Prince Lonkhokhela praises youth- focused budget but ...
‘‘ We urge that these vacancies be filled up speedily because there are many youth who are not employed. We pay taxes and this money should hire people to fill the positions that are said to exist and are necessary.”
MBABANE – Eswatini National Provident Fund (ENPF) Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Prince Lonkhokhela is full of praise for the youth-focused budget speech by Minister of Finance Neal Rijkenberg, but is worried at the elongated delay of the fund’s conversion.
The prince, during an interview yesterday at the Happy Valley Hotel in Ezulwini, said the Budget Speech had a lot to offer for young people.
He said the first thing he noted in Parliament when the minister tabled the Budget Speech was the presence of school pupils, something he said should be encouraged because young people are the future.
“Whatever that we do now is for them; if we take bad decisions, they are the ones who will have to suffer the consequences, not us. The country belongs to those who are still in school right now,” he said.
He noted how the pupils who were at the Budget Speech were clean and looked like proper future executives.
“Some of them were wearing head boy and head girl tags, which really impressed me. We thank the minister and Speaker for inviting these pupils. How I wish each school should have at least two pupils assigned to either go to Parliament to witness the delivering of the Budget Speech or to monitor it through the media,” Lonkhokhela said.
He said even with the education sector, it was impressive that the youth was being taken care of and the wish was that such assistance would increase without measure.
“We should just put or direct resourcestowards the youth as much as possible. That’s how I feel about the
youth,” he said.
ALIGNING WITH HMK’S SPEECH
The prince said the minister’s speech was quite impressive and complimented the King’s Speech from the Throne.
“The King spoke policy and the minister followed up with how this would be implemented. We should not have a situation where the King would say one thing and then have the minister heading in a totally different direction,” he said.
The CEO also thanked the minister for announcing a lifting of the hiring freeze that has been in place since 2018.
HIRING FREEZE
Rijkenberg said the hiring freeze had resulted in less than one per cent increase per annum in the wage bill. In 2017, the wage bill was at 41 per cent as a percentage to budget, but was not at a more sustainable 35 per cent, but this had unfortunately resulted in some ministries desperately needing to fill posts.
He then announced that this year’s budget was providing E900 million more than last year to fill these vacancies.
Lonkhokhela said this was a positive development because unemployment in the country was in an exceedingly sad state.
“We urge that these vacancies be filled up speedily because there are many youth who are not employed. We pay taxes and this money should hire people to fill the positions that are said to exist and are necessary. Maybe that’s where the development of the economy is being delayed, because by employing people into these positions would mean money is being activated. Lifting the hiring freeze is most welcome and we call upon this to be fast tracked because many people are desperately in need of jobs,” the prince said.
He said also this would assist the private sector as the front runner in job creation.
Government, he said, could do this by looking at ways to provide job opportunities for the youth in the agriculture sector by, for instance, empowering them on the processes to follow if they want to lease land for agricultural purposes.
“I’ve seen that the youth is willing and eager to work, but there is no support,” he said.
PUBLIC DEBT
The CEO also thanked the minister that despite the tough time we are coming from, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, the country managed to come out with such debt levels.
“In fact, it is one of the lowest in Africa. Debt is killing every nation, but ours is still highly manageable. I think we are the envy of many countries, even though we keep complaining that our debt level is high. Yes, it is high by our standards but compared to what is happening and the future needs we are better. It is even better now because the minister told us about a balanced budget which is telling us that even the levels we are at will go lower,” he said.
The prince recognised and appreciated the role that Cabinet played in turning the fortunes of the country around because they came into office at a time when the country’s fiscal position was in a bad state, but managed to bring about stability and a positive future outlook before their term ends.
“I wish to go back to the time when the country had a surplus and money would be kept at the Central Bank of Eswatini in loads. Those were the times. What the finance minister is now doing through the saving he has announced is a positive,” Lonkhokhela said.
SAVING VITAL
The prince also congratulated the finance minister for establishing the SACU Stabilisation Fund, into which Rijkenberg said E1.5 billion would be put as a start to cater for any reduced SACU receipts in the future.
The prince said he was very impressed when the minister announced this fund.
“It has been long overdue. Government is not different from the average person and family who have their ups and downs financially, such that they have to go to borrow. Saving is not only done when there is abundant surplus, but you have to save the little you have. I am happy that the minister is bringing stability into the country’s finances,” said the CEO.
He also expressed support on government’s initiative to increase the leverage on the MSME guaranteeing capacity from three times to five times the portfolio value.
ENGINE OF DEVELOPMENT
He said MSMEs are the engine of development anywhere in the world.
“Without them, a lot of even big businesses would not survive. There is interdependency between small and big businesses. We also heard that banks are offering increased credit to clients though at a slow pace because such is being hampered by interest rates. But we do need the credit, especially after the COVID-19 pandemic where everything went into a slump,” he stated.
Adding, the prince said it was also encouraging to see a significant amount of money being channelled towards the agriculture sector and hoped that it would be utilised for the benefit of a a larger population.
He further acknowledged the role of