SACP response to the Medium-Term Budget Policy Statement
24 October 2018
The South African Communist Party has noted the Medium-Term Budget Policy Statement presented on Wednesday, 24 October in Parliament, Cape Town, by the Minister of Finance Tito Mboweni. The Medium-Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF) that the Minister outlined is constrained by the conditions of the technical recession that has gripped the South African economy and an economic outlook that has been revised downward.
The corruption of corporate-capture of the state, including looting, as well as the associated governance decay, mismanagement and maladministration, have severely impacted public resources and by no small measure contributed to the multiple crises in which our revenue and state owned enterprises were plunged. Neither is the international context favourable. Decisions taken and developments taking place as far as the United States impact developing country economies. South African economy is not an exception.
The SACP is therefore not in denial about the difficult economic situation in which our country finds itself. However, we need to ensure that, in approaching this crisis, we do not choke off any prospect for real job-creating recovery through excessively conservative macro-economic policy, or the short-term disposal of key public assets. The SACP notes the announcement made by the Minister of the plan to reconfigure state owned enterprises, and will engage both with the Alliance and the government on this and other strategic economic questions. If personnel budgets come under scrutiny, then it is the bloated, over-paid top management structures that must be targeted, not the tens of thousands of honest and hard-working rank-and-file workers.
State owned enterprises have an important role to play driving the imperative of democratic national transformation and development. They must be governed and managed properly in order to thrive, and require a favourable operating environment. It is therefore crucial to review their regulatory framework and remove all aspects that hold them up while advantaging private corporations.