The Gupta business family at the centre of a political scandal in South Africa has sold its main mining company to a little-known Swiss-based group — the second sale of a prime asset this week, the Financial Times reported. Oakbay, the Guptas’ holding company, said it had agreed to sell Tegeta Exploration and Resources to Charles King for R2.97bn ($225m).

South Africa’s National Treasury confirmed the appointment of Vodacom Group Ltd. executive Vuyani Jarana as the first permanent chief executive officer of the state-owned carrier since November 2015. Jarana will take the helm at South African Airways when Vodacom releases him of his duties, the Treasury said in an emailed statement on Thursday. The debt-laden airline has failed to make a profit since 2011 and was handed a bailout last month after National Treasury transferred funds to help it avoid a default on its debt to Standard Chartered Plc, Bloomberg News reported.

South Africa is evaluating assets it could sell to pay for this month’s 2.2 billion rand ($169.5 million) bailout of unprofitable carrier South African Airways, Finance Minister Malusi Gigaba said in letter to parliament, Bloomberg News reported. The government’s decision to settle a debt owed by the airline to Standard Chartered Plc mustn’t affect the balance of this year’s budget, Gigaba said in the note to Baleka Mbete, speaker of the National Assembly. Further details will be provided in October, he said.

South Africa will extend more support to the beleaguered state-owned power utility and is considering selling assets as part of a 14-point plan to revive an economy that’s in its second recession in almost a decade, Bloomberg News reported. The country will approach the energy regulator this month about the “hardship” Eskom Holdings SOC Ltd. is dealing with, and will develop a case for “soft support” of the electricity producer until its new tariffs are finalized next year, Finance Minister Malusi Gigaba told reporters in Johannesburg Thursday.

Ratings agency Fitch is likely to follow rival Standard & Poor’s and cut South Africa’s sovereign credit rating to below investment-grade, analysts said, an outcome that would underscore worries about political uncertainty and prompt a further sell-off in assets, the Irish Times reported. The ratings agency was considering its position as thousands of South Africans took to the streets on Friday to urge President Jacob Zuma to step down after a turbulent week in the wake of his firing of respected finance minister Pravin Gordhan.

Pravin Gordhan, South Africa’s finance minister, has slashed the country’s growth forecast in half and warned that political turmoil threatens to derail an economic turnround as he battles to stave off a downgrade to junk status, the Financial Times reported. In a budget delivered days before he is due to appear in court on fraud charges, Mr Gordhan said South Africa was “at a crossroad, politically and economically” in defending and reforming public institutions.

South African Airways, the national carrier, probably incurred a loss for a fifth consecutive year in the past financial period, and would be insolvent without a government-backed guarantee, Bloomberg News reported. The state airline’s loss for the year ending March is estimated at 1.8 billion rand ($124 million), and follows a 4.7 billion loss a year earlier, Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan said in parliament on Tuesday. Gordhan approved a further 4.7 billion rand going-concern guarantee last week that will allow the company to release delayed financial statements on Sept. 15.

South African Airways, the national carrier, probably incurred a loss for a fifth consecutive year in the past financial period, and would be insolvent without a government-backed guarantee, Bloomberg News reported. The state airline’s loss for the year ending March is estimated at 1.8 billion rand ($124 million), and follows a 4.7 billion loss a year earlier, Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan said in parliament on Tuesday. Gordhan approved a further 4.7 billion rand going-concern guarantee last week that will allow the company to release delayed financial statements on Sept. 15.

South Africa’s central bank stood by its main interest rate Thursday, as the threat of near-recession outweighed intensifying inflation risks facing the continent’s most developed economy, the Wall Street Journal reported today. South African Reserve Bank Governor Lesetja Kganyago said the risks to growth were too great raise the bank’s main “repo” rate above 7.0 percent. Kganyago has raised rates three times in the past year in an effort to curb inflation that has shot above the bank’s 6 percent target ceiling.

South Africa will narrowly avoid slipping into recession this year, the International Monetary Fund said, as lackluster leadership and the global commodity rout drag down a longlisting economy, The Wall Street Journal reported. The IMF said Thursday that Africa’s most developed economy will expand just 0.1% this year, down from its previous forecast for a 0.6% expansion. Growth of just 1.1% in 2017 will do little to make up for the a multiyear slump that pushed unemployment and the current-account deficit to record highs.