netanyahu-day-after" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">reported</a>.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-what-to-watch-for">WHAT TO WATCH FOR</h2>



At some point this week Qatar is expected to host continued discussions between Israel and Hamas in the hopes of finalizing a truce, Egyptian security sources&nbsp;<a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/israel-hamas-skirmish-throughout-gaza-talk-truce-resurfaces-2024-02-25/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">told</a>&nbsp;Reuters.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-big-number">BIG NUMBER</h2>



More than 29,000. That’s the death toll in Gaza since the fighting began more than five months ago,&nbsp;<a href="https://apnews.com/article/israel-hamas-war-news-02-19-2024-81c2d362340b611a98e4b929b4b5d0a4" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">according to</a>&nbsp;the Gaza Health Ministry. More than 1,200 people have died in Israel since the fighting, mostly from the Oct. 7 attack, Israeli officials say.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-key-background">KEY BACKGROUND</h2>



If the negotiators come to an agreement, this would be the second pause in fighting since the start of the war on Oct. 7. The last pause in fighting ended December 1 after Hamas and Israel agreed to a multi-day cease-fire in exchange for the release of more than 100 hostages by Hamas. Since then, the fighting has continued, more people have died and the international calls for a cease-fire, both temporary and permanent, have grown. Recently, the Biden administration has publicly <a href="https://usun.usmission.gov/statement-by-ambassador-linda-thomas-greenfield-on-algerian-proposed-draft-resolution-on-the-situation-in-the-middle-east/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">advocated</a> for a temporary cease-fire and the release of all hostages being held by Hamas. That came after the U.S. <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/brianbushard/2024/02/20/us-vetoes-un-resolution-calling-for-israel-hamas-cease-fire-and-offers-its-own-plan/?sh=58a029884b7f">vetoed</a> a United Nations resolution that called for an immediate cease-fire and hostage release deal between Hamas and Israel.

TOPSHOT-PALESTINIAN-ISRAEL-CONFLICT-GAZA

Ramadan Truce Between Israel And Hamas Gets Closer, Reports Say

Zafar Siddiqi, the co-founder and chairman of CNBC Africa, passed away on Friday, February 23. He was 76.



An entrepreneur in media and education with an impeccable record across three continents – the Middle East, South Asia and Africa, Siddiqi was also the Chairman of Lancaster University Ghana and Curtin University in Ghana.



In a letter to the staff of the ABN Group, which includes both CNBC Africa and FORBES AFRICA,



Dr Rakesh Wahi, the founder and publisher of FORBES AFRICA, said that Siddiqi’s “leadership, wisdom, commitment, values and support will be missed and will leave a gap in our lives”.



“Twenty years ago, Zafar and I embarked on a journey to set up CNBC Africa. An ambitious project that was seen with scepticism as no one had attempted a Pan-African Business News Network for the African continent,” Wahi said.



Before starting his journey in media, which would span over 30 years, Siddiqi started as an accountant for global auditing firm KPMG and later as the Managing Director of one of its consultancy practices. He spent 18 years with KPMG in Oman and Pakistan.



His introduction to TV began in Pakistan specializing in providing business programs to overseas broadcasters. He later founded the CNBC Arabia network across the Middle East, the first international brand to broadcast in Arabic. This was followed by CNBC Pakistan and CNBC Africa.



“Nothing broke our will to succeed and succeed we did, with the support of all of you (management and staff) and armed always with each other’s strength and belief in what we had embarked on. We never gave up and vested our lives both physically and financially, into our beliefs,” Wahi added.



Siddiqi firmly believed in Africa and the future of broadcast journalism on the continent. “I believe Africa is on the verge of explosion as far as investment is concerned. There are not many places in the world that have the resources Africa has,” he stated in a 2018 interview with FORBES AFRICA.



His passion for TV was evident in his 2019 book, TV News 3.0: An Insider&#8217;s Guide To Launching And Running News Channels In The Digital Age, which was an authoritative study of the media world.



“In 2002, I launched CNBC Arabia, over the whole of the Middle East, which was 26-odd countries,” Siddiqi also told CNBC Africa in an interview in 2019. “The dialects were different, traveling was different. Media was just about opening up after the Gulf War… and that&#8217;s all changed. It&#8217;s changed so much. And I think technology has changed all of that. Social media has changed all of that. And I think that African countries are moving very quickly towards this integration, because you&#8217;ve got to keep up with what&#8217;s happening in the rest of the world. So that is why I firmly believe that these economies will move closer together. And hence, I believe that CNBC Africa will play a very important role.”



