President who dared to dream

PRESIDENT Cyril Ramaphosa presented his State of the Nation Address on Thursday night – his second this year, but the first following the ANC’s victory in the general elections in May.

The stakes were high, the expectations immense with an economy in decline, almost on the precipice of a recession, raging unemployment and unemployability, municipalities in almost terminal decline, a public health service where patients die in long queues, an education system producing many unemployable and untrainable school leavers and, critical state-owned enterprises leeching money off the exchequer we can ill afford. Chief among these is Eskom, whose decline has mirrored and indeed speeded up our economic tailspin.

Ramaphosa addressed all of these and much more. He dared to dream, for which he was roundly derided by the opposition parties, but the joke is on them.

Our democracy stands at a crossroads, we need to dream and our president needs both a vision to inspire us and victories along the way.

Involved in an internecine war with his own party secretary-general and the rump of his predecessor’s loyalists which shows no signs of abating, Ramaphosa looked to have lost a key battle on the eve of the address, with the week-long delay in the naming of the new vitally important standing committee chairpersons resulting in the re-appointment of a raft of former ministers and senior party members either directly fingered in state capture or notable only for their factional loyalty.

On Thursday night, though, Ramaphosa re-exerted his leadership over both party and state, grasping the nettle of paying for electricity and drawing an unequivocal line in the sand about the independence of the Reserve Bank.

The road will not be easy, but the president has a plan – more than that he has a vision and it includes every single one of us.