Zuma says economy will grow by 1.3%
“FINALLY!,” this is how President Jacob Zuma started his speech last night, before giggling, after witnessing EFF members being punched and kicked out of the National Assembly following disruptions that lasted for over an hour.
Zuma seemed unmoved by the violence that took place in the chamber after National Assembly speaker Baleka Mbete called in security personnel to remove EFF MPs who had disrupted his speech.
The scuffle overshadowed Zuma’s State of the Nation Address – which had been hyped up as an announcement of a radical economic transformation programme.
When finally allowed to speak, Zuma said the economy was expected to grow by 1.3% this year‚ up from the estimated 0.5% in 2016.
Despite the uncertain global economic environment‚ South Africa had entered a period of recovery. However, the economy was not growing fast enough to create the muchneeded jobs. A programme to stimulate economic growth would focus on a few key areas to reignite growth – industrialisation‚ mining and beneficiation‚ agriculture‚ agro-processing‚ energy‚ small and medium enterprises‚ attracting investment‚ growing the oceans economy‚ and tourism.
Zuma said there were encouraging signs of labour market stability and he welcomed the agreement reached this week on the national minimum wage.
The President reiterated the government’s commitment to the independent power producer programme, which would be expanded to other sources of energy including coal and gas in addition to renewable energy.
Eskom will sign the outstanding power purchase agreements for renewable energy‚ Zuma said.
He insisted that undue government delays and unnecessary red tape related to investment – such as licences and visas – would not be tolerated.
“We should make it easy to do business in SA‚” he said.
The government was working to ensure bulk water supply to support economic growth‚ Zuma said. He announced that the government would train about 10 000 youths as plumbers and water agents.
“We call upon municipalities to support the war on [water] leaks … Government is working hard to ensure bulk water supply to [ensure] economic growth and increase access for vulnerable rural municipalities‚” said Zuma.
SA has been hit by successive droughts in the past three years. Several municipalities have introduced stricter water restrictions as dam levels continue to drop.
Reporting on progress with the expanded public works programme‚ Zuma said that since 2014‚ two million work opportunities had been created on the road to achieving the target of 6-million by March 2019.
Of these‚ more than one million had been taken up by youth. — TMG