In the interview with FORBES AFRICA, as an entrepreneur, Siddiqi had this valuable piece of advice on the power of networking: “Remember to be yourself and be original, that’s how you succeed. Originality [always] comes through!”



His passing is a loss not just for the ABN Group but to the industry to which he was passionate about.

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Remembering Zafar Siddiqi: The Formidable Entrepreneur And Investor In Media For Over Three Decades

A notable shift seems to be taking place in Egypt&#8217;s economic strategy in a new era of collaboration with several regions in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). And the country’s banks such as CIB (Commercial International Bank) are playing a part in this transformative journey.



“Kenya made sense. East Africa is close to Egypt, the language is similar, and Kenya is the gateway.&nbsp; The Kenyan market is one of the most advanced digitally and digital is the perfect way to, with a controlled investment, grow a large footprint quickly,” says the bank’s Managing Director Hussein Majid Abaza.



In April 2020, CIB initially acquired a 51% stake in Kenya&#8217;s Mayfair Bank, subsequently completing the buyout in 2023 and rebranding it as CIB Kenya.



As Egypt remains resilient amid political unrest, security concerns, and fluctuating tourism numbers, CIB has maintained its annual growth.



The introduction of CIB Kenya could herald an era in which Egypt is seeking to foster trade partnerships. The bank&#8217;s niche lies in facilitating exports and it will seek to grow business links between the two countries such as with tea, where Egypt is the second-largest market for Kenyan tea exports.



Egypt&#8217;s commitment to the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) is also a pivotal move that aligns with the broader vision of a unified African market. After ratifying the AfCFTA protocol in 2019, Egypt, under President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi’s leadership, chaired the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA) from November 2021 to June 2023.



Trade liberalization initiatives and investment trade missions have underscored Egypt&#8217;s commitment to opening new markets on the continent. The country’s trade dynamics seem to show its resilience and adaptability, with the country emerging as a leading exporter to COMESA countries in 2022, reaching $3.4 billion.



“The continent is the right place to be; it is where growth is, and where growing populations are,” says Abaza.



CIB&#8217;s strategic foray into Kenya serves as a microcosm of Egypt&#8217;s larger ambitions for Africa. By leveraging its financial expertise towards new cross-border acquisitions, Egypt seems to be not only strengthening its economic ties with East Africa but also fostering innovation through the exchange of fintech ideas and talent through extensive banking analyst training programs in East Africa.



While Egypt&#8217;s influence within COMESA is expanding, these figures also underscore the vast potential for further development. In comparison to the global trade landscape, with the value of Egypt’s exports sitting at $51.6 billion in 2022, there is still considerable ground to cover in integrating SSA into Egypt&#8217;s global trade chain.

Panorama of Cairo

Egypt’s Pivot Towards Sub-Saharan Africa And Strengthening Economic Ties

<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-topline">TOPLINE</h2>



A Norwegian Cruise Line is stuck off the coast of Mauritius after some passengers on a South African voyage were quarantined after experiencing a stomach illness aboard the ship, and local authorities decided to prevent any other passengers on the massive ship from disembarking until test results come back.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-key-facts">KEY FACTS</h2>



The Norwegian Cruise Line said “a small number” of guests aboard the ship began experiencing mild symptoms of a stomach-related illness earlier this week.



The Norwegian Dawn was scheduled to arrive in Port Louis on Feb. 25, but after the boat skipped its Reunion Island stop it arrived earlier at Port Louis, where authorities said the ship could not dock, the Mauritius Ports Authority&nbsp;<a href="http://www.mauport.com/communique" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">said</a>&nbsp;Sunday.



The Mauritius Ministry of Health took samples from about 15 passengers on board the Dawn—which was on a&nbsp;<a href="https://www.cruisemapper.com/ships/Norwegian-Dawn-699?tab=itinerary" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">12-day cruise</a>&nbsp;from Cape Town to Port Louis—because of the ongoing health risk and isolated them aboard the boat, according to the authority&nbsp;<a href="http://www.mauport.com/communique" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">said</a>.



