LISTEN: Mixed reactions to #MidTermBudget

Published Oct 26, 2016

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Parliament – There were mixed reactions to Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan’s medium-term budget policy statement (MTBPS) on Wednesday, with some praising him for pulling off a tough balancing act, and others disagreeing with him but vowing to back him against “persecution”.

African National Congress secretary general Gwede Mantashe welcomed the budget proposals, saying Gordhan did “relatively well under the circumstances”.

Mantashe said he was impressed that government would sustain its spending on both higher and basic education.

“I think money put in…must reassure students that this commitment isn’t just lip service, it is a commitment,” said Mantashe.

“The minister of finance is being systematic in meeting the demands of students, but the focus is on the poor.”

Democratic Alliance (DA) leader Mmusi Maimane praised Gordhan’s speech, saying that it contained some DA proposals, including allocating a progressive increase to the higher education budget. He added his party would be lobbying for more interventions in this sector.

Maimane took the opportunity to condemn a violent student protest which took place outside the parliamentary gates while Gordhan was delivering his speech. Police officers used stun grenades and fired rubber bullets to disperse them.

Maimane said government had failed to adequately respond to the demands of students, but had rather responded with force.

“We have a government that has failed to response to the needs of our people. This cannot be the culture we live on going forward,” Maimane said

Higher Education Minister Blade Nzimande also criticised the protesting students, describing the violent scenes outside the legislature as “unfortunate” and “unpleasant”.

The minister acknowledged that while adding R17 billion to fund tertiary education over the next three years was a welcomed relief, it would not be enough to provide free education to all poor, academically deserving students.

“It’s certainly not enough but its a huge step forward,” Nzimande said.

“We are of the view that the measures we have taken, coupled with what the minister has announced, show a very decisive commitment by government towards reaching the goal of providing financial assistance to those that might need it.”

Economic Freedom Fighters leader Julius Malema was left disappointed by the fact that free higher education did not feature in the MTBPS.

“The ANC must take full responsibility and continue to look for money, call a national dialogue where concrete proposals will be made on where money can be sourced so that we finance this free education. It is not going to go away, it is going to happen, year in, year out, until free education is delivered.”

“We do not agree with his budget, we don’t agree that he did not declare free education. But his limitation is that he is serving a wrong organisation,” Malema said.

But, Malema did however pledge his political support to Gordhan when he appears in the Pretoria Regional Court on November 2 on fraud charges related to the early retirement of former SA Revenue Service employee Ivan Pillay.

“We came to say to the minister he is not alone. We can see political persecution. We know how those who abuse state institutions operate,” Malema said.

“Therefore the whole world must know that we don’t have any doubt that our minister did not do anything wrong.”

Malema slammed ANC MPs for giving Gordhan a standing ovation before he tabled the medium-term budget, branding them as “pretentious”.

“At night they are going to be plotting against him. At night they are going to be identifying items in that budget they will be stealing from. But Zuma’s days are numbered,” Malema said.

The Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP) heaped praised on Gordhan for staying the path of fiscal consolidation, but cautioned that increased borrowing to fund government priorities did not bode well for the future.

“What is of grave concern to the IFP is South Africa’s increasing debt which currently stands at just over R2 trillion and currently generates a debt repayment of R147 billion per year, and our worry is that should the country suffer another credit ratings downgrade, the interest payment will increase and that additional debt service fee will have to be found from the fiscus,” said IFP chief whip Narend Singh.

Organised labour was critical of the budget proposals. The Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) said the budget was not pro-poor enough.

Matthew Parks, Cosatu’s parliamentary deputy co-ordinator, said this year’s MTBPS was a “business budget”.

“We are quite disappointed with the budget statement. This is basically a business-as-usual budget and we could not see anything fundamentally different to stimulate the economy and to create jobs,” Parks said.

“For workers, you’ve had an economic crisis for 40 years with one out of three workers unemployed. We are not sure what is different with this budget which is going to resolve that massive crisis.”

African News Agency

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