Cape Town - President Cyril Ramaphosa has once more called on South African society, its business and government counterparts, to work together to revive the country’s battered economy.
Ramaphosa made the call in his weekly letter, saying that although the country was steadily recovering from the impact of Covid-19, South African households were battling to survive due to increasing prices and a slow economy.
He said although the government’s Economic Reconstruction and Recovery Plan was succeeding in certain areas, the complete revitalisation of the country’s economy depended on greater partnership across society.
Ramaphosa said that the state had initiated programmes across the board to generate enough revenue to fully implement initiatives needed to improve people’s lives.
The country’s debt service costs were fast outgrowing its systematic budget, meaning there was less to spend on education, health, social protection, and infrastructure, placing greater pressure on service delivery.
“We are acting with increased focus and effort to remove the most immediate constraints on growth, and doing so with our social partners. Actively pursuing inclusive economic growth,” Ramaphosa said.
“Our collaboration with the business sector has moved far beyond discussions. We have been working closely with Business for South Africa on critical actions to address the key challenges of energy, logistics, and crime and corruption.”
Last month, Ramaphosa, with members of his Cabinet, met business leaders under the umbrella of Business for South Africa. The meeting was held in the wake of his engagement session with the leadership of the country’s four labour federations.
Commenting on the outcomes of the meeting, Ramaphosa said the labour federations had agreed to join the government to address the country’s pressing economic challenges.
He also referred to the government working with the National Energy Crisis Committee to bring an end to load shedding and achieve energy security.
“Our engagements with essential partners of our society affirm our plans and ideals. A good example of the work being done is the mobilisation by businesses of additional capacity and skills to support the recovery of Eskom’s power plants,” he said.
“Full implementation of the plan to improve the performance of Eskom’s existing power stations, add new generation capacity, and reform the energy sector is expected to result in over 12 000 megawatts of generation capacity being recovered or added to the system by the end of 2024.”