Until testing is complete, Mauritius would not let anyone leave or board the ship for the next cruise until Tuesday, Norwegian said in a statement.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-what-to-watch-for">WHAT TO WATCH FOR</h2>



It will take about 48 hours for health officials to receive the test results from the 15 passengers they tested.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-what-we-don-t-know">WHAT WE DON’T KNOW</h2>



It’s unclear exactly how many passengers or crew members are sick. Officials only said they tested 15 individuals.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-big-number">BIG NUMBER</h2>



2,184. That’s how many passengers are aboard the Norwegian Dawn, along with 1,026 crew members,&nbsp;<a href="http://www.mauport.com/communique" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">according to</a>&nbsp;the Mauritius Ports Authority. About 2,000 passengers were scheduled to disembark the cruise Sunday but are still aboard the boat. Some 2,279 new passengers were scheduled to board the ship in Port Louis on Sunday but have not yet done so, the Mauritius Ports Authority said. U.S.-based Norwegian Cruise Line said it is providing guests complimentary hotel accommodations until “they are able to board.”

Cruise Ship In Lockdown At Sydney Harbour Over Coronavirus Fears

More Than 2,000 Stuck On Cruise Ship Because Of Mystery Illness

South Africa joins other African nations like Cape Verde, Seychelles, Mauritius, and Namibia in attracting &#8216;digital nomads’.



South Africa is positioning itself as a beacon for global professionals through its latest visa regulation amendments, including the introduction of the &#8216;digital nomad&#8217; visa. Announcing these changes via his newsletter on Monday, President Cyril Ramaphosa underscored the urgency of attracting skilled individuals to propel the country&#8217;s competitiveness and economic growth. &#8220;To succeed in an ever-changing global economy, our country needs far more people with the right skills,&#8221; Ramaphosa articulated, emphasizing the initiative&#8217;s role in fostering employment and innovation.



The South African Department of Home Affairs has gazetted proposed amendments, including the digital nomad visa, inviting public feedback until March 29. This step towards modernizing immigration laws underscores the initiative&#8217;s potential but also its pending finalization. Additionally, South Africa joins other African nations like Cape Verde, Seychelles, Mauritius, and Namibia in attracting digital nomads, reflecting a continent-wide embrace of remote work trends. These countries offer unique opportunities for digital nomads, highlighting Africa&#8217;s growing appeal in the global digital economy.



&#8220;The story really is how the world of work has changed, and the world of work means that you can work anywhere at any point in time because of the internet, and disruption that has taken place because of technological innovation,&#8221; explains Judi Nwokedi, a tourism expert and Founding President of the Black Business Women&#8217;s Alliance to FORBES AFRICA. &#8220;So you have a new cohort of workers with possibly high levels of disposable income&#8230; to capture a fast, emerging sector that is in demand… You want to attract people like that, and their spending.”



The Department of Home Affairs aims to simplify the visa regime, recently introducing a points-based system for the critical skills visa and offering the &#8216;digital nomad&#8217; visa to remote workers employed by foreign companies. This approach not only acknowledges the shifting paradigms of work but also promises to make South Africa a lucrative destination for high-skilled professionals. According to the government gazette published on February 8 this year, these amendments are designed to attract talents that can contribute significantly to the South African economy by introducing a more flexible and welcoming visa policy for digital nomads and professionals with critical skills.



Nwokedi further emphasizes the need for ease of access, &#8220;Flight connectivity, and a visa regime that is seamless. Apply online, pay online and move into the digital economy&#8230; We are competing with many attractive destinations, and one of the hurdles is getting a visa.&#8221;



South Africa has already been a destination for remote workers, with the Covid-19 pandemic having accelerated remote work, allowing workers from economically strong countries to migrate and work – especially in Cape Town, voted as the most popular remote work destination according to a survey by Remote.io.



However, challenges in the form of visa processing delays and administrative complexities could potentially deter the talent South Africa seeks to attract. In December 2023, the Department of Home Affairs issued a waiver to visa applicants and visa holders requesting extensions due to the current backlog the Department is experiencing.



Despite these obstacles, the allure of South Africa as a destination for digital nomads remains strong. The country&#8217;s diverse culture, breathtaking landscapes, and vibrant tech scene present a compelling case for remote workers and critical skills professionals looking for a dynamic work-life balance.



