SACP denounces downgrade of South Africa’s sovereign rating
28 March 2020
The South African Communist Party (SACP) strongly denounces the rating agency Moody’s’ decision to downgrade South African’s sovereign rating to a sub-investment status. Others are saying the downgrade was obviously expected. As the SACP, we are unequivocally saying the decision is heartless, insensitive and inconsiderate: It was made in the midst of the global public health emergency, national state of disaster and nationwide lockdown in South Africa, caused by the spread of the novel coronavirus (Covid-19).
A number of our economic sectors will not be running during this period as a result of the Covid-19 global state of public health emergency and its impact on our people and country. South Africa is not alone in this – other countries are also faced with the same emergency situation.
It is clear that certain global rating agencies and other forces want to usurp economic policy formulation from democratically elected governments, such as ours in South Africa, and impose a foreign monopoly-finance capital driven agenda opposed to the interests and aspirations of the people, especially the workers and poor. This is a class agenda, an offensive during a global public health emergency and national state of disaster, rather than a mere technical rating exercise.
The SACP is strongly opposed to that agenda, its related weaponisation of rating agencies, and all other attempts at exploiting the Covid-19 global public health emergency to undermine our democratic national sovereignty or impose private profiteering agendas. Our democratically elected government must be in charge of our economic policy formulation, within the framework of our constitutional democracy, in democratic consultation with the people of our country.
In particular, the working class has to unite, advance and defend its interests and aspirations in order for our country’s democratic process to lead to our national development goals. Our country’s economic policy direction must be based on our historical context and national development imperatives, rather than be underpinned by foreign exploitative and imperial interests.
In the same vein, the SACP strongly denounces the unpatriotic and private profiteer driven calls for government to liquidate or divest the South African Airways, SAA, and other state-owned enterprises (SOEs). The attack on public property rights is part and parcel of neoliberal manoeuvres to impose corporate-capture of our entire economy, and therefore private capital monopoly, and leave no space and no role for public participation as represented by publicly-owned enterprises and government intervention, as well as community and worker-controlled co-operatives.
SOEs were not adequately capitalised as a result of the neoliberal 1996 GEAR class project. They were increasingly placed under the yoke of private profit seeking interest bearing capital and its finance regime. This and other wrong policy choices, reinforced by bad governance, mismanagement, maladministration, corruption and looting at the enterprise level, were directly responsible for the debt crisis and other crises a number of our SOEs find themselves in today.
Private sector companies, including foreign controlled multinational corporations, consultancy firms and auditing companies, benefitted out of the governance decay, including in particular state capture. The problem and its entire legacy must be fixed in the interest of the public and development of our democracy and economy to serve our people. In order for SOEs to play a developmental role, they each require developmental finance and adequate capitalisation, rather than divestment and liquidation.
Issued by Alex Mohubetswane Mashilo, Central Committee Member: Head of Media & Communications, SACP, 28 March 2020
