Johannesburg - President Cyril Ramaphosa is set to face questions from MPs on the government's handling of the coronavirus crisis on his first question and answer session since he declared a state of national disaster in March.
The president declared a state of disaster in March following rising coronavirus cases in the country. His government has said instituting the lockdown helped delay the virus peak and allowed health facilities to prepare with more than 100 quarantine facilities around the country and field hospitals.
Since then the country has been in a national lockdown in efforts to fight the spread of the diseases. Many of the regulations enforced by the government to restrict movement have been criticised with mounting court action challenging their validity.
Ramaphosa's question and answer session is the only agenda for Parliament on Thursday.
The questions the president will face deal mainly with the government's handling of the coronavirus outbreak.
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These are the questions he will answer during the session:
- What measures has the government put in place to accelerate the recovery of the South African economy amid the effects of Covid-19?
- What relevant details of the scientific risk assessment that the Government’s National Coronavirus Command Council (NCCC) allegedly relied on with regard on the modelling used to predict the number of deaths and the projected number of deaths upon which the President announced the institution of a national hard lockdown to curb the spread of Covid-19 from 26 March 2020?
- Whether the president’s decision to ease the lockdown from alert level 5 to level 4 and level 3 within a short space of time was informed by scientific evidence?
- And what would be his policy directives to the Department of Small Business Development and small, medium and micro-enterprises that will strike a balance between saving lives and livelihoods in achieving the National Development Plan target of creating 9,9 million new jobs which would constitute 90% of all new jobs by 2030?
Other questions posed to the president but will not be dealt with during the sitting include a question from EFF leader Julius Malema on whether the decision to move to level 4 of the national lockdown was informed by scientific advice.
The DA's John Steenhuisen asked the president about scientific evidence that the NCCC relied on to decide on a risk-adjusted lockdown strategy.
Other questions can be accessed
IOL
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