Nwokedi also highlighted the economic dynamics affected by the influx of digital nomads, &#8220;I guess when you are in a free market, the free market forces reign&#8230; so you have to have dynamic pricing which protects the locals, but you also have to want locals who want to make money.&#8221;



The economic impact of this initiative could be transformative, with potential boosts to tourism, real estate, and local businesses.



Rental prices in desirable remote work destinations such as Cape Town have increased drastically, with the latest State of Cape Town Central City Report indicating an annual increase of 28% for one-bedroom apartments, driven in part by the influx of foreign remote workers.



In his newsletter, Ramaphosa expressed optimism about the initiative&#8217;s impact on innovation and competitiveness. &#8220;International experience shows that employees with critical skills contribute to improved productivity, enhanced innovation,&#8221; he noted, signaling a strategic move to bolster the country&#8217;s global standing through a skilled workforce.



Nwokedi concludes, &#8220;South Africa can do with as many positive components to redefine the narrative of our country and our brand. If it is an intervention that does not require huge capital, why not take the path less traveled where you can shift the needle on the dial?&#8221;



The introduction of digital nomad visas by South Africa represents a forward-thinking approach to economic growth, recognizing the value of integrating global talent into the local economy.



Ends

Male traveler at the airport using his cell phone while waiting for his flight

South Africa: Embracing Digital Nomads For Economic Growth

<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-topline">TOPLINE</h2>



Internet users in Pakistan are turning to virtual private networks to access the social media platform X after the site was blocked over the weekend following a contentious national election and admission of ballot fraud by a local government official.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">KEY FACTS</h2>



VPNs, which can mask the identity and location of users to help access websites and services that may be blocked in a certain region, have become increasingly popular in the days since access to X, formerly known as Twitter,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/maryroeloffs/2024/02/18/users-report-x-down-in-pakistan-after-official-admits-election-rigging/?sh=509ed05f7e39">was cut off</a>&nbsp;for much of the country.



While social media platforms have been marred with issues in Pakistan for the last month, the issue came to a head at about noon ET on Saturday and, as of Friday morning, X has been restricted in the country for five days, according to watchdog monitoring service&nbsp;<a href="https://twitter.com/netblocks" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Netblocks</a>.



Top10VPN, an independent VPN review website,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.top10vpn.com/research/vpn-demand-statistics/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">reported</a>&nbsp;that demand for VPN services in Pakistan rose 131% Sunday, the first full day of the X outage, and continued into Monday, when the demand was 91% higher than average.



Nord Security, a VPN provider in Pakistan, told Forbes search interest in its products doubled on Sunday and reached four times its usual traffic for the week on Tuesday, while ExpressVPN said traffic to its website from Pakistan spiked 67% within the first 24 hours of the disruption, and has increased 80% in the four days since.



Surfshark, another provider in the country, said its new user acquisition rates in Pakistan climbed between 300% and 400% when compared to the previous month, “indicating a growing dependence on these services for internet access and privacy.”



The American media team for Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), the centrist party whose leader&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/siladityaray/2023/12/18/imran-khan-pakistans-jailed-ex-leader-uses-ai-deepfake-to-address-online-election-rally/?sh=227df3aa5903">Imran Khan</a>&nbsp;was jailed ahead of the country&#8217;s election earlier this month, on Wednesday&nbsp;<a href="https://twitter.com/PTIOfficialUSA/status/1760316797843067377" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">posted to X</a>&nbsp;that the Pakistani government has also begun to block popular VPN services.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">CRUCIAL QUOTE</h2>



“Pakistan’s latest clampdown on social media is a continuation of a broader trend of limiting internet access and undermining digital rights in the country,” Lauren Hendry Parsons, a privacy advocate for ExpressVPN, told Forbes in a statement. “It’s another example of a global decline in internet freedom as more countries have become more comfortable enforcing internet shutdowns.”



