ANALYSIS: How Ramaphosa governs and his plans to change the economy

[Cius]

Someone sent me this article that blew me away: https://www.fin24.com/Opinion/analy...-and-his-plans-to-change-the-economy-20191112

In his seventh month in office (Sept 2018), Ramaphosa announced an economic recovery package. The package consisted of 25 actions. In our evaluation 11 of these have been done; 5 are in process; 3 have not been done (all 3 to do with extra money); and on 6 we could not obtain hard data.

 

[bwana]

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[Cius]

Edit: Sorry Bwana, rooky mistake, have tried to correct, hope this works:

They fairly point out that the economic recovery plan has largely failed to bear fruit yet and a lot more is needed however some seriously important stuff has happened.

Labour reforms:

The requirement for unions to hold a secret strike ballot amongst their members before engaging in a strike is now part of labour law. It was fiercely resisted by unions and some even threatened a constitutional challenge, which has not happened.

A second measure, the youth wage subsidy, that the unions also opposed aggressively has been extended for another ten years.

A third fiercely opposed measure, the evaluation of teachers, has been agreed to. On September 3 an agreement was signed with the education union, SADTU, for a quality management system in schools. The system is detailed and comprehensive, will begin on January 1 2021 with teachers evaluated twice a year.

So much for the conventional wisdom that government can’t introduce policies the unions disagree with…

This is huge, in particular the first and last points are simply massive. SADTU has been blocking any attempt to measure teacher performance for 20+ years and it is a huge part of why our education system is failing. This for me was the number one long term change needed in our education system for a long term fix to the economy and Ramphosa has actually delivered on it to almost no fanfare. Astonishing, and wonderful to see the ANC finally facing down the unions and winning! Next we need to see some harder action on illegal union activities to get them back within the bounds of the law.

Energy:

The Integrated Resource Plan was finalised and gazetted. This must be read with the government’s plans for Eskom. These are truly ground-breaking policy initiatives as an entire sector (electricity) currently dominated by a government monopoly (Eskom) will be turned on its head. Some dismiss these policies as insufficient and ‘it-will-not-happen’, partly based on the ‘unions-will-not-allow-it’ argument. Government has signalled a strong political desire to implement these initiatives and I am happy to place my bet that this will happen.

The IRP and the Eskom proposals will together unlock massive investment, expand the role of the private sector considerably and significantly expand sectors like gas and wind power.

Another great peace of news that lets hope they deliver on. Private power generation is the solution to our current issues. We can expect it to start early next year.

• The president has repeatedly made it clear that the government will not spend its way to growth and will maintain strict fiscal and monetary discipline. That has happened. The deterioration of South Africa’s fiscal position has to do with low growth and mismanagement/theft at the SOEs.
• Big structural reforms have been announced in energy and telecommunications. It will unlock many billions in investment and is considerably more growth friendly than anything in the Sept 2018 package.
• Growth is also being pursued through addressing constraints like visas and ease of doing business; and getting business, government and labour to collaborate in selected sectors.
• Specific steps are being taken to enhance inclusion and create black-owned businesses.
• The president summarised his administration’s approach at the investment summit: ‘Over the past 18 months we have made inroads. Our gains have been gradual, but they have been incremental and noteworthy. We are confident they will now gain further traction… ‘. He quoted a Confucian proverb: ‘The man who moves a mountain begins by carrying away small stones.’ This is how Ramaphosa governs.

There is so much bad news and big issues to solve, a lot of it dating from the Zuma era. Lets hope the positive can incrementally solve some of our bigger issues and undo that damage. This article certainly shows some huge progress. If the in progress stuff can be closed out soon (like spectrum, private power into the grid, etc) we could see a lot more good news come. Anyways, just thought it was an interesting read and worth sharing. In saying all this I do not want to discount the massive issues SA has, the fact that no senior looter is in jail yet, the load shedding, or anything else, I just felt that sometimes we tend to only look at the bad news and not look at the bigger picture. There are actually people doing some good work out there and it deserves to be acknowledged.

 

[ToxicBunny]

There have been some good moves made, even if they've been glossed over...

The major issue still arises in whether these changes which can possibly build a good base into the future are enough to stem the chaos in the short term...

 

[Priapus]

There is so much bad news and big issues to solve, a lot of it dating from the Zuma era. Lets hope the positive can incrementally solve some of our bigger issues and undo that damage. This article certainly shows some huge progress. If the in progress stuff can be closed out soon (like spectrum, private power into the grid, etc) we could see a lot more good news come. Anyways, just thought it was an interesting read and worth sharing. In saying all this I do not want to discount the massive issues SA has, the fact that no senior looter is in jail yet, the load shedding, or anything else, I just felt that sometimes we tend to only look at the bad news and not look at the bigger picture. There are actually people doing some good work out there and it deserves to be acknowledged.

I agree, I just wish the media houses would publish more good news at time; but that's not their narrative. I read the articles posts (ACT 1, ACT 2, IRP and the power plan) and did not know much of that had already happened or I probably forgot, with all the other bad news being posted.

I am hopeful that we start to move forward, even if its slowly.