About 30 minutes after noon on Monday President Cyril Ramaphosa walked up to the podium in Joburg to unveil the ANC’s latest “economic action plan”. Zuko Godlimpi, the party’s energetic head of economic transformation, had at the weekend promised fireworks at Ramaphosa’s briefing.
So, I rushed from my 11am meeting and plonked myself in front of a television set, ready to be wowed by the new plan that would raise our annual GDP growth rate from its criminally low 0.8% to the ANC’s promised 3% in double-quick time. I was hoping for new ideas, innovative plans and a commitment to doing things differently.
Ramaphosa has been in office for seven years. He has had more than enough opportunity to make good on his promises to curb corruption, grow the economy and ignite job creation.
Ramaphosa spoke for about 35 minutes and was done by 1.05pm. At 5.30pm, more than four hours after his “groundbreaking” announcement, there was not a single report about it on BusinessLIVE, News24 Business or any other business and economics news platform.
The reporters had listened, the market had also perhaps listened, and everyone had yawned.
That’s because the entire action plan was a rehash of the same old ideas and promises we’ve been hearing since 2018. As Ramaphosa briskly went through 10 action points, I kept thinking: “Hey, I’ve heard that one before — is anyone going to check if anyone did anything about it in the past?”
By the time Ramaphosa reached his concluding remarks I knew what was coming. The president did not disappoint: “The NEC [ANC national executive committee] resolved that an economic war room be established in the Presidency to co-ordinate cross-government performance monitoring and publish regular scorecards on progress.”
How many task teams, commissions, war rooms, advisory councils and other bodies is Ramaphosa going to appoint to do the work that his ministries of finance and of trade, industry & competition should be doing?
How many task teams, commissions, war rooms, advisory councils and other bodies is Ramaphosa going to appoint to do the work that his ministries of finance and of trade, industry & competition, and the huge bureaucracies they command, should be doing?
I will leave you, dear reader, to hunt down and read the statement for yourself. Here’s the gist of it and some of my thoughts.
The government will “fast-track” the transmission development plan to install 14,500km of new transmission lines for the electricity grid; “accelerate” the recovery of the freight and logistics sector; rebuild our chrome and manganese industries; and improve the “the capacity of the state to manage major projects”. Read those words again: “fast-track”, “accelerate” and “improve”. They mean that on these first four “interventions” the government has been dragging its feet. So, nothing new here. We just promise to do better next time. Again.
The fifth intervention is to drive local economic development and investment in infrastructure in townships, rural areas and small towns with “local economic development technical units”. Sixth, the government will create jobs, “labour activation initiatives as well as public employment”. I don’t want to sound like a pessimistic Eeyore, but some of us shudder when we think of a government that cannot do its job in the first place now venturing into “job creation”.
The president also said “development finance institutions will be transformed into catalytic investors”, while provincial industrial parks will be revitalised and aligned with special economic zones and corridor planning.
We’ve heard the remaining two interventions before, as well.
One is to “accelerate the diversification of our trade partners, strengthen our participation in the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) and address the impact of tariff and nontariff barriers”. Why hasn’t this been done all along? The AfCFTA agreement was signed in March 2018 and came into force one year later. Only now, due to punitive US tariffs, is South Africa realising that it needs to diversify its trade partners.
Finally, Ramaphosa pledged to “develop a sustainable budget negotiation strategy in the context of the government of national unity”. After this year’s budget fiasco, that’s welcome news.
The action plan is a damp squib. The only way to excite business and society is for the ANC to implement policies with speed, honesty and vigour. South Africans will continue to ignore the president so long as his fine words are never accompanied by action and real change.
Would you like to comment on this article?
Sign up (it's quick and free) or sign in now.
Please read our Comment Policy before commenting.