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">KEY BACKGROUND</h2>



The&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/maryroeloffs/2024/02/18/users-report-x-down-in-pakistan-after-official-admits-election-rigging/?sh=4d885cc97e39">recent restrictions</a>&nbsp;on social media in Pakistan began on Saturday, when a government official admitted he&#8217;d help to manipulate the results of a nationwide Feb. 8 election. Liaqat Ali Chattha, the commissioner of Rawalpindi,&nbsp;<a href="https://sg.news.yahoo.com/senior-official-says-helped-rig-104840000.html" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">said</a>&nbsp;he would hand himself over to police after he&#8217;d &#8220;personally supervised&#8221; the switching of 70,000 votes. The fraud admission came one week after an extremely contentious national election that saw Khan jailed ahead of the vote and charges dropped against the leader of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) party, who is the preferred candidate of the Pakistan military. After Khan was sentenced, use of the PTI symbol to identify party candidates on national ballots was&nbsp;<a href="https://www.voanews.com/a/pakistan-s-pti-barred-from-using-cricket-bat-electoral-symbol-/7439552.html" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">banned</a>—a move slammed as an access issue for the roughly 62% of the country who&nbsp;<a href="https://mofept.gov.pk/ProjectDetail/NjQ4ZTg2NjItOWM2NC00Y2IxLTkzMDgtMjU2OTFhMjA4NzNh#:~:text=The%20current%20literacy%20rate%20of,is%20illiterate%20in%20the%20country." target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">cannot read</a>—and all PTI candidates were forced to run as independents. PTI-backed candidates&nbsp;<a href="https://time.com/6693631/imran-khan-allies-lead-pakistan-election-final-results/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">did gain more votes</a>&nbsp;than those of any other party, but because each candidate ran as an individual, PML-N was the largest single-party winner in parliament. Both groups have claimed victory, and Sharif said he plans to form a coalition government. The Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) has demanded an inquiry into the claims of election rigging, according to the&nbsp;<a href="https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/pakistan/amid-allegations-of-mass-vote-rigging-could-2024-pakistan-election-results-be-declared-null-and-void/articleshow/107796285.cms" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Times of India.</a>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">BIG NUMBER</h2>



5. That&#8217;s how many times Pakistan has implemented internet restrictions so far this year, according to Surfshark. Of those, three took place in February and were directly related to the elections. The other two occurred in January&nbsp;<a href="https://www.jurist.org/news/2024/01/pakistan-experiences-internet-disruption-during-virtual-pti-rally/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">during virtual events</a>&nbsp;organized by PTI. State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller on Wednesday&nbsp;<a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/us-urges-pakistan-lift-internet-shutdowns-social-media-restrictions-2024-02-21/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">urged</a>&nbsp;the Pakistani government to &#8220;restore access to any social media that has been restricted, including Twitter.&#8221; Elon Musk, the owner of X and the world&#8217;s second-richest person, has not commented publicly on the outage.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">TANGENT</h2>



Those who have been able to access X have lashed out at Umar Saif, Pakistan’s interim technology minister, after he posted several times on the platform after the outage began, which implies he used a VPN to skirt government wishes. Saif&nbsp;<a href="https://twitter.com/umarsaif" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">has posted</a>&nbsp;original content to X four times and retweeted one post since Feb. 18, including a post flaunting the growth of Pakistan&#8217;s IT industry. None of his posts referenced the outage. &#8220;Sir which vpn you&#8217;re using to tweet this?&#8221; one X user&nbsp;<a href="https://twitter.com/Thisharoon2/status/1760240974876340482" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">asked</a>. Anas Mallick, a reporter with WIONews,&nbsp;<a href="https://twitter.com/AnasMallick/status/1760272060201263411" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">responded</a>&nbsp;to a post Wednesday with &#8220;please let us know what VPN are you using to tweet this for the benefit of general public.&#8221;



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">SURPRISING FACT</h2>



Pakistan isn’t the only country to have VPN use surge following a change in policy. Nord Security said traffic surges like the ones seen in Pakistan this week were also observed in 2022, when <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/china/chinas-xi-says-full-control-over-hong-kong-achieved-determined-taiwan-2022-10-16/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">news emerged</a> China was considering taking full control of Hong Kong, and in the United States in 2017, when the FCC repealed <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/14/technology/net-neutrality-repeal-vote.html" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">net neutrality rules</a>. Similar spikes also occurred in the United Kingdom in 2016 when the country passed the so-called <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/nov/29/snoopers-charter-bill-becomes-law-extending-uk-state-surveillance" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">&#8220;Snoopers&#8217; Charter&#8221; law</a>, which allows the government to collect online information on its citizens and have it stored by private companies.

