Ramaphosa disappoints with first SONA after elections
21 June 2019
After the entire country had great expectations for President Cyril Ramaphosa's first State of the Nation Address (SONA) after the elections, which was supposed to provide direction for the country's future and send out clear and positive signals to investors, his speech was a great disappointment.
Regrettably, the focus was on the past and it was once again used as a peg on which to hang the ANC government's failures for which the President did not put forward any real solutions. What will be done to save South Africa's economy remains unclear.
On top of that, any plans that are put forward will be of very little to no value as long as the dark cloud of the expropriation of property still looms over the economy. The only thing that is certain in this regard is that the government is proceeding with it and the FF Plus condemns it strongly.
The President called on all South African citizens to start paying for services by saying that people must accept that the days of boycotting electricity payments are over. It will, however, not be of any use if consumers pay, but the money never reaches the electricity supplier.
The biggest problem is not that people do not pay their electricity accounts, but that municipalities do not pay their accounts with Eskom. It must be addressed. The President also did not say what will happen if people continue to miss payments. Will their power supply be cut off? That is an example of a concrete suggestion for how to rectify the problem.
The same is true for unemployment, investments, education, health and crime. Plans from the past were rehashed and once again the private sector and trade unions were asked to cooperate with the government to bring about growth.
The reality, however, is that if trade unions' powers are not restricted and labour legislation is not amended to do away with Affirmative Action (AA), the economy simply will not grow.
Public enterprises like Eskom are joined even more strongly to the government and the only thing that is certain in this regard is that the taxpayer will keep paying for one rescue package after the other for years to come.
President Ramaphosa used vague words in his SONA to paint the picture of a beautiful dream for the public, but the reality is that we find ourselves in a nightmare and the President will realise that when he wakes up.
Issued by Pieter Groenewald, FF Plus leader, 21 June 2019
