‘You watch this space!’

This was the president’s promising refrain throughout his State of the Nation address

Hope, optimism, resilience and progress — that was the message of President Cyril Ramaphosa’s State of the Nation address on Thursday. He looked confident — and very much still like the man who stood in the same spot a year ago, invoking the spirit of thuma mina.

Though he must still battle his way through the morass of ANC factional politics in Luthuli House, inside the National Assembly, he looked upbeat, and very much in charge. What’s more, he sounded like a president confident of the trust of the electorate.

“Our people have embraced the renewal that our country is going through and are much more hopeful about a better tomorrow,” he said. “Our people’s hope is not baseless; it is grounded on the progress that is being made.”

Reflecting on interventions in state-owned enterprises and crucial state agencies such as the National Prosecuting Authority and the South African Revenue Service, he emphasised that “meaningful progress” had been made. It’s not all bad, he seemed to say, with repeated reminders that much more will have to be done for a more just society to be achieved.

Over the past year, Ramaphosa has not shied away from addressing the problems that beset his government. He recently irked former president Jacob Zuma by describing Zuma’s presidency as nine wasted years. But he still struggles to explain his complicity in those nine years.

When he spoke about the various commissions of inquiry underway on Thursday, he noted: “The revelations emerging from the Zondo commission of inquiry into state capture and other commissions are deeply disturbing, for they reveal a breadth and depth of criminal wrongdoing that challenges the very foundation