Supporters of Pakistan’s former Prime Minister Imran Khan protest in Peshawer

X Outage In Pakistan Triggers Surge In VPN Use

Last week, on Thursday, February 15, the Ethiopian Government&#8217;s investment arm, <a href="https://eih.et/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Ethiopian Investment Holdings</a> (EIH), signed a memorandum of understanding with Hong-Kong-based West Data Group&#8217;s Center Service PLC to commence mining bitcoin.



The partnership is under a general agreement for a groundbreaking $250 million data mining project &#8220;that is dedicated to establishing cutting-edge infrastructure for data mining and artificial intelligence training operations in Ethiopia,&#8221; according to the EIH. Ethiopia is positioning itself as a leader in the data centre space in Africa, which is estimated to grow to $5.4 billion by 2027, according to Aritzon Advisory and Intelligence.



As noted by Kal Kassa, CEO for Ethiopia at&nbsp;<a href="https://www.hashlabsmining.io/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Hashlabs Mining</a>, “the development is part of the Ethiopian Government&#8217;s aim to drive economic growth by leveraging technology and energy sources to attract foreign investments.”



The EIH has yet to confirm the details of its bitcoin mining operations or respond to requests for comment by other publications. Nevertheless, as the project matures, we can expect to get more clarity from them on the particulars of the arrangement.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-bitcoin-mining-in-ethiopia">Bitcoin Mining In Ethiopia</h2>



Despite the ban on crypto trading in the country, 2022 saw the ratification of favorable data mining laws that permit &#8220;high-performance computing&#8221; and &#8220;data mining,&#8221; which is where bitcoin mining falls under. In the last two years, this has opened the floodgates to miners seeking its comparatively positive reception to bitcoin mining, coupled with its abundance of energy sources—chiefly hydro—to its optimal weather and cheap energy costs.



According to data from Bitcoin mining services company Luxor Technologies, in 2023, Ethiopia ranked fourth behind the USA, Hong Kong, and Asia as one of the top destinations for Bitcoin mining rigs. Russian bitcoin mining company Bitcluster has already built the first 120 MW bitcoin mining facility, and companies such as Hashlabs Mining have started building bitcoin mines in Ethiopia for their global clients.



In a few years, according to a forecast by a senior executive at Bitmain and reported by Bloomberg, Ethiopia&#8217;s energy potential could rival Texas&#8217;s generation capacity, which currently accounts for an astounding 28.5% of the US&#8217;s 40% global hash rate.



Nevertheless, bitcoin miners are cautious about the future of regulation in the country. As other regions have shown, bitcoin mining has no permanent regulatory cushion. It is also too early to predict whether Ethiopia will switch its stance on bitcoin mining as Iran and Kazakhstan did when it started competing with domestic energy demand.



Regardless, the government is keen on expanding its inflow of foreign currency to mitigate its economic challenges and views mining as a compelling investment opportunity to realise that goal.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-the-future-of-nation-state-mining-in-africa">The Future Of Nation State Mining In Africa</h2>



With the energy infrastructure yet to match demand on the ground for electricity in several African countries, using bitcoin mining has continued to become an attractive avenue to bring electricity to millions.



In Ethiopia, for example, over 40% of its population, roughly 120 million people, are without electricity. Yet, the country has an installed capacity generation of over 5,000 MW and anticipates a projected additional install capacity generation of ~5,150 MW following the completion of the Grand Ethiopia Renaissance Dam (GERD), the largest hydroelectric project in Africa.



Following the examples of mining projects elsewhere in Africa, such as&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/abubakarnurkhalil/2023/05/24/africans-are-pioneering-the-bright-yet-complicated-green-future-of-bitcoin-mining/?sh=6d70d31654ac">Gridless</a>&nbsp;and&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/digital-assets/2023/11/20/nigerian-bitcoin-miner-trojan-mining-launch-500kw-hydro-mining-site/">Trojan Mining</a>, Ethiopia too can leverage its abundant excess green energy to provide electricity to its citizens via bitcoin mining. It can serve as a blueprint for other African countries with comparable energy sources to follow and navigate similar economic problems.



Further, the inclusion of bitcoin mining into the Ethiopian economy could contribute $2 &#8211; $4 billion to its GDP, according to data from&nbsp;<a href="https://projectmano.com/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Project Mano</a>, an open collective seeking to educate the government on the potential benefits of bitcoin to the country’s economy.



