Mboweni has mountain to climb at Davos summit

Ex Afrika semper aliquid novi (Out of Africa, always something new) reads Finance Minister Tito Mboweni’s Twitter bio, and he will certainly have to pull something out of his hat at the UK-Africa Summit and Davos if he hopes to lure investors to SA.

Mboweni, International Relations and Cooperation Minister Naledi Pandor and Trade and Industry Minister Ebrahim Patel’s Sisyphean task will be convincing investors electricity supply is stable while the performance of the economy, widely expected not to rise more than 1% in 2020, is growing despite the International Monetary Fund dropping SA’s GDP growth to an expected 0.8% this week from 1.1%. This month, the World Bank raised its estimation from 0.4% in 2019 to 0.9%.

Economist Thabi Leoka said Mboweni needed to be honest about the state of the economy and fully explain the issues hampering growth.

“I then expect him to lay out the plan to get the SA economy out of the hole,” Leoka said. “Many of the issues are in the

National Treasury’s policy document.”

Leoka said she would like Mboweni “to speak in unison with other African leaders so the continent is viewed as a market versus just SA”.

“He should mention the Africa Free Trade Agreement, which will create the largest trade union in the world.

“There are great opportunities for business and trade for the UK and African countries. As the UK is exiting the EU this year, I expect him to emphasise forging new trade partnerships with the UK.”

Bureau for Economic Research chief economist Hugo Pienaar said there was a lot of negativity surrounding SA “for good reason, most of the time”.

He added: “Some of that is second-hand information or rumours, so it is good for investors to interact with the actual decision-makers, and hear their story of what government and business are doing to improve SA’s fortunes.”

In November, President Cyril Ramaphosa secured pledges of R200 billion from local and international business at the second SA Investment Conference.