SACP STATEMENT ON THE CABINET STATEMENT ON THE GROWTH PATH

The SACP welcomes the fact that finally Cabinet has placed for public engagement the new growth path. We will closely study the proposals contained in the document to be released and respond in detail, as Cabinet has committed itself to such engagements. We wish to however make some preliminary observations as follows:

Firstly, we welcome the fact that the proposed new growth path places employment creation at the centre stage of economic policy of government going forward. Most pundits would argue that most if not all policies of government do so anyway. An interesting observation for us though is that unlike GEAR, the new growth path places the much needed emphasis on building and strengthening our productive and infrastructure investment capacity with an industrial strategy at the centre as opposed to a growth path that is dependent on manipulating macro-economic indicators to ‘beautify' ourselves in front of international markets.

The SACP has for almost one and half decade been calling for a radical transformation of our current, semi-colonial, growth path. We also welcome the mooted review of current BEE in order to ensure that our empowerment strategy means increasing the participation of blacks in manufacturing and actual production rather that the current, narrow, deal chasing and self enrichment that has come to characterize BEE. All of our economic interventions, including BEE, must be subjected to a different logic, that of increased investment into the productive economy.

Secondly the SACP notes the emphasis placed on driving a social compact among social partners for the success of the new growth path.  We are looking forward to such engagements and government initiatives in this regard. The SACP will however not support a social compact that is aimed at extracting further concessions from the working class and the poor as opposed to the rich. We will support a social compact premised on, amongst other things, the following:

a. the closing of the apartheid, often racialised, wage gap.

b. slashing of executives salaries and bonuses and other perks, both in the public and private sector.

c. containment of rampant price increases on basic necessities like food stuffs and electricity.

Finally as the SACP we hope that in so far as funding of the new growth path is concerned, consideration should be given to our Red October Campaign demand for redirecting resources both in the public and private financial institutions towards investment in infrastructure, rural development and expanding our productive and manufacturing capacity as a country.

The SACP will use both its Red October campaign and alliance platforms to further engage on the further details on the proposed growth path and put our proposals across. A radical transformation of the systemic challenges faced by our economy requires that we mobilize and popularise the growth path so that it becomes an economic transformation programme that is backed up by mass of the workers and the poor of our country.

Statement issued by the SACP, October 26 2010

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