The economic benefits of Ethiopia strategically leveraging its abundant energy resources for Bitcoin mining are vast and far-reaching. It is only a matter of time before other African nations join the bandwagon.



Bitcoin mining will ultimately be a pivotal tool in addressing the economic challenges of various African countries.

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Ethiopia To Become The First African Country To Start Bitcoin Mining

<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-topline">TOPLINE</h2>



Researchers have potentially linked an antiviral protein produced by the body during infection as the cause of long Covid, according to a new study, and they’re optimistic the next step is making medications to treat the disease.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-key-facts">KEY FACTS</h2>



Researchers followed patients with long Covid for 2.5 years to determine why some recovered from their symptoms and others didn’t, according to the study published Wednesday in Science Advances.



Long Covid (or post-Covid) symptoms include shortness of breath, loss of smell or taste, brain fog or chest pain following recovery from a Covid infection that can last for weeks—or in some cases, for years—<a href="https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/long-term-effects/index.html" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">according</a>&nbsp;to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.



When infected with the coronavirus, people produce an inflammatory protein called&nbsp;<a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4154595/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">interferon gamma</a>&nbsp;(or IFN-y), which is part of the body’s natural response to fight off infection.



The production of the protein typically stops once infection goes away, but researchers discovered participants with ongoing Covid symptoms had high levels of IFN-y for up to 31 months after initial infection, which the researchers believe may be the cause of long Covid.



Over 60% of patients experienced relief from at least some of their symptoms during the study period, and participants who were vaccinated after infection saw significant decreases in their long Covid symptoms and IFN-y production, suggesting vaccination “improved” long Covid symptoms, according to the study.



Current long Covid treatment only targets symptom alleviation and not the underlying disease, but now that a potential cause has been identified, there’s “hope that this could help to pave the way” for creating medication to specifically target long Covid, and “give some patients a firm diagnosis,” Benjamin Krishna, the study’s co-author and an investigator at Cambridge University, said in a statement.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-crucial-quote">CRUCIAL QUOTE</h2>



“The number of people with long Covid is gradually falling, and vaccination seems to be playing a significant role in that,” Krishna said. “But new cases are still cropping up, and then there is the big question of what happens when the next coronavirus pandemic comes along. Understanding what causes long Covid now could give us a crucial head start.”



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-big-number">BIG NUMBER</h2>



65 million. That’s how many people worldwide suffer from long Covid, according to a 2023&nbsp;<a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41579-022-00846-2" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">study</a>. The CDC&nbsp;<a href="https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/72/wr/mm7232a3.htm?s_cid=mm7232a3_w" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">estimated</a>&nbsp;around 6% of American adults in June 2023 experienced long Covid at some point in their lives.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-what-to-watch-for">WHAT TO WATCH FOR</h2>



The study researchers believe because there are several symptoms of long Covid that can look very different from each other, more research is needed in order to create subgroups of the disease. It’s “unlikely” all symptoms are caused by the same thing since some patients are able to recover while others aren’t, so future studies into why should be conducted, according to the researchers.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-key-background">KEY BACKGROUND</h2>



Several risk factors play into who’s more susceptible to long Covid, <a href="https://covid19.nih.gov/covid-19-topics/long-covid" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">according</a> to the National Institutes of Health: underlying health conditions like obesity and diabetes, going unvaccinated, experiencing severe Covid infection or hospitalization, older age and being a woman are all risk factors. Long Covid can affect several organs and body systems like the heart, lungs, kidney, reproductive system and brain and also trigger other health conditions like kidney disease, autoimmune disorders or diabetes. Other experts have attempted to identify the cause of long Covid. Some <a href="https://cardiab.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12933-021-01359-7" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">studies</a> have hypothesized tiny clots in the cells that persist for a long time may be the cause of some symptoms. The microclots may cause an inflammatory response, which causes exhaustion and fatigue, two of the most common long Covid symptoms. The Science Advances researchers believe their new findings suggest microclotting can’t be the only or most significant cause, though they don’t rule it out. The lowering of certain anti-inflammatory gut microbiomes during and after Covid—which causes an inflammatory response—may also trigger long Covid, according to a 2022 <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9088471/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">study</a>. Another theory is that the coronavirus itself—not the body’s response to it—causes long Covid by damaging or altering cells, leading to lasting symptoms, according to a separate Science Advances <a href="https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.abc5801" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">paper</a>.

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